As part of this, on Oct. 14, the board of trustees approved permission for Superintendent Karen Engle to seek such legislative action.
The overview
Section 11.059 of the Texas Education Code allows trustees of independent school districts to serve three or four year terms. Currently, CCISD’s trustees serve three-year terms based on board policy, according to district agenda documents.
District documents note increasing the trustee term length of three years to four years “would promote stability and save time and money by only requiring the district to conduct elections every other year instead of every year.”
How we got here
The district discussed the potential change at its September Legislative Affairs and External Affairs Committee meeting.
The committee is a standing board committee that consists of three members in active legislative years. Those members include two board members and one alternate in non-active legislative years, according to district documents.
The responsibilities of the committee consist of the following:
- Meet with administration to monitor federal, state and local legislative issues
- Assist administration in preparing recommendations for addressing legislative and external affair issues
- Review legislative practices for process improvements
In May, CCISD held a board election but had to run it themselves, according to district documents. CCISD’s General Counsel Leila Sarmecanic said at the workshop this was because Harris County lacked the bandwidth to help run it due to it being a presidential election.
“Having elections every year is costly,” Sarmecanic said.
Stay tuned
Board trustee Scott Bowen said if the board were to receive a resolution from the state, the Legislative Affairs and External Affairs Committee believed it would be ideal to potentially pass it in 2026. After that, the elections would happen every other year beginning in 2027, Bowen said.
