At its Sept. 9 meeting, the Austin ISD board of trustees took another step toward finalizing its guiding principles for a facility master plan that will inform how it uses funds to support facilities.
"We know we're going to be on a very tight time frame," board President Vincent Torres said, adding that as soon as trustees establish a set of principles, they can move on to the next item.
In April, the board approved a resolution that included a commitment to develop an FMP by June 30, 2014. Once completed, the FMP will be a living document that outlines the current status and future use of AISD facilities. It will also guide the district's development of capital improvements and support planning for future bond elections, according to board documents. The board is working to develop guiding principles that will be used to establish the FMP, Torres said.
The board did not take action at the work session, but instead discussed and updated its draft FMP guiding principles related to three goals: protection of taxpayers' financial investment in AISD facilities, environmental stewardship and sustainability, and communication and community engagement.
The board made minor adjustments to the wording to provide more clarity, such as changing "underrepresented communities" to "historically underrepresented communities" and changing "transparent" to "transparent to the affected community" in its principle regarding communication and community engagement.
Under the principle on environmental stewardship and sustainability, Torres suggested adding that "a healthy school environment will always be ensured as part of this guiding principle."
Trustees made revisions to the guiding principle regarding the protection of the taxpayers' investment in facilities through a long-term plan for maintenance, repairs and renovations as well as building replacement. District staff indicated "long term" in this case represents a 10-year timeline, but trustee Robert Schneider said a decade is too long when it comes to supporting the technology the district requires to maintain records, and he suggested a shorter cycle.
"There are going to be just some things that you just won't be addressing at every bond. You don't have enough money to do that," Superintendent Meria Carstarphen said, adding that the district needs a long-term plan.
Bonds vs. M&O dollars
Texas public school financing law requires "property-rich" districts such as AISD to send some of its property tax money to the state to be used to bolster poorer districts.
Trustee Jayme Mathias said he would like to add clarity to the FMP guiding principles to inform the public that district maintenance and operations dollars are subject to recapture payments, while funds received as a result of voter-approved bond elections are not.
Schneider requested a comparison showing how other property-rich districts fund their facilities and how they balance bond funds with M&O dollars.
District staff will research trustees' questions and update the wording of the principles, which be presented to the board for final approval at a later meeting. The board already discussed and approved preliminary wording of two of the guiding principles—one concerning health, safety and security, and one concerning academics—at its Aug. 27 meeting.
The district still has two FMP guiding principles to discuss—optimal utilization and equity. The board could also add more guiding principles to its list as part of the planning process.
