On Tuesday, Texas voters went to the polls to say YEA or NAY to 214 separate new debt propositions worth $26.2 billion (principal only). Based on a cursory review of the official and unofficial election results, it is clear that most of the borrowing was approved. Using the Bond Review Board’s bond election database, we’ve...
On Tuesday, Texas voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 4, a constitutional amendment to increase the residence homestead exemption for school district purposes from $40,000 to $100,000. With 99% of precincts reporting, voters approved of the measure by a margin of 83.4% vs. 16.6%. The passage of Proposition 4 cements the Legislature’s $18 billion tax relief package,...
Prosper ISD, a small affluent school district in North Texas, is asking voters to approve four bond propositions costing $2.8 billion (principal only) or more than $5 billion when principal and interest are both accounted for, according to the Voter Information Document. But while most people, including myself, have been fixated on the bond package’s...
The city of Houston has developed something of an addiction to federal pandemic aid. But its supply of “free” federal dollars will soon run dry, leaving many worried about its fiscal future. To date, the city of Houston has received more than $1 billion in pandemic aid through the American Rescue Plan. Much of this...
It’s election season, which means Texas local governments are, once again, asking voters to approve huge quantities of new debt. In fact, according to the Bond Review Board’s bond election database, Texas cities, counties, school districts, and special districts are seeking voter-approval for 199 separate propositions in all, which are worth a combined $24.4 billion...
Several years ago, an Austin American-Statesman reporter, Lori Hawkins, covered a gathering of several hundred Austinites who’d met to vent their frustrations over surging property tax bills and to express concern that they’d “soon be priced out of their homes.” Rather fortuitously, Hawkins interviewed an Austin homeowner in attendance, Gretchen Gardner, who inadvertently revealed some...
What do you do if your school district advocates against you? Well, that’s what taxpayers in Belton ISD (BISD) are trying to figure out. On Tuesday, BISD’s communications team sent out an email blast deriding parental empowerment legislation being considered at the Legislature right now. In the statement, which is now prominently featured on the...
Alamo Heights ISD, a small affluent district northeast of downtown San Antonio, appears to be firmly against giving poor kids trapped in failing schools a way out. In a newly published letter, the school board makes a number of searing charges against Education Savings Accounts—a tool that allows parents to pay for tuition at any...
As most everyone can attest to, education reform is a hot button issue right now. Especially when it comes to parental empowerment. For various and sundry reasons, the effort to give parents the tools they need to pull their kids from failing schools has garnered the wrath of many modern-day progressives who’ve mobilized to protect...
On Wednesday, a group of far-left pastors published a column in the Dallas Morning News criticizing the budding parental empowerment movement and calling on the Legislature to heap a great deal more on Texas’ failing public school system. The central premise of the article, which was difficult to take seriously, is that we, as a...
Yet another Austin-area school district is serving fewer students, even while its budget balloons. According to a recent Community Impact article, the number of students enrolled at Pflugerville ISD for the 2023-24 school year “is expected to come in under projections by 300 students.” The district’s superintendent, whose salary ($313,566) is more than two times...
Public education elites appear nervous that the Texas Legislature may soon enact the nation’s finest parental empowerment program, thereby giving families the ability “to pick the public or private school that best fits their child.” This unease, especially among public school superintendents, is easy to detect in their media commentary. Here are just a few...