At the February 17 work-study meeting of Katy ISD’s board of trustees, board members discussed possible modifications to the district’s policy for naming new schools and portions of campuses such as athletic facilities.

The policy – called CW local – has come under recent fire following the naming of one of the new elementary schools for long-time KISD educators James and Mitzi Cross, and Cross’ subsequent decision to run for the school board position currently held by board president Victor Perez. Some members of the Katy community felt that Cross was taking advantage of the publicity surrounding the school’s naming to fuel his political campaign.

Board Secretary Mary Ellen Cuzela, who chairs the board’s policy committee made up of herself, Perez and trustee Morgan Calhoun, presented a draft of changes to CW local to the rest of the board. Cuzela said that the board had identified needs in December to tighten the policy up and make it more reflective of the district. She summarized the reasons for the proposed changes to the naming policy as follows:

· Ensure that all applicants who submit naming applications to the district are notified if their nomination is moving forward or not, and if not, the reason it is not.

· Ensure that the naming committee – which consists of two board members, the future principal of the unnamed school, and parents -- has ample time to read the nomination packets, which can run up to 50 pages. Cuzela said that this is especially important for parents participating on the committee, since they may not be as familiar with the nominees.

· Ensure the voting process within the committee to respect the voices of the public by changing the voting to a simple majority vote with “less room for manipulation, inadvertent or not.”

· Ensure that the district is not seen as favoring one candidate over another in an election, “should this strange timing happen again.”

· Provide respect for all applicants, for the committee, for the parents and the public who will be using the facility and “not just a couple of board members deciding something.”

Cuzela suggested that the naming committees have a quorum that would require four parents who would use that campus to be present, and if not, to move the voting to a second day. She also said that the typical meeting time for a naming committee is two and a half hours but only consists of 45 minutes review time for as many as ten lengthy nomination packets. She suggested giving the packets to committee members seven days in advance, so that they would have time to review them.

Trustee Dawn Champagne expressed concerns over proposed changes which would require a namesake applicant to withdraw from consideration, should they decide to run for school board. She also questioned the portion of the policy which addressed use of the “family name;” the proposed revision would require that the application would be ineligible if related family members using the family name

are employed by KISD or run for the school board. Cuzela said that this section was intended to prevent “electioneering.”

Trustee Rebecca Fox also questioned changes to the proposed “family name” provision, which originally said that the “most senior living member who uses the family name” of a family could not be a district employee or a board member. The proposed change would require that related family members of potential namesakes who use the family name cannot be current KISD employees and must be retired from the district for at least five years and cannot be on the school board. Fox said that this revision would have prevented the naming of both Faldyn and Youngblood Elementary Schools, since both families have adult children who teach in the district. Perez replied that those were good points. Fox later added that the requirement that applicants be retired for five years would have excluded 21 of current school namesakes from consideration and called the requirement “arbitrary.” Fox recommended keeping the original language “most senior living member who uses the family name” and trustee Lance Redmon agreed.

Redmon also supported adding more people to the committees but said that he would still like to see members of the District Improvement Committee on the naming committees. “There are people that have a long history in the community and that perspective is valuable.” He added that in newer areas, “a mix of the old and the new” was a good idea.

Champagne asked the reason that the superintendent was no longer the chair of the naming committee, to be replaced by the board president. Cuzela replied that that the complete responsibility for naming lies with the board. Calhoun said that the chair only facilitates the meeting and does not contribute their thoughts on the naming.

Fox also discussed the need to adjust the naming policy to address the naming of portions of a facility such as athletic fields. She suggested that the policy address how often these requests would be made and considered and how signs would be paid for.

Perez asked that board members send their comments and proposed revisions to the draft to him, to district attorney Justin Graham and to Superintendent Ken Gregorski. The proposed update will likely be on the agenda for the next board meeting.

In other actions, the board discussed:

· Consideration of board approval for the Texas Association of School Boards (TASB) risk management casualty program for plan year 2025-2026. Cuzela objected to doing business with TASB due to “DEI” (diversity, equity and Inclusion) being in the TASB mission statement.

· Consideration of renewal of contracted bus service with Gold Star Transportation for supplemental transportation services. The company, which has contracted with KISD for the past five years, would operate 30 routes at a cost of $88,866.50 per five-hour route per year, absorbing all costs, including acquisition of new buses which will be available for the next school year. Gold Star’s drivers make slightly more than KISD drivers but do not receive benefits which KISD drivers do. KISD has 38 open routes on any given day, officials said and are filled by KISD staff when drivers are not available, officials said.

· Proposed summer work schedule, which would be the same as the previous year.

· Refund of the Katy Rotary Endowment Scholarship, which had not been awarded since 2025.

The next meeting of the board will be a regular board meeting on February 24 at the Education Support Complex at 6801 S. Stadium Lane in Katy.