The Littlefield Independent School District Board of Trustees met in regular session on Wednesday, May 8, 2024, at 12 p.m. in the Board Room of the Jerry Blakely Administration Building.
The meeting was called to order by Board President Pat Demel and the Invocation was given by Gary Birkelbach.
There was nobody present to speak during public forum and the Minutes of the previous meeting were approved by general consent.
Superintendent- elect Mitch McNeese gave the Superintendent Report, saying, “We just got done with all of our STAAR testing and everything went smooth. Everything is all online now, Matt did a great job of getting our computers up and programed right. Now, we are just waiting on our scores, I know all of our kids did a great job and the teachers did a great job of getting our kids ready for those tests.”
He added, “The baseball team went down to Seminole and beat Crane in two games and they will be playing Bushland on Friday in the Area round in a one-game playoff at 5 p.m. at WBU. That will be a good game. We had our Band Concert Tuesday night, six grade through the varsity did a great job. Our band is second to nobody and I’m very proud of what they do. May 14th is our Awards Ceremony at 10 a.m. in the new gym and then the scholarships will be presented at 6 p.m. on the 14th in the gym. Next Friday will be graduation and we have 86 graduates.”
Items five, six and seven were Statement of Elected Officer, Certificate of Election and Oath of Office.
Supt.-Elect McNeese, stated, “The following School Board Candidate has been certified as unopposed and, therefore duly elected, Will Williams – Precinct 4. The following School Board Candidate has been elected and, therefore duly elected as of the May 4th election, Reese Rogers – Precinct 3. Secretary of State recommends these post-election procedures occur in the following sequence: Statement of Officer is completed, Certificate of Election is issued to newly-elected officers, Newlyelected officers take the Oath of Office.
Item eight on the agenda was Board Reorganization.
Nomination by Rogers, secondened by Williams to elect Gary Birkelbach as Board President. With there being no further nominations, Birkelbach was named President by acclamation.
Nomination by Sal Acevedo, secondened by Hervey Valdez to elect Williams as Board Vice President. With there being no further nominations, Williams was named Vice President by acclamation.
Nomination by Acevedo, secondened by Pat Demel to elect Hervey Valdez as Board Secretary. There being no further nominations, Valdez was named Board Secretary by acclamation.
Nomination by Demel, secondened by Williams to appoint Rogers as TASB Assembly Delegate. With there being no further nominations, Rogers was named TASB Assembly Delegate by acclamation.
Nomination by Williams, secondened by Demel to appoint Acevedo as TASB Assembly Delegate Alternate. There being no further nominations, Mr. Acevedo was named TASB Assembly Delegate Alternate by acclamation.
Item nine on the agenda was to deliberate and take possible action to approve 2024-2025 Allotment and TEKS Certification Form.
“In accordance with the Texas Education code 31.004 Local Education agencies are required to certify annually to the State Board of Education and the Commissioner that students have access to instructional materials covering all Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) for all required subjects, except physical education,” McNeese explained. “We are in compliance with that code.”
The motion was made by Valdez, seconded by Williams to approve the 2024-2025 Allotment and TEKS Certification Form. The motion carried.
The next item on the agenda was to deliberate and take possible action to engage Bolinger, Segars, Gilbert, and Moss as our Auditor for the 2023-2024 School Year.
“This is our annual external engagement letter and we have had these guys for multiple years and they have done a great job, so I recommend this for approval,” Supt.-elect McNeese said.
The motion made by Mr. Williams, seconded by Mr. Demel to engage Bolinger, Segars, Gilbert, and Moss as our Auditor for the 2023-2024 School Year. The motion carried.
Item 11 is deliberation and possible action to approve SHAC Report.
“Shelby West Morlen has done a great job of heading up our SHAC Committee and has been very busy this year doing some great things for both our staff and our students,” Mrs. Hays said. “We voted and implemented two more additional emergency response boxes to the Field House. They also worked with the Junior High to certify 80 students in CPR. We were unable to host our blood drive that we do every year, but we are on the schedule for next year.”
She added, “We also did additional training on Fentanol prevention because that has become such a big issue. So we’re helping to educate kids and we’re started a little younger with that, working with the junior high. We had Covenant Wellness come out and they provided annual visits at no costs for 26 of our staff members, as well as doing some trainings with our staff.”
The motion was made by Valdez, seconded by Acevedo to approve the SHAC Report. The motion carried.
The next order of business was to deliberate and take possible action to approve Trust Property Disposition.
The motion was made by Valdez, seconded by Demel to approve the Trust Property Dosposition. The motion carried.
Item 13 on the agenda was to deliberate and take possible action to approve Facilities Maintenance Priorities Plan.
“The school is continuing to progress really, really well. They got the parking lot done as they told us they would and the striping looks good,” Gregory said. “Inside, they continue to go up with sheet rock on the walls, they’re putting final touches on cables and wires in the walls and AC duct work. At any given time you walk through there, there is at least 50 people in there working.”
The motion was made by Demel, seconded by Williams to approve the Facilities Priorities Plan. The motion carried.
The next item on the agenda was to deliberate and take possible action to approve the Financial and Investment Review and Report.
These reports were presented by Bryan Gregory.
The motion was made by Williams, seconded by Demel to approve the Financial and Investment Review and Report. The motion carried.
Item 15 was deliberate and take possible action to approve Budget Amendment.
“We have one budget amendement for you guys to consider today, if you remember back in February we approved purchasing a Suburban,” Gregory said. “We need to amend our budget to pay for that. The good news is we are pulling that money out of our 5742 account, which is actually our interest earned account. YTD we have collected $402,000 in interest just on that general operating account. We budgeted $230,000, so we are actually in really good shape with $172,000 that we didn’t count on getting. So, we’re going to pay for that Suburban out of that.”
The motion was made by Demel, seconded by Williams to approve the budget amendment. The motion carried.
Item 16 on the agenda was Personnel Matters Including Appointment, Employment, Evaluation, Reassignmentt, Duties, Discipline, Dismissal and / or Compensation of Indivdual District Employees.
Pursuant to Texas Government Code Section 551.074 the Board went into executive session to discuss peronnel at 12:38 p.m. The Board returned to regular session at 1:09 p.m.
Under Certified Personnel, the motion was made by Williams and seconded by Valdez to approve hiring certified personnel (Jake Proffitt) for postion of high school teacher, and (Veronica Savala) as High School Assistant Principal. The motion carried.
Resignation letters were presented on Taylor Herrera, and Talitha Cook.
Supt.-elect McNeese provided the Board with Board training opportunities and with there being no further business, Board President Birkelbach declared the meeting adjourned at 1:18 p.m.