November 27, 2023 – SSISD Bond Committee will meet again on Monday, November 27th at Douglass Early Childhood School to push forward with information on another bond request for much needed improvements to SSISD campuses. The 50-member committee has met three times previously at different campuses to get a better feel of what is needed for the district as well as how much the next bond request will be after two failed attempts in 2022. Currently, SSISD administration is recommending up to $150 million bond package, made up of different parts and amounts for voters to choose from as early as May of 2024.
SSISD Board of Directors have been accelerating payments of past bonds over past years (2012-2017) and have refunded more than $12.5 million in bonds over those years resulting in a balance of just over $35 million as 2023 comes to a close. SSISD administration is hopeful that can achieve a “no-tax-increase” bond during the next election cycle by “leveraging” taxes on new industries in the school district to cover the increase of the bond payback over a 30 year period.
SSISD previously has had two bonds fail at the ballot box. The first in May 2022 being a $93 million bond which suffered low voter turnout and failed with a vote split of 1,191 voting against and 956 voting in favor of the measure. With a revamped bond package, and much higher voter participation, an $81.5 million bond, failed again in November 2022 by a razor thin margin of only 92 votes with a total of 7,710 votes cast in that election.
SSISD Administration, led by new superintedent, Dr. Deana Steeber, has so far recommended to the committee that the Sulphur Springs Independent School District is in need of the following:
- New K-5 Elementary School at SSES property (600-student capacity)
- New K-5 Elementary School at site TBD (600-student capacity)
- Renovations at Barbara Bush Elementary (Required library renovations for 600-student capacity and playground updates for ADA compliance)
- Renovations at Bowie Elementary School (for 400-student capacity in K-5 and playground updates for ADA compliance)
- Additional district-wide safety and security measures
- Land acquisition for new elementary school
- Renovations for special programs staff relocation to Johnson or Travis campus
The above list is broken out into different categories by administration with the two new K-5 Elementary schools and land acquisition for one of the schools being “Major Projects” and the renovations of Barbara Bush, Bowie, Johnson, and, Travis categorized as “Moderate Projects”. Safety and Security additions (district-wide) were placed in “Minor Projects”. All of these additions, improvements, and measures are likely to show up next May as different choices in the form of seperate bond proposals for voters to pick and choose what they believe may be most important to the future of SSISD.
The SSISD 50-member bond committee will meet for a final time on Monday, December 4, 2023 at Travis Primary School to further decide the final components of any upcoming bond election and how it will be constructed.
