Polk County News - Breakout

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By Sydney Murphy
Polk County Judge

Senate Bill 175 prohibits cities and political subdivisions from using taxpayer funds to hire lobbyists, which includes all 254 Texas counties and a massive number of cities and political subdivisions. This legislation sounds good on paper, but in practice banning lobbying by local government entities will place all the power in Austin. Texas cities, counties and political subdivisions along with their respective organizations will be banned from the hallways of the Texas Legislature.

This will eliminate any input or communication during the legislature with regard to bills that would negatively impact our communities. Quite often the impact is severe and the only way to mitigate the damage to Texas residents and communities is through lobbying and through information provided by the individual associations. This is not the first time that this type of bill has been introduced to the Texas Legislature and is being floated before the voters as a positive change. It was introduced by Sen. Mayes Middleton, and has the support of Governor Abbott, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick and Speaker of the House Dan Phelan. Lawmakers need to reject it without further consideration!

Supporters of the bill claim that it hurts taxpayers and is an inappropriate use of taxpayer dollars. However, the State of Texas utilizes those same taxpayers’ dollars to lobby in Washington – to protect Texas. Local elected officials work closely with their constituents and better understand the needs of their communities. They are more qualified to provide accurate information and take a stand for the issues that directly affect their constituents and provide solutions that work at the local level – in the same way that Texas legislators better understand Texas as opposed to Washington.

SB 175 will silence Texas cities and counties but allow corporate lobbyists and special interests complete access to the Texas Legislature. Shouldn’t the people of Texas as a whole have complete access as opposed to special interests? The legislature needs to evaluate lobbying in the legislature, but not move forward with trying to silence local government. To represent the interests of Texans, every city and county has a duty to stand for the issues that affect their constituents and other Texas residents. Texans should not be silenced by their own state legislature.

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By Brian Besch
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The Livingston ISD School Board heard from a staffing expert, an update on the teacher incentive allotment, and approved a staffing pool in Monday’s regular meeting for February.

Expert Dale Dixon spoke to the board, informing them that LISD is efficiently staffed, but needs to examine staffing every year.

“You are, in fact, more efficiently staffed than similar districts,” Dixon said. “However, there are some data here that should definitely be part of the planning process. When you go through the planning process of hiring teachers — and you should be underway — you have to keep in mind what it takes to meet accountability demands. And also, you need to take into account what it’s going to take to keep you in competition with salaries that are exploding in districts around you. There’s no computer program that will tell you what that is, but we can take the data and make important decisions.”

LISD had Dixon complete a staffing study in October of 2014. The district has operated with those staffing ratios since that time, and the board has approved any staffing adjustments. The finances of the district have maintained sound practice by staying with Dixon’s recommendations.

In a related action item, the board approved LISD staffing, including the hiring of a teacher pool to 50% of a three-year hiring average.

Livingston ISD Director of Personnel Ben Wilroy said he looks at a four-year average when going through the hiring process.

LISD superintendent Dr. Brent Hawkins explained the pool process that has allowed the district to begin the school year with a full staff, a rarity amongst local school districts.

“Mr. Wilroy looks at a historical average of how many people we hired over the years,” Hawkins said. “If you approve that tonight, we go ahead and start posting pool positions. We start hiring positions in that pool, so that as positions become available, those employees are put into those positions. That is very proactive and it does come at a risk. The other side of it is the old adage of ‘the early bird gets the worm.’ It closes quick, so when you are hiring in July, you’re hiring people who are like some of our districts to the south of us that do that — associate teachers, where they don’t have their certification.”

The Teacher Incentive Allotment (TIA) was created by the Texas Legislature as part of House Bill 3 to provide a realistic pathway for top teachers to earn six-figure salaries and to help attract and retain highly effective teachers at traditionally hard-to-staff schools.

The district submitted its designation data to Texas Tech University to go through the process of valuation for the teacher incentive allotment. At the beginning of the month, the district received an email stating 22 teachers have been approved. By the end of April or first of May, notification should be received from the Texas Education Agency’s Teacher Incentive Allotment division on a final approval and what amounts of money will be sent.

The teachers will have the designations for five years and receive a certain bonus for those five years. All 22 of the teachers submitted have been approved to this point. Wilroy said the first approval is a major hoop in receiving the designation.

“That’s the whole idea behind this, is to put the most talented and the best teachers in our classrooms, and especially in our rural districts where those dollar amounts will rise.” Wilroy said.

Wilroy also said the bonus money earned for the designation will follow teachers to another district, should they choose to move.

Hawkins thanked his staff for the work provided to get over the first major hurdle. He relayed stories he has heard over the past week of school districts who were not able to secure the designation for their teachers because of errors in the application process.

There was no motion made on amending a policy that would strike policy provisions, meaning the board would hear all grievances in the policy including all extracurricular grievances.

The consent agenda was approved, consisting of overnight trips, payment of bills, property donations, and a cheer and Emerald Belles constitution. 

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From Enterprise Staff

Stephen F. Austin State University recognized the outstanding academic achievements of a select number of students by naming 923 to the president’s honor roll for fall 2022. To qualify for the president’s honor roll at SFA, the student must have earned a 4.0 semester GPA in 12 or more semester hours while a full-time, degree-seeking undergraduate student. Local students making the president’s honor roll include:

From Livingston – R. Raqeeb Anjum, Jacob Brown, Emily Dickens, Bryan Duff, Collin Kaleh, Austin Carl Pena and Carley Scott.

From Corrigan – Kimberly Bull, Katy Burris, Kaytlynn Fussell and Marley Mahoney.

From Moscow – Nazeli Hidalgo.

From Onalaska – Kristen Miller.

Fifteen hundred SFA students were named to the dean’s list for fall 2022. To qualify for the dean’s list at SFA, the student must have earned a semester GPA over 3.5 in 12 or more semester hours while a full-time, degree-seeking undergraduate student. Local students making the dean’s list include:

From Livingston – Chloe Adams, Veronica Dickens, Savannah Hadley, Gabriela Kratzer, Kristin Sprott, Hannah Taylor, Cora Truelove, Oscar Vazquez and Elizabeth Waguespack.

From Corrigan – Lizet Soto-Aguilar and Billy Watts.

Enrolling approximately 12,000 students, Stephen F. Austin State University offers more than 80 undergraduate majors and 120 areas of study within six colleges - business, education, fine arts, forestry and agriculture, liberal and applied arts, and sciences and mathematics. SFA provides the academic breadth of a state university with the personalized attention of a private school. Visit sfasu.edu to learn more.

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From Enterprise Staff

Skyler Seets of Livingston was recently named to the dean’s list at the College of William & Mary for the fall 2022 semester.

In order to achieve dean’s list status, a full-time degree seeking undergraduate student must take at least 12 credit hours and earn a 3.6 grade point average during the semester.

William & Mary is the second oldest institution of higher learning in the United States.