It seems that the board of managers that the TEA has imposed on the El Paso Independent School District thinks it does not need much public input.
Evidently citizens (known elsewhere as “crazies”) have been showing up at the board meetings to give their input.
The board wants to restrict that input, I guess because it is inconvenient to their schedules.
Among other things the board wants to move the section for public input to the end of the meetings. That is a shameless attempt to make it less convenient for the public to speak.
They also want to limit speakers to three for an issue and three against the issue. Wouldn’t you like to live in a world where things are that simple?
They also want to allow members of the public to only speak to the board every 60 days.
Is anything better?
The TEA supposedly appointed this board to provide accountability, transparency, trust and confidence to the public.
We now know for certain how some members of this group want to conduct business.
Business as usual
Only worse. At least under the old regime the public had an opportunity to vent. Yes the meetings were long. The public obviously had a lot to vent about. If these new people don’t want to spend the time necessary to conduct business in an open and fair manner, they should resign. Could it be that these people are too busy with other things to do their job right?
Are we lucky or what?
Has the TEA appointed a group of people with the wisdom of Solomon? Can it be that they know what to do and the public is really just an inconvenience? Maybe if the board only met every 60 days we would be better off.
It’s the thought that counts
Even if pressure causes the board to backtrack on this issue, we still will know how they think. This is a genuinely bad idea and should have never been brought up. Whoever did bring it up clearly is on the wrong side of the issue.
Eternal vigilance is the cost of liberty.
Cato
elpasospeak 
Perhaps the public should form a shadow board and hold its own public meetings which would last however long it takes for people to be heard. The outcomes from those meetings could then be presented very efficiently to the very special group of very important people who have been hand-picked by the State to run EPISD. In fact, the shadow board could simply put its comments and recommendations in written report form and mail it to the homes of these very important people so as not to inconvenience them.
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Casual Observer,
I do think it would be a good idea to have a forum (between the rank of principal and the board) that people could go to. Citizens would still need the right to go to the board if they were not satisfied with the results at the intermediate level.
Then again, call me crazy.
Cato
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