Legislative Priorities

The Board of Trustees of the Lockhart Independent School District adopted its priorities for the 88th Legislature, which convened January 10, 2023.

On Monday, January 23, the Lockhart ISD Board of Trustees adopted the district's legislative priorities for the 88th Legislature. As public schools continue work hard for Texas families and communities, funding for public education will be an important subject during this legislative session at the Texas Capitol. Funding has a direct impact school safety, facilities, the teacher shortage, staff compensation, and more. You can find our priorities for the 88th Legislature below.

who represents me?

Find out who represents you in the Texas Legislature and let your voice be heard.

RAISE YOUR HAND TEXAS

Follow Raise Your Hand Texas to stay up-to-date on the 88th Texas Legislature.

our priorities (pdf)

Download a PDF copy of Lockhart ISD's Legislative Priorities for the 88th Legislature.

Our Priorities:

Fund education based on enrollment.

Lockhart ISD supports an adequate and equitable school finance system, including:

Advocating for enrollment vs. attendance as the standard for school funding.
Raising Texas’ per pupil funding to the national average.
Sustainable state funding for HB 3 (2019).
Local spending discretion to ensure that the needs of students, staff, and communities are met.

Address the teacher shortage.

Lockhart ISD supports all efforts to combat the statewide teacher shortage crisis, including:

Providing more substantial financial aid and other programs to incentivize students to enter the field, increasing educator and staff compensation, improving staff health and retirement benefits, and decreasing the burdensome mandates that increase an educator's workload.

Increase school safety and facilities funding,

Lockhart ISD supports increased funding for student safety and school facilities, including:

Increased funding of the School Safety Allotment and local flexibility to ensure districts can adequately meet student and staff safety needs.
Adequate funding and updates to the state’s current facilities programs OR the creation of a statewide funding mechanism to assist school districts with building new facilities that accommodate student enrollment changes, reduce the need for additional debt, and renovate aging facilities with safe and efficient buildings that are conducive to meeting the needs of students in a modern classroom.
Additional funding for the Instructional Facilities Allotment (IFA), Existing Debt Allotment (EDA), and the New Instructional Facilities Allotment (NIFA).
Excess “revenue in excess of entitlement” must be returned to the basic allotment and not into the general fund or other fund not benefitting traditional public education.

Update ballot language for accuracy.

A-F ratings, high-stakes testing, and accountability.

Lockhart ISD supports revising the accountability system by looking beyond standardized testing to meaningful assessments with value for students, parents, and teachers, including:

Opposing A–F campus and district ratings that oversimplify the complex work of schools and incentivize teaching to the test.
Exemption from A-F accountability ratings for first-year campuses.
Prohibiting standardized tests from serving as the primary indicator of school and student performance.

Support student and staff mental health.

Lockhart ISD supports measures that positively impact student and staff mental health, including:

Access to evidence-based mental health services and mental health professionals either within a district or a collaborative network
Development of higher education incentive programs and state agency grants to recruit and prepare licensed professional counselors, preferably bilingual, to meet the needs of students and staff.

Support local control and parent partnerships/rights.

Lockhart ISD supports increased local control of school districts and parental rights, including:

Support for measures that embrace parents as partners with educators, administrators and school trustees in their children’s education as outlined in Chapter 26 of the Texas Education Code and encourage productive engagement between them without undue involvement from the state.
The same rights for charter school parents that parents of students in community-based public schools are entitled to, including due process rights relating to student discipline and expulsion.

Revive Tax Code Chapter 313.

Accountability for charter schools.

Lockhart ISD supports holding charter schools to the same standards as traditional districts, including:

Restricting the expansion of charter schools (including increases in the number of campuses under existing charters), unless charter schools are subject to the same accountability and transparency laws and regulations as community-based public schools.
Reducing the impact charter schools and other educational institutions receiving public funds have on the state budget and local public schools by limiting funding to a rate no higher than that of local districts.
Increase the transparency and accountability of charter schools and other educational institutions receiving public funds, especially with regard to student enrollment processes / recruitment, student expulsion practices, business operations, expenditures, special education requirements, public notices, school discipline, financial dealings (leases, mortgages, bond debt, contracts) transportation, bilingual programs, policy notices, employment contract policies, parental rights, lobbying and political expenditure restrictions, student data privacy, efficiency audits, lunch programs, and nepotism.
Tying the charter school “small and midsize allotment” to the same 5,000-student cap as the district small and midsize allotment.

Oppose community censorship.

Lockhart ISD supports freedom from censorship, including:

Opposing legislation or measures seeking to limit school districts’ or administrators’ ability to have representation before the Texas Legislature, state agencies, and the executive branch.
Supporting statutory duty and right of local school boards to advocate and associate for the educational needs of all students and communities.

Vouchers, taxpayer savings grants, and virtual vouchers.

Lockhart ISD supports the use of public tax dollars for public education rather than private education, including:

Opposing any state plan that would use vouchers, tax credits, taxpayer savings grants, tuition reimbursements, or any other means to divert public tax dollars to private entities, virtual instruction corporations, homeschooled students or parents, with little or no academic or financial accountability or transparency to the state, taxpayers, or local communities.

In This Section