Dublin ISD received a clean audit at its Thursday, Jan. 29 school board meeting.
The meeting was rescheduled from Monday due to inclement weather and the district being closed for several days.
Gerald Rodgers, a CPA with James E. Rodgers and Company, P.C. presented the audit to the board.
For FY 2025, the district has $15.1 million in the General Fund, $3.5 in other funds totaling $18.6 million. Expenses totaled $10.5 million.
The district is required by law to keep at least 90 days of operating expenses in their general fund, and the district is also saving funds for construction projects, such as ongoing roof repairs or a new ag barn, or simply cover unexpected expenses.
One audit finding was that the district had funds dropped into an account and about $300,000 did not have a letter of credit to back it up from the bank.
The state mandates all funds are backed through letters of credit much like the FDIC does on personal bank accounts.
The district was over at that point because property tax payments were being dropped into their accounts without notice. The district and the county tax-assessor collector have already rectified this issue.
“It’s much more easy to handle now,” Business Manager Kassi Eads said. “Every month or couple of weeks a check is being brought to us to deposit for our property taxes.”
Within the audit, a suggestion was made for the district to implement additional vendor management controls such as background checks for significant vendors, requiring conflict of interest forms for vendors who meet a minimum threshold of annual payments and additional independent verification of vendor entity validity that might include online searches, unsolicited telephone calls and the verification of business entity legal status.
The district also approved contracting with James E. Rodgers and Company, P.C. for its FY 2026 audit.
TAPR Report
The district also received its 2024-25 Texas Academic Performance Report and held a public hearing on the item where no comments were received from the public.
The TAPR report contains information already received by the district including its overall grade rating of B or an 88.
“Please recognize this report is released long after our team of administrators and teachers have already disaggregated the data,” Director of Curriculum and Instruction Trish Thornton said. “Please be assured our administrators under the supervision of our superintendent are working diligently off of the plan that we created and developed alongside their teachers and implemented from the get go.”
DISD received the original data during the summertime and already implemented new plans since the beginning of school.
The district as a whole was recognized for post secondary readiness.
Ag barn sale
The district officially accepted a bid for the old ag barn and property near the airport.
Two bids were received: Ride West, LLC (Ryan Dakota Edwards and Tara Edwards) for $302,000 and Erath Investments, LLC/Dakota Hankins for $305,000.
The board unanimous accepted the bid from Erath Investments, LLC.
In the future, the board will be building a new ag barn located near the Secondary Campus in order to aid students to more easily take care of their animals during breaks or in ag classes.
The funds from the sale of the old ag barn will go toward the new project.
Discussion on prayer time through SB 11 The board took no action on designating a daily prayer time through the recently approved Senate Bill 11 due to an additional burden that would be placed on staff and a restriction on students.
SB 11 says if schools want to act on it they can adopt a resolution designating a daily prayer time.
“It’s the law, if students want to have a time of prayer, they can do that. If they want to read their Bible, they can do that,” Superintendent Melissa Summers said. “They’re protected and we are for that. We have FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes), See You At The Pole, so that is already available to them.”
Summers explained if the district adopted the resolution that any student involved in daily prayer time or even FCA must have a signed permission slip and a waiver form.
“They cannot be a part of it if they don’t have the form, and it would be up to some adult keeping up with all those forms,” she said. “If you don’t have the form signed you couldn’t even walk up and listen to what we are talking about, so we would have to police that.”
Summers said she absolutely wanted students to pray, read the Bible and worship together but did not want to add an extra burden of keeping up with forms to school personnel.
School board President Bob Cervetto said currently students could do all those things as they pleased without the restrictions.
“If you do this, you are allowing the government to tell you when you can and when you can’t,” Board Member Pat Leatherwood said.
Ultimately, the board took no action on the resolution leaving students to be able to openly pray or join FCA if they choose.
Contract renewals
The board unanimously voted to approve the following contract renewals for administration: Director of Curriculum & Instruction Trish Thornton (2026-29), High School Principal Norma Villican-Arreguin (2026-29), Athletic Director Greg Hardcastle (2026-29), Special Education Director Kalley Mitchell (2026-29), Business Manager Kassi Eads (2026-28), Band Director Cathryn Smith (2026-27), High School Counselor Taylor Clayton (2026-27), Intermediate School Principal Amanda Lisso (2026-29), Elementary School Principal Brandy Carr (2026-29), High School Assistant Principal Cedric Ivie (2026-27), Junior High Assistant Principal Lindsay Tyus (2026-27), Intermediate School Assistant Principal Christine Watson (2026-27), Elementary School Principal Ryan Lewis (2026-27), Elementary School Counselor Kimberly Bradford (202627), Intermediate School Counselor Alexandra Goodwin (2026-27), Junior High School Counselor Sasha Sharp (2026-27) and Girls Athletic Coordinator Waylon Salinas (2026-27).
Other business
In other business the board:
■ Received an update on roof repairs which should be done by Friday, Feb. 6
■ Received an update on the district’s safety audit with one finding. Two tiny windows on the elementary school gym were missed with the entry resistant film. This has already been fixed.
■ Approved an election services contract with Erath County for the May 2 school board race