Keller ISD Superintendent Tracy Johnson opposes any plan that would split Keller ISD in two.
She’s so against a proposal to detach a portion of the district that she prepared a resignation letter to present to trustees during executive session, Johnson said at a Jan. 16 special meeting.
“It’s been a huge distraction. A distraction that’s not needed,” Johnson said. “I don’t know how we do this. I’ll be honest, I don’t know if I want to be a part of it.”
Board President Charles Randklev was not prepared to accept such a resignation, he said. For the time being, Keller ISD will stay Keller ISD.
During that special meeting — during which dozens of community members were forced to stand outside the Keller ISD Administration Building while waiting for room inside — the Keller ISD board of trustees did not take action on a proposal that would create a new school district by splitting the existing one.
Instead, the seven-member board and Johnson faced a barrage of public comment from residents and taxpayers. Before trustees discussed the proposal behind closed doors for just over two hours, almost 100 residents spoke during public comment.
Of those, nearly all called for transparency while voicing concerns, questions and consternation. Some hurled insults. One filed a lawsuit against board members shortly before the meeting began, asking a Tarrant County judge to prevent the board from violating the Texas Open Meetings Act and to impose all “appropriate legal sanctions” to ensure their transparency.
Another resident expressed full support for the proposal as rumored.
“I believe both communities would be better served by reducing the size of the district to create more manageable and focused entities,” Keller ISD parent Danielle Doty said.
“The proposal… has been introduced with no public engagement, leaving many parents, educators, property owners and even a few trustees feeling blindsided,” former Keller ISD trustee Ruthie Keyes said. “Such a significant restructuring could disrupt our educational process and the great community we have here.”
Splitting districts would lead to demographic shifts
Standing ovations and outbursts from the crowd punctuated the meeting, at one point leading Randklev to call a 10-minute recess after asking residents to keep the applause down.
Once the meeting was back in session, residents continued to share concerns about the rumored boundaries between the potential new district and the possibly reshaped Keller ISD. Though the proposed boundaries created by the split were not confirmed or publicly discussed by trustees, reports have designated Denton Highway as the possible dividing line between the two districts.
A Fort Worth Report analysis of student and campus data from the 2023-24 school year showed that the split would transform the demographics of Keller ISD.
Currently within Keller ISD, 11,432 students are considered low-income. Of those, 10,060 attend school on the west side of Denton Highway and would be part of the detached district; 1,372 students who attend campuses on the east side of Denton Highway would remain part of Keller ISD.
“It is clearly an attempt to break off only the most affluent neighborhoods in our district, while shafting middle and working class communities, ” community member Julie Hagan said.
The differences in racial diversity between the east and west side of the highway are also stark.
Keller ISD’s student body during the 2023-24 school year was 47.3% white, 24.8% Latino, 11.4% Black and 9.5% Asian.
For campuses on the west side of Denton Highway in the proposed district, 40.6% of students were white, 28.4% were Latino, 14.2% were Black and 9.6% Asian. On the east side of the highway in the potentially reconfigured Keller ISD, 64.1% of students were white, 15.8% of students Latino, 4.5% Black and 9.37% Asian.
“That is a mistake,” resident Pryor Jordan said. “Diversity is our strength.”
Students also performed better on the east side of the highway last school year. On the west side, 58.6% of students met grade level in reading and 44.8% met grade level in math. On the east side, 77.5% of students met grade level in reading and 69.1% of students in math.
The proposal is about raising the ceiling and floor of Keller ISD students, Randklev said, all while the state prioritizes other areas over education funding. The Legislature last increased per-student funding in 2019.
Since then, Keller ISD has made sweeping staff cuts, consolidated a campus and decided against pay raises for teachers for the 2024-25 school year.
“All I can tell you is we are looking for ways to basically get in front of these things, be more reactive and be more nimble,” Randklev said.
Trustee Micah Young — who alongside trustee John Birt participated in detachment discussions with Randklev before bringing the proposal to the rest of the board — on Jan. 16 presented residents with data from a third-party finance firm.
The reconfigured Keller ISD would net $9,250 per student, he said. A new, detached district would net $10,200 per student and would not be subject to recapture, a mechanism where districts deemed property-rich by the state must send back a portion of their local tax revenue to the state to support property-poor districts.
If nothing changes, more Keller ISD schools are at the risk of closing, Birt said.
How would the process move forward? County commissioners divided
During the executive session, the board consulted with their attorney on district boundaries and the process of creating a district by detachment, while also discussing trustee duties and responsibilities, according to the Jan. 16 agenda.
To create a district by detachment, state law outlines the necessary procedures, which include either the submission of a petition signed by at least 10% of registered voters in the detached area or the school board’s approval of a resolution to initiate the process.
That petition or resolution would outline the proposed boundaries and provide a description of the territory to be detached. Once the petition is signed by residents or the resolution passed by trustees, it would be submitted to the Tarrant County Commissioners Court.
County Commissioner Manny Ramirez emphasized further legal clarity is needed to determine what would come next.
“Statutes … are not explicitly clear about whether a board resolution alone triggers automatic action,” Ramirez, who represents northwest Tarrant County, said in a statement. “It does specify that if the Commissioners Court receives a valid and satisfactory petition, we are required to call for an election by the public to address the matter.”
If an election is called, the division would move forward only if a majority of voters approved and at least 25% of the registered voters in each proposed school district cast a ballot.
“Before moving forward with any decision of this magnitude, it is imperative that we all seek clarity on the legislative intent and requirements of the Court prescribed by the resolution process,” Ramirez said.
As the statute is unclear whether the approval of a resolution would force commissioners to call for an election, some residents were concerned trustees will attempt to pass the detachment without taxpayer input.
The majority of speakers petitioned trustees to call for an election.
“We’re asking you the most American of all procedures: A vote,” community member Taryn Wells said.
Whether an election is called or not, the Commissioners Court is responsible for issuing the order to create the new district and the new district would assume and be liable for any portion of the existing district’s debt. If the detachment is approved, commissioners would appoint a new board of trustees for the newly created district.
Commissioner Matt Krause, who represents northeast Tarrant County and the Keller area, said he has heard interpretations of the statute “argued both ways.”
“Personally, as I read the statutes, I do not believe an election must be called if a resolution is adopted by the board,” Krause said in a statement. “In that case, the detachment process moves on to the next phase.”
If a resolution is adopted, it appears the process automatically goes to the Commissioners Court, Krause said.
“As a Court, we determine only whether a petition is valid, not whether to approve or disapprove of a petition or resolution,” he said. “Should the board commence the action, Texas statute says the Court SHALL carry out certain responsibilities. There is no wiggle room there. So, if the detachment matter comes before the Court, we must take it up just as prescribed in statute.”
He and fellow commissioners have no control over whether the district initiates a detachment proceeding, he said. He implored his constituents to reach out to the school board with their concerns.
Trust in board has been broken, residents say
Some Keller ISD residents, though, feel unheard. In a Jan. 16 lawsuit, resident Matthew Mucker accused board members of violating the Texas Open Meetings Act by “engaging in discussions and planning for the proposed partition outside the public eye and bypassing a public vote by constituents” in an effort to fast track the split.
During the meeting, Mucker said the split may not necessarily be a bad thing. If the board had come to the public to find a solution, the tone of the meeting would have been far different, Mucker said.
“We are now in a situation where an enormous population of Keller ISD will never trust the board again,” Mucker said.
Other residents are concerned that the board is too partisan.
In February, just months before the May 2024 election, Randklev and trustees appointed Heather Washington to the board to fill a position vacated by Keyes.
Randklev and Washington’s seats were up for election in 2024. Both were supported by Patriot Mobile Action, the PAC operated by Patriot Mobile, a wireless provider that bills itself as a Christian conservative phone service. Krause, a former state representative who was elected to the commissioners court in November, also donated to Randklev’s campaign.
“You know, folks don’t like it, but I’m a Republican and I’m a conservative,” Randklev said, as he expressed frustration that his advocacy for public school funding has not been heard by his fellow Republicans in Austin.
While opposed to the split, some residents welcomed the idea of electing a new slate of candidates to represent them.
“In addition if a split is passed, and Keller ISD remains as the established ISD, then the new ISD, whatever its name, is free from this board’s political agenda and can focus on preparing its students for the future,” said resident Michael Buran.
For the Keller ISD board of trustees, there is no agenda, Randklev said. Issues surrounding budget cuts, debt, school consolidations and programming costs must be addressed.
“We will inevitably have to address this problem through some hard decisions,” Washington echoed. “We’re going to have to talk about that and have some real, adult conversations.”
The district will create a community webpage in the coming days to clear up some of the “misconceptions,” Randklev said. The board plans to publish more information in Keller ISD community groups to “workshop” the idea and receive further feedback.
Trustees are also rescheduling their next board meeting for Jan. 30, rather than Jan. 23 as scheduled, Randklev said.
Matthew Sgroi is an education reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at matthew.sgroi@fortworthreport.org or @matthewsgroi1.