Coppell Chronicle Vol. 2, No. 45
Coppell Chronicle Vol. 2, No. 45
Fences Proposed for All Campuses • District Arms New Security Coordinator • Coppell Heeds Ruling on Short-Term Rentals • Deposit Fee Instituted for Party Trailer
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Fences Proposed for All Campuses
Schools could be surrounded by 8-foot fences under a set of safety standards proposed by the Texas Education Agency.
The Coppell ISD Board of Trustees was briefed on those standards during their Dec. 12 meeting. Chief Operating Officer Dennis Womack said this is the rare case when the state government is offering to pay for a new set of rules.
“It’s not often that we can come before the board and say, ‘Here’s some proposed standards that the state’s given us AND here’s some proposed funding that the state will give us,’” Womack said.
The TEA would like to give each school district at least $200,000 to pay for these proposed safety standards. Larger districts would get more money, depending on how many students they serve. Womack said he’s been told Coppell ISD would receive more than $600,000 as part of this initiative.
The proposed standards, which the TEA announced in early November, call for 8-foot fencing unless the fence has anti-scaling design features; in those cases, a 6-foot fence is acceptable. Besides fencing, the eligible expenses for the associated grants include components of reinforced doors, forced-entry-resistant films for windows, and technology for silent panic alerts.
In response to a question from Board President David Caviness, Womack estimated that the standards will be adopted no earlier than February.
“Once we know what the actual rules will be, once they’re adopted, then we can determine how best to apply whatever funds we do have available,” Womack said.
Superintendent Brad Hunt tied this topic back to the work being done by the district’s Bond Steering Committee. He said campus security has been a critical piece of those volunteers’ discussions.
“We’d like to be able to discuss it more,” Hunt said, “but we’re dealing with some other issues, some misinformation that’s taking up a lot of the committee members’ time.” (See “District Asks Everyone to Remain Calm” in the Dec. 18 edition.)
The superintendent estimated that erecting fences around every campus in the district would cost much more than $600,000. That’s why such security measures may end up in the bond package that will likely be on our ballots in May.
Hunt, who began his career in Coppell ISD by teaching social studies, turned this into a quick lesson about the economics of supply and demand.
“If there’s a requirement that everybody has to have a certain level of fences, then all school districts in Texas are doing this at the same time,” he said. “You know that’s going to affect not just the cost but also the availability of the folks that are helping to make that happen.”