After learning that HISD’s $808.6 million bond will be on the Nov. 5, 2002 ballot, our staff started sharing family secrets about deadbeat relatives. Every family seems to have a “black sheep.” A loser who always needs the family’s help, but never keeps his or her word.
“If you help me out this time, I promise I’ll pay you back,” is their maudlin mantra that you’ve learned not to believe. We’re sure you have such a family member in mind. One that either has a short memory or thinks their family has a short memory.
Then again, they could simply think we’re stupid. Denial aside, many of our politicians play us just like deadbeat relatives. We only see them when they need help.
However, since we keep voting for them, maybe we’re as stupid as our deadbeat relative thinks we are. Frankly, unless you can think of a logical reason why Black voters should approve another huge bond, then it’s apparent HISD also thinks we’re stupid. Didn’t we vote to renovate or build schools in the ‘hood in 1998?

You do remember the $678 million bond don’t you? Well, walk your neighborhoods and see if the 1998 bond was used to renovate schools in our neighborhoods that needed renovating the most. Otherwise, if you can identify with that deadbeat relative we talked about; we know sooner or later the family stopped supporting him or her.
More than likely, you got mad as hell when the deadbeat kept insulting your intelligence. At that point, you most likely asked, “You must think I’m a fool to keep giving you money, that you not only misuse, but come back and ask for more.” We Must Understand, there isn’t a bit of difference in being a sucker for a mooching, deadbeat family member, who you know you can’t trust to keep his or her word, than being a sucker for many of our politicians and/or public servants who keep coming back asking for our support.

When it comes to family, we’ve all been there and done that, whether we admit it or not. Furthermore, for some unfathomable reason we have historically voted the same deadbeat politicians back into office, again and again, although they fail to live up to their promises. We also tend to vote for proposals and propositions that promise jobs, or contracts for minority firms that seldom, if ever are fulfilled.
Cutting to the chase, if you’ve ever seen a detailed report on how HISD actually used the $678 million bond we voted for in 1998, please tell us where to find a copy. We would love to share it with our readers who will be asked to vote for an $808.6 million bond in the upcoming Nov. 5 general election.

We seem to recall that the 1998 bond was to repair and replace badly dilapidated schools, in certain inner-city neighborhoods.
We adhere strictly to our policy to never submit an open record request to peruse public information. Thus, we would welcome any input from any source that would like to share their data with us. Including HISD.
Meanwhile, we checked our personal files and learned that HISD okayed Dr. Rod Paige’s $1.2 budget for 1999-2000 (his final), but at the same time HISD teachers were the lowest paid among Greater Houston’s 16 major school districts. HISD has never delivered a high level of education to our Acres Home and northwest Houston area kids; therefore asking our community to vote for another huge bond adds insulting our intelligence, to the injury of inequity.
It so happens we like HISD’s current general superintendent, Kaye Stripling. She impressed us as being sincere when we had the pleasure of talking with her up close and personal at an Acres Home Citizens Chamber of Commerce Network/Luncheon on April 4, 2002. She assured us that Dr. Rod Paige had left HISD in great shape.

Either Stripling was misled or was being less than honest. We’re inclined to believe the latter, insofar as we’ve started hearing rumors that HISD has plans for M.C. Williams Middle School and Highland Heights Elementary that is guaranteed to make a lot of people very unhappy.
How dare HISD ask minority citizens to vote for a huge bond without being held accountable for how they use the money once they get it?
Just as most of the bond money was used to build new schools in Houston’s predominately White affluent Westside, you can bet most of the $808.6 million will be used likewise. Olga Gallegos, the lone dissenting trustee, is right to complain about her eastside district being neglected, even if HISD officials continue to claim that more new schools have been built in her predominately Hispanic neighborhoods than any other.

Truthfully, it’s an insult to our intelligence for HISD to suggest that building 30 “shacks” in an already impoverished and underserved community should out weigh building two or three mansions near affluent enclaves surrounded by superior school districts. Hell, we’re disappointed that Black HISD Trustees aren’t questioning the bond. Surely our representative has already been assured that the older schools in our neighborhoods are at the top of the list of 60 schools to be renovated.
If not, there is no way to justify an aye vote. Black voters don’t have to take our word that schools in the ‘hood are in deplorable condition. Just visit them.

But we advise you not to use the toilets, or try to drink from the broken water fountains. No! HISD, we aren’t going for the okey doke this time. Just as we aren’t going to sit still and allow Aldine ISD to get away with some of the things they currently are planning.
But that’s a future editorial. We Must Understand, Black voters that talk education being the key to our children’s future, must start doing whatever is necessary to make sure that they get a quality education. We can start by making sure that bond money we vote for is used properly in our neighborhoods.

Not only should Black voters demand an accounting from HISD before voting for the bond. Proactively, we should also let them know, in no uncertain terms, that if the bond isn’t going to benefit us, we’re going to kill it.