Salyer, "does not want this information exposed"--Macias

José A. Macias Jr. 5 hrs · San Antonio, TX · In order to honor my pledge to keep the Judson ISD community informed. I drafted a follow up open letter. Dear Judson I.S.D Community! The task of renaming our high school off Evans Road is shaping up to be a very real fight. The sad part is that it doesn’t necessarily need to be a fight. This process not only exposed major weaknesses in our current naming policies, but also highlighted the level of disregard by several of my colleagues to acknowledge the divisiveness of this issue and the “will” of the community. Representative governance is inherently about representing your community. It should be transparent, and never be about self-interest. Mr. Salyer notified Mr. Salinas and I that he will not place our request to rescind the name of the new high school on our November 19th agenda. Additionally, he also denied my requests to reorganize the Board and to discuss legal services. Herein lies the problem, Mr. Salyer does not have the authority to deny Board requested items from the agenda. He is exercising an authority to “manage” the agenda as the basis of denying board requested items. He would be in essence, judge, jury, and executioner regarding our board agenda. Furthermore, he is disenfranchising my constituency, families that I represent, who have asked me to place this item on the agenda. Why is Mr. Salyer taking such action? Quite simply, he does not want to change the name of the high school and is using political maneuvering to exercise his “will” instead of the “will” of our community. If an item is not placed on an agenda, we cannot take action or discuss the item in open session. Mr. Salyer is also using our legal resources (and district tax dollars) to provide him with strategies to derail efforts to change the name of the new high school. I believe that is why he is attempting to deny my request to add legal services on our agenda. He does not want this information exposed. What are our next steps? • Speak at our November 19th board meeting. • Continue emailing and contacting your board representative. Demand that your elected representatives listen. By ignoring you, they are inferring that your voice is powerless. I will continue working with my colleagues in demanding we follow appropriate protocol. In closing, I would like to add that it brings me immense sadness to see our great district go through this internal turmoil. Issues like this invite media scrutiny, damage our reputation, undermine our successes, and create division. The intent of this letter is to keep you informed about this process. I certainly hope that you feel informed. Thank you once again for your support - I remain overwhelming inspired by you. We will win this war. We may lose some battles along the way, but if we cannot garner the votes for change now, that change will come in May 2017. God Bless! Jose A. Macias Jr. Board of Trustees, Judson I.S.D., District 4 210.386.0075 (direct)