Aledo Growth Committee welcomes public to upcoming meeting

Aledo continues to be a community experiencing rapid growth. One of the key issues a growing community inevitably faces is ensuring the local school district can stay out in front of the growth to keep schools from becoming overwhelmed by the perpetual influx of new students.

With that in mind, the Aledo Growth Committee has met nearly a dozen times since its inception in August. The committee has spent more than 25 hours studying data related to enrollment trends within the district, facility needs, instructional priorities, and the district’s financial standing just to name a few topics of discussion. 

Now, the committee is prepared to host the community at meetings on Dec. 6 and Dec. 8. Both meetings will be at the Aledo ISD Administration Building. The meetings will begin at 5:30 both nights. 

“Our goal is to give a short presentation to the community members who want to come to show the progress and the work of the committee to date,” said AGC co-chair Dan Reilley. “Then to facilitate some small group discussions with members of the committee clustered with members of the community to ask what other information they need and what ideas do they have?”

The committee plans to meet once more prior to opening the doors to the community in order to line out the framework of the Dec. 6 and 8 meetings. Reilley mentioned the committee plans to walk the members of the community through a brief presentation to ensure everyone in attendance is up to speed on all the pertinent data the committee has worked with.

“It is imperative for the community to be engaged and informed on our growth and how we best answer that growth,” Reilley said.

The committee, comprised of more than 50 members of the Aledo community, with the help of various experts brought in to aid the committee in making the most informed decisions possible, have identified several needs Aledo ISD will face in the near future.

“Right now, I would tell you that the consensus of our committee is, our first need in the immediate future is more capacity at the elementary school level,” Reilley stated. “We knew that during the last bond. The projections back then were showing that elementary school number seven would more than likely need to be on the ground by 2025. The newest demographic projections confirm that.”

While the committee has met several times leading up to the open meetings next week, Reilley stressed the importance of community feedback and ideas before the committee moves forward with its recommendation to the Board of Trustees.

“Our goal on Monday is to come up with some sort of framework – we might not have a complete package built – but at least our priority list will be identified with some loose numbers associated with that,” said Reilley. “Then we can go to the community and say, ‘Here’s what we’ve been working on. Here’s the process we took. Here’s the demographic information. Here’s where we’re leaning. What are your thoughts? What are we missing? Is there anything else we need to consider before we go to the Board with a recommendation in February?’”

Following the community meetings in December, the committee will meet two to three times in January if necessary to finalize its recommendations for the Board of Trustees. The first recommendation the AGC plans to present to the board is a long-range facility master plan to meet the ISD’s enrollment needs for the future. The second recommendation will be a bond proposal for a potential special election in the spring.

More information along with meeting recap videos can be found online at www.aledoisd.org/AGC.