Longtime incumbent trustee Maria “Mary” Macias is facing political newcomer Ignacio “Nacho” Martinez to keep her at-large trustee seat on the Clint Independent School District Board in the Nov. 5 election.
The district has seven board seats, two of which are at-large positions representing over 10,000 students from Clint, parts of Horizon and East Montana in far East El Paso County.
Trustees Eric Gardea, from District 3, and Isela Torres, from District 5, are running for reelection unopposed.
Clint ISD trustees serve two- and four-year terms, with the at-large seats serving four years. Trustees are not paid to serve.
School board members are responsible for hiring, firing and evaluating the superintendent. They are also tasked with adopting an annual budget, which now stands at $140.3 million, implementing policies and goals for the district to follow, and setting tax rates.
The school board can also decide whether teachers and staff who have gone through the proper training can carry a firearm and serve as armed campus guards. The board may also have to decide if the district should adopt a K-5 reading and language arts curriculum being developed by the Texas Education Agency. The curriculum gained controversy for including Bible teachings and comes with an incentive of up to $60 per student for districts who implement it.
The elected trustee will also be able to campaign on behalf of the district during the state’s 89th Legislative Session, where lawmakers will decide whether to increase school funding and likely vote on a voucher program that would allow parents to pay for private school using state funds.
The election comes as school districts all over Texas deal with budget shortfalls. Though Clint ISD approved a budget with a $21.6 million deficit, primarily due to one-time expenses, district leaders said they had enough reserves to shoulder the costs.
Here is a look at the candidates on the Clint ISD ballot:
Maria “Mary” Macias
Macias, 61, was first elected to the Clint ISD school board in 1998, according to the district’s website. She was re-elected in November 2022 to serve a two-year term and is the board’s second vice president.
Macias did not respond to El Paso Matters’ request for an interview. Macias lists her occupation as “housewife” on her application for a place on the ballot.
A lack of state funding and teacher shortages are among her top concerns for the district, Macias said in the El Paso Matters questionnaire. She plans to advocate for more funding and work to get federal funds to pay bonuses to high performing teachers.
Ignacio “Nacho” Martinez
Martinez, 55, said he wants to bring change to Clint ISD.
“I just want the district to get better, because the way I see it right now, it’s not going in the right direction,” he said. “I think we need to be a little bit more conservative on the way state funds are managed.”
Martinez worked for the district as a groundskeeper for 11 years. He retired from Clint ISD in February and now works as an irrigation technician for the San Elizario Independent School District.
Martinez said some of his top priorities for the board include raising teacher pay and reducing the emphasis on standardized testing.
“Clint used to be one of the highest paid districts, and everybody wanted to come to work for Clint. Not anymore. There’s a lot of people that have left,” he said.
Salaries for teachers at Clint ISD start at $60,000 and reach up to $76,500, according to the district’s salary schedule. Teachers at the El Paso Independent School District make between $57,750 to $69,548 a year; while Socorro Independent School District pays teachers between $60,500 to $73,528 a year.
Martinez said he plans to learn about the intricacies of school budgets once he gets elected.
“I still have no clue what they’re doing, because with the deficit that we’re in, I don’t know what’s going on there,” he said.
The candidate said he is in favor of arming teachers and school staff if they have the needed permits, and opposes including religion in school curriculum.
“Even though I am a strong Catholic, I don’t think it should be pushed,” he said.
Martinez said he is unsure if he supports vouchers.
“I’m kind of in the middle there. As a parent educating my child I would probably send them to private (school). The vouchers are an incentive,” he said. “Then again, here in Clint you have a lot of low-income students; both parents work, so they don’t have time to go and do the private school thing.”
Early voting runs from Oct. 21 to Nov. 1. Election Day is Nov. 5.
The post Longtime incumbent, political newcomer vye for Clint ISD school board seat appeared first on El Paso Matters.
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