The Higley Unified School District Governing Board will choose three candidates Tuesday to forward to Maricopa County School Superintendent Shelli Boggs for consideration to fill its vacant board seat.
The board meets at 5:30 p.m. Aug. 11 at the district office, 2935 S. Recker Road. Its agenda calls for discussion and possible action on selecting three applicants for Boggs to consider for the vacancy.
The district also released results of a community survey on the 12 applicants. Brooke Garrett received the strongest support across each of the district’s four ways of analyzing the responses.
Among 378 responses from district residents after removing potential duplicate submissions, Garrett received support from 56%, followed by Kimberly Jackson at 39%, Travis White at 31% and Kathleen Richards at 30%.
The district received 567 survey submissions overall. Because it could not limit respondents to one submission each, it also analyzed results after removing IP addresses with five or more submissions. The survey was advisory and does not determine which three applicants the board will select.
Boggs also is not confined to the three choices forwarded from the board and may appoint who she prefers.
The Higley board also will consider an emergency $190,956 procurement for cooling tower restoration at Higley High School. District officials say mineral buildup, debris, corrosion and worn components have reduced the towers’ efficiency.
Meanwhile, the Gilbert Public Schools Governing Board will try a new meeting format Tuesday, combining its policy meeting, study session and brief business meeting for the first time.
The meeting begins at 5 p.m., an hour earlier than the board’s normal meeting time, at the district office, 140 S. Gilbert Road.
The primary business item will be the district’s first revision to its fiscal 2026-27 budget. The board will review the revision during its study session before considering approval during the business meeting.
The policy portion includes reviews of policies covering visitors, bullying and harassment, board member conflicts of interest, banking, payroll, audits and procurement.
Please submit comments at yourvalley.net/letters or email them to AzOpinions@iniusa.org. We are committed to publishing a wide variety of reader opinions, as long as they meet our Civility Guidelines. Tom Blodgett can be reached by email at tblodgett@iniusa.org or follow him on X at @sp_blodgett.
Meet Tom Tom Blodgett joined Independent Newsmedia, Inc., USA, in 2022, when the company acquired Community Impact Newspaper's Phoenix-area properties. Raised in Arizona, he has spent more than 35 years in journalism in the state.
Community: He has served as an instructional professional in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication since 2005, and is editorial adviser to The State Press, the university's independent student media outlet. He also is director of operations for an 18U girls fastpitch softball team from Gilbert.
Education: Arizona State University with a BS in Journalism.
Random Fact: He lived in Belgium during his freshman year of high school.
Hobbies: Tweeting enthusiastically about ASU softball (season-ticket holder) and grumpily about other local sports (pessimistic fan).
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