Marana Unified governing board approves easement, consulting contract, policy revisions and staffing additions

The Marana Unified School District governing board on Sept. 11 approved a series of agreements, policy revisions and staffing changes, including a perpetual right-of-way easement to Tucson Electric Power, a district transportation study with Gage Precision Consulting, and updates to construction permitting policy and student-records policy.

The actions, taken mostly by voice vote during the meeting and recorded in the public transcript as "Aye," included intergovernmental and memorandum-of-understanding approvals, new staffing funded by the district’s M&O budget, and acceptance of policy language provided by the Arizona School Boards Association. Legal counsel reviewed multiple items and the board was also told that several agreements are effective on specified dates or rely on standard district reporting and record-keeping.

Why this matters: the easement with Tucson Electric Power (TEP) permits construction and maintenance of electrical transmission and distribution facilities along district property in the Saguaro Bluffs community; the transportation study aims to evaluate routing, staffing and fleet management to improve efficiency and on-time service; and policy updates change how the district manages construction-permit elections and disclosures of student directory information following recent state law changes.

Key approved items and context

- Right-of-way easement to Tucson Electric Power: The board approved a perpetual nonexclusive right-of-way easement to TEP for construction, operation and maintenance of electrical transmission and distribution facilities on district-owned property in the Saguaro Bluffs community. District staff said the easement will not interfere with district ownership and that legal counsel approved the agreement in form. (Transcript segment: presentation by a district staff member described as Mr. Bulgovsky.)

- Contract with Gage Precision Consulting for a transportation study: The board contracted Gage Precision Consulting to perform a comprehensive transportation study covering routing, staffing, fleet and budget management, policy and communications and a bell-time analysis. Paul Novak, representing Gage Precision, told the board the firm conducts on-site engagement and designs routing as if a district were new to identify recurring savings; he said the firm does not guarantee savings but has produced recurring savings in other large, complex districts. Consultants said they will provide regular updates and expect frequent onsite work across the 2025-26 fiscal year.

- Policy FEDB (construction of district facilities): The board adopted revisions to policy FEDB that use Arizona School Boards Association model language allowing the district, where permitted by law, to elect not to use municipal permitting and to assume responsibility for compliance with applicable building and fire codes. The presentation cited Arizona Revised Statutes (ARS) permitting districts to elect this approach and noted required recordkeeping, notification to local building officials, and retention of inspection reports and certificates of occupancy.

- Intergovernmental agreement with Flowing Wells Unified School District (JROTC): The board approved a formal intergovernmental agreement with Flowing Wells Unified School District to continue allowing Marana students to participate in junior ROTC programs at Flowing Wells High School; the agreement was described as effective July 1, 2025 and reviewed by legal counsel.

- Memoranda of understanding with Teachers of Tomorrow and Scholastic: The board approved an MOU with Teachers of Tomorrow, an alternative teacher-certification program, to support recruitment of certificated staff; the district attorney reviewed the MOU. The board also approved an MOU with Scholastic to provide anonymized demographic, achievement and formative-assessment data for a research study in exchange for a virtual professional learning package for participating schools. District staff said the MOU requires no classroom-level teacher responsibilities; data will be provided by the district office.

- Additional staffing approvals: The board approved two new positions to respond to enrollment and student needs: an adaptive-cluster special-education aide at Roadrunner Elementary and a 0.5 full-time-equivalent English-learners teacher at Tangerine Farms K–8. Staff said these positions will be funded with Maintenance & Operations (M&O) funds; a cost with employee-related benefits was included with the item.

- Policy JR (student records) and Regulation JRR: The board approved revisions to reflect changes in House Bill 2514, which amends Arizona Revised Statutes related to parental involvement and directory information. The updates were described by staff as providing parents an opt-out for directory disclosures and an opt-in for disclosure of addresses, telephone numbers and email addresses; the regulation also clarifies what constitutes directory information and how transcripts may be released.

- Arizona School Boards Association policy manual revisions: The board approved reorganized model-policy sections (B, C and D) distributed by the Arizona School Boards Association. Staff said the action reorganizes and, where necessary, updates policy language to reflect statutory changes; it does not, on its face, change local district policy content beyond reorganization and minor statutory-alignment edits discussed at a prior study session.

Votes and procedural notes

Most items were approved by voice vote recorded as "Aye" in the meeting transcript; no roll-call tallies with individual member votes were read into the record. The meeting included statements that legal counsel had reviewed several agreements and that several items had been discussed in a prior study session. One board member (identified in the transcript as traveling for work) was noted as absent from a portion of the meeting; the transcript does not include a formal recorded roll-call for each motion.

Implementation and next steps

District staff signaled that the transportation study will include frequent on-site engagement and that Gage Precision will provide ongoing updates; the Scholastic MOU will be implemented by district office staff providing anonymized data; and the district will follow the recordkeeping and notification steps required by the revised construction policy if it elects to use the exemption allowed by state statute.

End of coverage: the board moved to other agenda items after the approvals, including routine future-meeting scheduling and adjournment.