Manor ISD unveils 10-year facilities master-plan findings: growth projections, school-size recommendations and $99M deferred-maintenance estimate

Manor Independent School District trustees received a facilities master-plan briefing on Feb. 3 that included 10-year enrollment projections, recommended educational specifications for typical campus sizes and a multi-year deferred-maintenance estimate.

District staff reported that the demographer's most recent projection put enrollment at about 10,061 as of early January 2021 and forecasted enrollment of roughly 15,500 students in 10 years. The district said growth is uneven across the district and that several large residential developments are likely to increase student counts in specific neighborhoods along FM 973 and Gregg Manor Road.

Staff presented recommended educational specifications ("ed specs") for future construction: typical elementary campuses sized for about 700 to 750 students, typical middle schools sized near 1,000 students, and high-school planning that aimed to place campuses near the upper end of UIL classifications to improve competitiveness. The superintendent and staff said the ed specs follow Texas Education Agency guidance on square footage per student and are intended as planning parameters rather than final design.

The district hired engineers to inventory facilities using asset-management software. The analysis identified a near-term facilities backlog (items staff described as immediate deferred maintenance) of roughly $34 million for the earliest years, and a longer-term maintained backlog and replacement need that the briefing summarized as about $99 million across the 10-year planning window. Staff also presented a higher-cost scenario in which building new schools, adding wings and addressing all recommended projects across the district would reach about $380 million to $480 million, depending on overlap and choices to expand wings versus build new campuses.

Mendez and consulting staff mapped utilization by campus and highlighted locations projected to exceed capacity (for example, Logo/Logos and Shadow Glen were called out as future over-capacity in the slides). To address uneven growth, staff outlined three primary approaches: build new schools, add wings or repurpose existing facilities, or change attendance boundaries. Trustees discussed setting a utilization "trigger" (a percentage over capacity that would prompt action); staff proposed a 20% trigger as a working example but described alternatives ranging from 5% to 20% depending on board tolerance for temporary crowding while a project is delivered.

Board members discussed several specific facilities questions: whether Wildhorse Elementary should open as an elementary versus be used for other programs; the potential for an alternative school site; options for consolidating high-school grades to reduce busing; and the benefits of right-sizing campuses to the upper end of athletic classifications to avoid competitive mismatches. Staff said many of those questions would be vetted with the public through a proposed facilities advisory committee and community engagement before the board adopted any final plan.

Trustees asked staff to return with educational-specification drafts for approval, to recruit advisory-committee members for community-based review and to integrate the master-plan recommendations with the district's capital and bond planning. Staff also outlined a proposed timeline that would include committee meetings, public engagement, presentation of final recommendations to the board, and potential bond planning if trustees chose to pursue funding.