With early voting fast approaching, San Antonio Independent School District doesn’t plan to have a school project list for a $600 million bond package that will be on the Nov. 3 ballot.
“SAISD believes the most responsible approach is to make certain future bond decisions are made using real-time data and identified needs when funds become available, rather than relying solely on long-term projections,” said district spokesperson Laura Short in an email.
When going out for school bonds, districts usually release detailed project lists so the public knows exactly which campuses are getting bond dollars and for what.
Northside ISD is also going out for a bond this November, and the district website has a project list outlining how many dollars are going to each campus and why.
SAISD is putting four school tax propositions up to voters during the midterm elections, including a voter-approval tax rate election — which will show up as Proposition A and could generate revenue the district can use on people and programs — and three separate bond proposals for capital improvements.
While SAISD officials have generally outlined what Proposition B, Proposition C and Proposition D would pay for, the district has not released a specific project list naming which campuses and buildings will be allocated bond dollars.
“That information is forthcoming from the board, so we’re waiting to get a little bit more guidance on that,” said Ernest Gonzalez, director of strategy at SAISD, during a Sept. 30 virtual community meeting where officials discussed the upcoming election.
But a few days later, SAISD officials said most 2026 bond projects would not be assigned to specific campuses. Instead, decisions about where funds are used will be made as bonds are issued and funding becomes available over the coming years.
“The public education landscape can change significantly in a relatively short period of time. Student enrollment patterns, program demand, facility conditions, and community needs may look very different five years from now than they do today,” Short said.
Read our 2026 Education voter guide to learn more about school ballot measures.
What is SAISD asking of voters?
Prop B would set aside $492 million for school modernization, capital system replacements and safety and security upgrades. This includes things like new chillers, safety vestibules, bus fleets with three-point seat belts, police fleets and renovated classrooms.
Prop C asks for $102 million for IT improvements, such as network infrastructure and teaching and learning devices. This is not a campus specific proposal, meaning that if voters approve it, SAISD would make these improvements district-wide.
Prop D would use $6 million to improve SAISD’s Alamo Stadium and Convocation Center, located at 110 Tuleta Dr. This is also not a campus-specific proposition.
The school board agreed on these proposals after recommendations from the Blue Ribbon Task Force, a group of SAISD community members and parents that walked every district campus to assess facilities.
The task force’s recommendation graded every school’s “facility condition” to note where the need is but didn’t make campus-specific suggestions.
An initial “snapshot list” from July does say which campuses need upgrades in safety and security or facility conditions, but specific projects still need board approval.
The task force did not recommend improvements to the Alamo Stadium, but school board officials said the turf needed replacing, so Prop D was tacked onto the list last-minute.
SAISD wants ‘flexible’ bonds
Project lists can shift as factors like student enrollment and facility conditions change — they can also be paused, stalling construction for years.
SAISD wants to wait before committing to a list, citing lessons learned from the district’s implementation of Bond 2020, a $1.3 billion bond which was stalled by rising inflation after the COVID-19 pandemic.
That bond still has around $420 million in unspent funds. Now, district is also undergoing a larger modernization effort dubbed the “New Way Forward” to deal with a shrinking student population and aging buildings that are expensive to maintain.
Board officials have been openly skeptical about the way Bond 2020 funds are being spent, but Short said “SAISD is confident that the projects and commitments outlined in Bond 2020 will be completed successfully.”
Declining enrollment, which most large districts in Texas are experiencing, also puts into question whether campus renovations are sustainable in the long run.
Since 2020, SAISD has closed several schools to deal with a budget deficit brought on by having fewer students and officials expect to close more in the coming years.
At the end of the 2025-26 school year, the district closed Carvajal Elementary School and Rhodes Middle School — neighboring campuses with unspent 2020 bond funds — and officials promised community members that money would stay in their neighborhoods.
Currently, the Carvajal campus is being considered for “design,” as officials weigh whether to build a brand new elementary or academy on the plot shared by Carvajal and Rhodes.
Not listing specific campuses for Bond 2026 allows the district to remain “flexible” with the funds, Short said. If voters approve the bonds, Short said the district would engage with community members before deciding how to spend them.
If voters approve all four tax proposals this November, SAISD’s tax rate would go from $1.1552 to $1.6437 per $100 of taxable value by 2030 for homeowners in the district. For an average home of $240,000, that would be approximately $70 more annually.
It’s unclear how many registered voters live within SAISD boundaries. For the district’s last tax proposal in 2020, around 89,000 votes were cast. To check whether you can vote in SAISD’s tax election, find a copy of your sample ballot here.
Early voting goes Oct. 19 through Oct. 30 and election day is Nov. 3. The deadline to register to vote is Oct. 5.
