{"meta":{"first_year":2009,"last_year":2025,"district_years":20587,"source":"TEA Summarized PEIMS Actual Financial Data; ballot record compiled from county election returns","what_this_is_not":"None of these tests is evidence of wrongdoing. A reconciliation gap is most often a coding error; debt without a ballot is usually a lawful instrument that does not require one. What they have in common is that the public record does not answer an obvious question.","no_named_individuals":true},"benford":{"figures_tested":1197310,"mad":0.00043,"chi2":23.0,"nigrini_band":"close conformity","expected_pct":[30.1,17.6,12.5,9.7,7.9,6.7,5.8,5.1,4.6],"observed_pct":[29.9,17.6,12.5,9.7,8.0,6.7,5.8,5.1,4.6],"reading":"Across every figure Texas districts file, the leading digits follow Benford's Law about as closely as this test can measure. That is what an unmanipulated corpus looks like."},"benford_per_district_refused":{"why":"Nigrini's conformity bands were calibrated on large samples of homogeneous transaction data. A district files 300-800 aggregate line items. This is what PERFECT Benford data scores at those sizes — the bands are meaningless there.","draws_per_size":200,"null":[{"sample_size":300,"median_mad":0.01309,"band_it_would_be_assigned":"marginal"},{"sample_size":600,"median_mad":0.00958,"band_it_would_be_assigned":"acceptable"},{"sample_size":800,"median_mad":0.00824,"band_it_would_be_assigned":"acceptable"},{"sample_size":2000,"median_mad":0.00538,"band_it_would_be_assigned":"close"},{"sample_size":10000,"median_mad":0.00237,"band_it_would_be_assigned":"close"}],"verdict":"per-district Benford is not published"},"reconciliation":{"identities":[{"identity":"spending by function must sum to the reported total","district_years":20584,"reconciles_within_0_1pct":98.83,"gaps_over_1pct":79},{"identity":"spending by object must sum to the reported total","district_years":20584,"reconciles_within_0_1pct":100.0,"gaps_over_1pct":0},{"identity":"revenue by source must sum to the reported 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ARTS","year":2023,"students":334,"operating_reported":3461691.0,"functions_sum_to_pct_of_total":98.99,"unassigned":34855}],"summary":{"district_years_with_a_gap":79,"distinct_districts":37,"years_affected":[2022,2023,2024,2025],"confined_to_recent_years":true,"unassigned_total":36037297},"reading":"Objects and revenue reconcile for every district-year in the window. Functions reconcile for all but a handful, and those are operating dollars the district's own function breakdown does not account for. Most often that is a coding error, not a missing dollar — but it is the district's own filing disagreeing with itself, and nobody else publishes it."},"debt_without_a_ballot":{"districts_paying_debt_service":1161,"no_voter_approved_bond_on_record":{"districts":93,"students":39482,"debt_service_paid":267074302,"largest":[{"district_number":"245903","district_name":"RAYMONDVILLE ISD","students":1962,"debt_service_paid":32807075.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"161921","district_name":"CONNALLY ISD","students":2266,"debt_service_paid":32526234.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"031916","district_name":"SOUTH TEXAS ISD","students":4639,"debt_service_paid":25096190.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"001904","district_name":"FRANKSTON ISD","students":811,"debt_service_paid":12375833.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"137904","district_name":"SANTA GERTRUDIS ISD","students":826,"debt_service_paid":12054448.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"127904","district_name":"HAWLEY ISD","students":771,"debt_service_paid":10266421.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"138904","district_name":"BENJAMIN ISD","students":94,"debt_service_paid":7860749.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"074911","district_name":"SAVOY ISD","students":304,"debt_service_paid":7320296.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"180903","district_name":"ADRIAN ISD","students":141,"debt_service_paid":6708612.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"100908","district_name":"WEST HARDIN COUNTY CISD","students":535,"debt_service_paid":6658476.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"102905","district_name":"HARLETON ISD","students":704,"debt_service_paid":6579792.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"163902","district_name":"D'HANIS ISD","students":288,"debt_service_paid":6397664.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"044902","district_name":"WELLINGTON ISD","students":534,"debt_service_paid":5860069.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"015906","district_name":"RANDOLPH FIELD ISD","students":1426,"debt_service_paid":5086620.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"019901","district_name":"DEKALB ISD","students":898,"debt_service_paid":4998590.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"034905","district_name":"LINDEN-KILDARE CISD","students":616,"debt_service_paid":4773906.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"115902","district_name":"SIERRA BLANCA ISD","students":100,"debt_service_paid":4406735.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"153907","district_name":"WILSON ISD","students":132,"debt_service_paid":4060794.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"067902","district_name":"CISCO ISD","students":833,"debt_service_paid":3521646.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"020910","district_name":"DAMON ISD","students":105,"debt_service_paid":3218753.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"065901","district_name":"CLARENDON ISD","students":401,"debt_service_paid":2936918.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"161918","district_name":"AXTELL ISD","students":834,"debt_service_paid":2925255.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"073904","district_name":"WESTPHALIA ISD","students":159,"debt_service_paid":2850699.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"242902","district_name":"SHAMROCK ISD","students":343,"debt_service_paid":2576202.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false},{"district_number":"115901","district_name":"FT HANCOCK ISD","students":389,"debt_service_paid":2566237.0,"principal_ever_approved":0.0,"is_charter":false}]},"reading":"Texas permits school debt with no election — maintenance tax notes, lease-purchase and public facility corporations among them — and TEA reports debt service without recording how the debt was authorised. These districts paid debt service across the window with no matching voter-approved bond in the ballot record. That is a lawful position to be in. It is also a question the public record does not answer.","limits":["The ballot record is a compilation of county returns, not an agency register, so it may be incomplete for some districts. An absent election is weaker evidence than a present one.","Records begin in 1958. Debt approved earlier would not appear, though school bonds rarely run long enough for that to explain service paid after 2009.","Refunding existing debt does not require a new vote — but the original issue did, and would appear.","Charters are excluded: they cannot hold a bond election, so the question does not arise for them."]}}