{"id":3559,"date":"2025-10-14T20:53:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-14T20:53:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/3559\/"},"modified":"2025-10-14T20:53:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T20:53:07","slug":"friendswood-isd-scores-a-in-states-financial-integrity-rating-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/3559\/","title":{"rendered":"Friendswood ISD scores \u2018A\u2019 in state\u2019s financial integrity rating system"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/communityimpact.com\/houston\/pearland-friendswood-manvel\/education\/2025\/09\/09\/friendswood-isd-trustees-approve-school-health-safety-advisory-committees\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Friendswood ISD<\/a> scored 90 out of 100 points in its annual Financial Integrity Rating System of Texas, or FIRST, report.<\/p>\n<p>The ratings are based on financial data from fiscal year 2023-24, and were presented to the <a href=\"https:\/\/communityimpact.com\/houston\/pearland-friendswood-manvel\/education\/2025\/08\/26\/friendswood-isd-trustees-approve-balanced-budget-lower-tax-rate-for-fy-2025-26\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">board of trustees<\/a> at its Oct. 13 meeting.<\/p>\n<p>What you need to know<\/p>\n<p>FIRST began after the 77th Texas Legislature passed Senate Bill 218, which required the <a href=\"https:\/\/tea.texas.gov\/finance-and-grants\/financial-compliance\/financial-integrity-rating-system-of-texas-first\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Texas Education Agency<\/a> to form a financial accountability rating system for school districts, and districts to prepare an annual financial management report.<\/p>\n<p>The purpose of FIRST is to ensure districts are \u201cheld accountable for the quality of their financial management practices and achieve improved performance in the management of their financial resources,\u201d according to an <a href=\"https:\/\/myfisd.community.highbond.com\/document\/79580073-76b4-40f6-bd00-1ba93fc77289\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">FISD presentation<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The rating is based on several factors, including:<\/p>\n<p>Financial solvency through assets and liabilitiesBudgetary practicesDebt managementEfficiency in managing public fundsBy the numbers<\/p>\n<p>The FIRST rating uses 21 indicators, according to district documents. These include whether the district submitted financial documents to the TEA within the required time frame, if the district complied with debt payments by the end of the fiscal year, if cash on hand was sufficient, and whether the current assets and liabilities ratio was sufficient to cover short-term debt.<\/p>\n<p>Out of all indicators, FISD did not receive a 10\/10 for the following:<\/p>\n<p>Indicator 8 measures whether the ratio of current assets to current liabilities can cover short-term debt. FISD scored an 8\/10.Indicator 11 assesses whether the district\u2019s financial structure is stable enough to handle its long-term obligations without jeopardizing its financial position. FISD scored a 4\/10.Indicator 12 correlates future debt requirements with the district\u2019s assessed property value. FISD scored an 8\/10.Learn more<\/p>\n<p>To view the full FIRST report, review prior reports or the district\u2019s finances, visit FISD\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.myfisd.com\/departments\/financial-services\/financial-transparency\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">financial transparency page<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Friendswood ISD scored 90 out of 100 points in its annual Financial Integrity Rating System of Texas, or&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3560,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[3962,3963,3968,3966,3967,3969,3965,3964,27,29,28],"class_list":["post-3559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-friendswood-isd","tag-friendswood-isd-board-of-trustees","tag-friendswood-isd-finances","tag-friendswood-isd-financial-accountability","tag-friendswood-isd-financial-ratings","tag-friendswood-isd-financial-state-accountability","tag-friendswood-isd-first-ratings","tag-friendswood-isd-school-board","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3559"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3559\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}