Humble ISD board appoints trustee to serve second term who lost

Humble ISD board appoints trustee to serve second term who lost May election

Humble ISD Trustee Ken Kirchhofer says he is in favor to move to vote on whether to terminate Superintendent Elizabeth Fagen's contract at a school board meeting Tuesday, July 23, 2024 at Humble ISD Board, Business & Technology Center in Humble. Kirchhofer had said Fagen broke his trust and that it could not be repaired.
Yi-Chin Lee/Staff photographerThe Humble ISD board unanimously appointed former trustee Ken Kirchhofer to fill a vacant board seat after an extended executive session Tuesday night. Kirchhofer, who abstained from the vote, lost a reelection bid on May 3 after having served on the board of the northeastern Harris County school district since 2021.While the board, with new members Elizabeth Shaw and Oscar Silva, unanimously approved Kirchhofer's appointment, trustee Robert Scarfo said there would be a caveat that Kirchhofer could not run again for the seat in May 2027, the district's next regularly scheduled board election. Kirchhofer had run for re-election on May 3, but he was successfully challenged by Brittnai Brown who won the race by just over 4,000 votes, and Tracy Shannon, a third challenger, who ended up with about 40 more votes than Kirchhofer. Despite Brown's win, she was declared ineligible as a candidate shortly after the results were announced when Shannon filed a lawsuit challenging Brown's voter registration records. After a review, the district found that Brown was ineligible because she did not register to vote with her new Humble ISD address 30 days before the deadline to file for local office. In a statement previously emailed to the Houston Chronicle, Brown said she had changed her voter registration a few hours before she submitted her application for a place on the ballot under the assumption that if she changed her voter registration online, it would be immediately valid. In reality, it takes 30 days for changes to voter registration to be reflected in the record. Since the seat was declared vacant, Kirchhofer was chosen to remain on the board under the holdover position of the Texas Constitution, said Humble ISD spokesperson Jamie Mount. Kirchhofer said in a statement Tuesday that he was humbled by the appointment, and said it reflected the board's "confidence and trust" in his candidacy.However Shannon said that the move was a "slap in the face.""Other candidates who ran for school board also hoped to apply for the appointment or run in a special election, including Scott Ford and Natalie Carter. I think the community deserved for these candidates to also have a shot at it," Shannon said. "Voters made it clear that there was a call for accountability in this district," she continued, "It appears as though it is going to business as usual for Humble ISD, and this is not a good thing for our district."
Trustee Ken KirchhoferWhile school board races are supposed to be nonpartisan, political endorsements often sway voters' decisions. Shannon and Kirchhofer both describe themselves as conservative, but Shannon promoted herself as the most conservative during the campaign, finding issue with some of Kirchhofer's past votes on the board, according to her campaign blog.Shannon was backed by the 1776 PAC, a national political action committee that supports school board candidates with far-right aims, alongside Moms for Liberty, Moms for America and the Harris County GOP. The activist had also filed more than 20 book challenges in the district. Kirchhofer, however, was backed by the Kingwood Tea Party, an area conservative group.
According to Kirchhofer's board profile, he is director of operations for the Atascocita Golf Club and has lived in Humble ISD for more than 25 years.
Brown, who previously taught in Houston ISD, works for ADT Security as a technical support specialist. She said she did not intend to run a partisan campaign.
But this was not the only election challenge Humble saw in the May 2025 races. Another candidate in a different race, Natalie Carter, who ran to unseat then-board president Chris Parker, filed a petition for a recount which cost $25,375. The recount confirmed the race was won by a narrow margin of 39 more votes for Parker, only one vote off the initial total. Carter said in a previous comment that she was evaluating whether to file a formal election contest due to alleged reports of voter intimidation at the polls.
Brown did not immediately respond to a request for comment. www.houstonchronicle .com/news/houston-te xas/education/articl e/humble-isd-bo website&utm_campaign=another website_news