Damron Out as Superintendent

April 1, 2008 – Robert Damron’s career as a school superintendent ended abruptly at 12:07 a.m. April 1 after a five hour and seven minute called meeting of the Cleburne ISD school board.

The school board re-convened after the five-hour closed meeting, and immediately Robert Damron read a statement. In it he asked to be re-assigned to other duties for the remainder of his contract, which ends June 30. The school board, with all seven members present, voted unanimously to reassign Damron. Hear Damron's request for reassignment and Board vote here.

This may be seen as the first major fallout from the 156-page Texas Education Agency preliminary report which was delivered to Cleburne ISD on March 11.

The school board meeting’s only public attendees were two representatives from the United Educators Association - Linda Patterson and Dani Van Wig, plus Alden Nellis from CleburnePolitics.com and Phillip Navarette from the Times Review.

CleburnePolitics.com submitted an Open Records request for the TEA report on March 12. CISD administrators hired a lawyer to write a letter to the Attorney General requesting they be allowed to withhold it from the public.

The 156-page TEA preliminary report was the result of more than a year’s investigation into possible misuse of federal funds. The school has 30 calendar days to respond to the report, with an option to ask for a 30-day extension. After the TEA receives CISD’s response, they in turn will issue a Final Report within 30 days. The final report will become public record no matter what the CISD administration wishes. It will be published in its entirety on CleburnePolitics.com.

CleburnePolitics.com has published copies of original invoices and payments showing questionable use of taxpayer, state and federal funds for more than a year, as well as CISD’s check register, chart of accounts, credit card records and other financial records. Harold Gentry continued to submit Open Records requests and send the results to TEA.

Even after the TEA preliminary report was released, Cleburne ISD administration has publicly claimed they did nothing wrong.

“The report is speaking for itself,” said Harold Gentry, who filed the original complaint which resulted in the TEA investigation. Gentry will receive a copy of the final report, along with the Department of Education, Congressman Chet Edwards, State Representative Rob Orr and other agencies.