INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — The mayor on Tuesday announced his nine appointments to a municipal corporation that will control the Indianapolis Public Schools budget, taking that duty from the elected IPS school board members. The naming of the Indianapolis Public Education Corp. board members cam e days after IPS approved a roughly $490 million operating budget for the 2026-27 school year that includes $7 million in cuts to schools. The release noted that the Indiana legislature and Republican Gov. Mike Braun created the municipal corporation based on recommendations from the Indianapolis Local Education Alliance, a group led by Democratic Mayor Joe Hogsett that met throughout 2025 to study school sustainability. Braun signed House Bill 1423 into law on March 4. A news release issued late Tuesday afternoon from the Democratic mayor’s office said the corporation is tasked with overseeing facility and transportation management for public schools within the Indianapolis Public Schools boundary. The municipal corporation board includes three charter school leaders, three community members, and three members of the IPS school board. David Harris, the president and CEO of Christel House International, was appointed to serve as the chair of the new board. Joining him as charter school leaders are Janet McNeal, president of Herron Classical Schools and Dexter Taylor, the director of Paramount Brookside. The community leaders appointed to the board include Patricia Castañeda, vice president and Midwest community banking sales manager at Key Bank; John Hammond, a partner at the law firm Taft Stettinius Hollister in Indianapolis; and Edward Rangel, the founding CEO of Adelante Schools, which is a nonprofit, K-8 public charter school and Indianapolis Public Schools Innovation Network School. The members representing the IPS school board are President Hope Star, and members Ashley Thomas and Deandra Thompson. The state law requires all members of the municipal corporation board to live within IPS district boundaries. ...read more read less