Nederland Independent School District is doing the right thing to weigh possible growth in its school system and how best to meet any facility demands that would be associated with it.

A fledgling citizen advisory committee began to form Thursday night, and response to a call for membership on it brought a host of possible candidates. The advisory group would provide insight on facility needs. The committee members would tour schools, and assess what is needed.

And why shouldn’t they? This summer, Templeton Demographics studied the system and its enrollment needs, looking ahead by a decade.

The results: NISD would add 1,177 students by 2027, based on local job growth, housing opportunities, recent birthrates and swelling enrollment in lower elementary grades.

School Board President Susan Isom said she’s aiming for a vote on issuing bonds to fund school construction. Another school would help.

And yet, Nederland taxpayers might wonder just what the intent of this advisory committee is. Is it to study the need? Or to push the bond?

The Templeton study may be right on target, and yet it might give Nederland folks some pause. Consider the growth in enrollment over five recent years.

Snapshot enrollment numbers from the Texas Education Agency show system enrollment at 5,005 in 2012, when two propositions failed to pass. The next, enrollment grew by just nine students, according to TEA’s numbers.

In 2014, enrollment grew by another five students, to 5,019. It was in the following year, 2015, that enrollment grew enough to notice — to 5,175. But enrollment stalled again in 2016, to 5,184 — a growth of just nine.

To reach growth of 1,177 students in a decade would require growth of 100 students a year, the sort of growth that NISD enjoyed just once between 2012 and 2016.

Templeton also suggests that housing opportunities will expand but there’s no sure proof of that, at least not within landlocked Nederland proper. The city has little available land for new subdivision growth, though developers would covet it if it were there.

Nederland is a sought-after community, on high ground, or at least high for Mid County and Greater Port Arthur, with good schools and pleasant neighborhoods. It’s the type of community where people move, raise families, and stay. If land were available for residential development, every square foot of it would be under construction now.

Nederland people ought to hope that this committee will form with open minds, with people who are willing to consider first if relentless growth is surely coming and if new schools really are necessary. To determine first to build schools without certainty they will be needed would be a disservice to taxpayers, and would undermine confidence in the school system.