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There's no such thing as a free gift.

Just ask officials with the Houston Independent School District.

They've recently discovered that three parcels of land have been bestowed on the state's largest school district.

A surprise? Yes. But not the good kind.

Don Boehm, the district's finance lawyer, said HISD officials never asked for the properties, never accepted the deeds and — pardon their manners — neither need nor want them.

The three property owners — two of whom made the mysterious transfers in the early 1990s — will not be getting thank-you notes.

Instead, HISD officials plan to file legal notices to get the property out of the district's name and to seek back taxes — more than $92,000 combined — that the original owners have failed to pay.

The Houston school board is slated to vote Thursday to approve the actions.

"It's like if someone were to leave a puppy on your front door. You're not obligated to take that puppy," said Leah Stolar, a partner with the law firm Linebarger, Goggan, Blair and Sampson.

HISD contracts with the firm to collect delinquent taxes on its behalf.

The three parcels in question aren't next to any schools and are too small to house any new campuses, Boehm said. The land is vacant in two cases, and an old house condemned by the city is on the third parcel. HISD could be on the hook for a demolition fee, plus the cost of maintaining the land.

Once the school board's legal no-thanks is filed with the Harris County Clerk's Office, the attorneys at Linebarger will go after the back taxes.

But that money might not be recovered, Stolar acknowledged, as the owners could be long gone. Two of the properties were transferred to HISD two decades ago, in 1990 and 1993. The other was deeded in 2009.

If the property owners kept their transfers secret from HISD, district officials would have no way of knowing that the paperwork was filed, Boehm said.

"We don't go over and check on every deed filed in Harris County property records," he said.

He declined to speculate why the property owners pawned off the parcels on HISD.

Speaking generally, he said, if someone wants to donate property in lieu of paying taxes, "There are certain things under the Tax Code that have to be done.".