November 7th Referendum isn’t entirely a NO Vote.

Q1. Shall Prairie Grove Consolidated School District No. 46 use excess property tax proceeds on hand to reduce the district's bond and interest levies as long as the District's cash reserves are greater than four months? VOTE YES… What took them so long? Lowering our liabilities does not seem to be a priority for the School Board. They should have been doing this since 2002.

Q2. Shall the Board of Education of Prairie Grove Consolidated Community School District 46, McHenry County, acquire, improve, build and equip a school building and issue bonds to the amount of $25,000,000 for the purpose of paying the costs thereof? VOTE NO…the justification is not there to support this size of a referendum. We can wait and we can save ourselves a lot of money in the process.

District 46 - NO -
Northwest Herald Oct . 22, 2006


Student enrollment has been nearly stable in Prairie Grove District 46.

And although new residential developments are coming, one is in a holding pattern, and it’s likely at least a couple of years before the others start adding large volumes of students into District 46, which serves Prairie Grove, Oakwood Hills and surrounding areas.

District 46 is asking voters Nov. 7 to approve a $25 million construction referendum. It would cost the owner of a $300,000 house $91 a year in property taxes, according to district figures.

We do not believe that Prairie Grove taxpayers need to begin paying for a school that the district does not need to begin building just yet.

District 46 school officials say the $7 million increase from the failed March request is due in part to having to buy land, but the largest difference is in increased construction costs.

The building program would include a 525-student junior high, additions to two buildings, air conditioning for the elementary school, and a new bus entrance off Valley View Road.

The student-teacher ratio is about 24 to 1. The ratio can increase; it might not be ideal, but other schools can do it, if temporarily.

We do not support approval of the school referendum.

Anonymous said...

As a “yes supporter” in the last referendum, I have been disappointed. I am surprised that the School Board has proposed a new referendum. After the referendum was defeated in the spring, and with down-turn in housing I do not understand how the School Board can justify a new referendum. I have been asking questions around the neighborhood and have learned quite a bit about our situation.

As citizens, this referendum raises serious concerns about the integrity of the School Board and Dr. Fasbender. The campaign for the last referendum was positioned by the School Board and Dr. Fasbender as being tax neutral. In retrospect, that was too good to be true. Since I have started to look into our actual situation, I have been shocked to learn that our taxes could actually go down, by as much as 30%, if we do not pass a referendum in the near future. This was not presented to the community by our School Board as an option to the community. Instead, looking back at the last referendum, it appears that the School Board was creating a need for a new school; and a reason to keep taxes high.

Our elected School Board has been chosen by the community to oversee the school in the interest of the citizens. I am now concerned with the integrity of the School Board. I am starting to question everything we get from the School.

Needless to say, I am not naive anymore about our school. Just because the Steve Todd and Luara Domoto claim the school is at capacity does not make the statement "true". I have learned that school enrollment is virtually the same now (2006) as it was in 2002. In 2002, we did not hear cries from the school that it is overcrowded. In 2002, we did not have a school board searching for mobile classrooms. In 2002 we did not condemn children to converted "janitor's closets". If the numbers of students have not gone up since 2002, what has changed in the building to create over-capacity?

As a former “yes supporter”, I am happy now that the last referendum was defeated. I will vote no, because I do not believe that the school board's intentions are aligned with the community and it is not evident to me that the School Board and Dr. Fasbender truly have the best interest of the community in mind.

This Comment was Posted 4:43 PM, October 19, 2006 under Six Months later and $7M more... It was so great that I needed to move it to the main page. Vote NO

Six Months later and $7M more...

The housing market is in a 15 year low, developments surrounding the district have been put on hold, student enrollment has remained below projections and yet the School Board feels it is appropriate to request a $25M referendum on the November ballot. As a member of the Facilities Taskforce established after the failed (2-1 against) March referendum for $18M, I am disgusted to see the School Board’s recommendation to proceed with the November Referendum.

I personally sat through endless hours of taskforce discussions throughout the summer and saw no evidence that would support this size of a referendum. In addition, the taskforce itself was mislead by the schools administrators that we would have an open sharing of alternative ideas including options that would take into consideration postponing this referendum until we could see how the developments were progressing. The taskforce was committed from the beginning to force a referendum in November against the recommendation of numerious members, many of whom resigned from the taskforce in disgust of the process. Here we are, six months later, and I ask what's changed?

Everything... Now we have proof the developments in the area are not growing as fast as was proposed by the school board. We now have a clear understanding of the costly impact of soliciting premium bonds and the financial damage that they would have caused if the March referendum had passed. And we now know that the student enrollments numbers are lower than the schools published projections, which is not a surprise on all fronts.

We also know that the state legislative representatives are willing to work with us (i.e. no need to rush) to create laws that allow districts like ours to issue bonds above our bond limit without having to incur premium bond fees. Again, this last point is important. We don't have to rush to get this done in 2006. We will need to expand in the future and we can do so with sound financial instruments instead of excessively leveraging our community prematurely.

In general, we know that the school board and various community members are committed to misleading the community into a costly referendum with no remorse for the tax payers in this community. I urge you to research the facts and VOTE NO in November.