Donald E.
Russ
November
4, 2012
Dear
School Board,
I am a
long-time resident of District 65.
I have had two children go through these schools and I currently have a grandson
attending. But I do not claim any
special status because of those things.
I write to you simply as a long-time taxpayer to the District.
Not to
belabor that point, but on July 4th, 1776 we adopted a Declaration
that listed many hurts and concluded, “In every stage of these Oppressions We
have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions
have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus
marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a
free people.”
Accordingly, we enshrined our most fundamental rights in the First Amendment of
our Constitution which concludes “and to petition the Government for a redress
of grievances.”
Further, I
realize that three of you were elected to the Board only last year.
And while a majority of you have been involved in the conduct of the
Board for years longer, I am not, on the whole, speaking to you individually.
You are the Board. The
Board’s conduct in recent years and its conduct going forward is the subject of
this letter. It is my right “to
petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
You don’t
have to read it or, even if you do, you don’t have to react to it but “A Prince,
whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit
to be the ruler of a free people.”
2001 student enrollment: 1,137
“Unfunded
mandates” is a term that was invented to describe what the 50 states and the
federal government do to school districts.
Also, to restrain self-destructive school districts from placing
impossible burdens on their captive taxpayers, statutory limits are placed on
year-to-year tax increases and voter approval is required for greater rate
changes and for borrowing.
And so it
was that on April Fool’s Day, 2003, the taxpayers of District 65 voted to waive
the tax cap and give the District a 15 percent raise.
That was
an expression of trust. The
taxpayers voted to have their own taxes raised, trusting that the School Board
would use that money to solve the problems of the past and plan properly for the
future. Parents of students would
not have produced an adequate number of votes.
Many people who live in District 65 but who do not use its services voted
in favor of giving the District more taxing authority simply as a matter of
faith.
2004 student enrollment: 1,092
Prohibition was never a good idea.
It remains the only Constitutional Amendment that was subsequently repealed, but
not before it gave birth to organized crime.
We never would have had Prohibition were it not linked to women’s
suffrage. Were the issues divorced,
women would still have gotten the right to vote but Constitution would certainly
not have been amended for Prohibition.
Central
School was a great school, structurally speaking.
Built for the Baby Boomers, it was architecturally uninspired but it was
sturdy and sound. By contrast, East
School, built 60 years earlier, was half-subterranean and presented
water-related issues. (Fixing East
School was an option. It was
advocated by many who thought that the building was architecturally significant.
The School Board simply preferred to build rather than fix.)
So we would build.
The School
Board was clear: East was the
problem. That narrative was
inconsistent with the concurrent discussion of using East for another community
purpose, but still it was relentlessly argued that we had to build because East was unfit.
There was not space to move the K-1-2 students of East into Central with
the 3-4-5 students. So, we would
have to expand Central School.
But we
didn’t. Instead of demolishing East
and expanding Central, we demolished both and built LBES.
Like Prohibition, the demolition of Central was never a stand-alone
issue. Most people agreed that
beautiful East had to go, but the School Board never explained to us why Central
had to go too.
It was
bait-and-switch. The mildew in East
required consolidation at Central.
Doubling the population at Central required some construction.
And as long as we are knocking down schools anyway, and building at the
Central site, we might as well knock down Central too and build bigger.
And anyone who inquired about the logic of all that was told, “Just look
at the great school we could have!”
2005 student enrollment: 1,083
I remember
sitting in Central gym for the School Board’s referendum presentation when Neil
Dahlmann was handing-out an anti-referendum document.
He was told that he could do so outside the building, but not inside.
It seemed unnecessarily heavy-handed to me. This was before I met Mr.
Dahlmann [1] and
I wasn’t the only one who saw that as petty.
During that meeting, I marveled at the resilient floor of the gym and
commented on the concrete and brick walls, and I asked what was wrong with
Central. The answer I got in that
forum was that the heating is difficult to control in one room. I was at a loss
for words but a gentleman across the audience helped by wondering if that couldn’t
be “addressed technically”.
I left the
meeting convinced that there was nothing wrong with Central except that there
was no love for it. The sentiment
was that if we were going to lose East, then we should scrap Central as well and
start with a clean canvas. A series
of architectural renderings reinforced that idea.
Adding-on to Central would have been far less costly than demolishing it
and building LBES in its place, but the School Board never entertained that
alternative. Instead, they just
kept producing more renderings and repeating, “This is what we should have.”
The School
Board never compared the cost of LBES to the cost of an expanded Central; the
Board only compared the interest of new bonds for LBES to the interest of the old bonds
expiring. “We are going to get a
beautiful school and there will be no increase in taxes!”
And the taxpayers who put their trust in the School Board by granting it
greater taxing authority just a few years earlier were convinced the Board members
were wizards: Why try to salvage
dumb old Central when we are getting a school for free?
“Just look are the renderings!”
Only the
Board and the architects knew that the renderings were a lie.
The rest of us were dismissed as being obsessed with costs and future taxes.
We were told that any sad, old people who care about their pocketbooks
more than our children should just look at this chart:
The chart
is confusing but the message shouts:
There is nothing to worry about!
Besides, just look at these renderings.
There are big ball fields around the school!
Unfortunately the ball fields would be replaced with a giant, fenced-off water
detention pond. But that would not
be revealed until after the referendum.
There was some mention of Phase 2 and the certainty of more construction
spending even beyond the referendum amounts, but through more wizardry the Phase
2 costs would not affect taxes
2007 student enrollment: 1,017
And so
began the current era of the School Board, the MJ Brady Era.
A majority of the current School Board members have been involved with
the Board throughout this period.
Our new school has super-insulated walls and so it seems does our new Board.
Faced with a long-term trend of declining enrollment and an 82,000 square
foot school in the pipeline, they added 6700 square feet to Middle School.
Unlike
excess taxes that pile-up in bank accounts, funds collected from the sale of
bonds must be spent promptly. The
Board had collected $24.4 million and a stack of artistic renderings, but no
real plans in spite of the millions of anticipatory dollars spent before the
referendum. And then a pointless
reluctance to coordinate with the Village Board and the Park Board delayed the
letting of contracts so long that a repeat referendum nearly became necessary.
But of all
the errors,
the most
glaring failure
was the construction schedule: “The
big question is the timing. It's been a little over a year since the ground
breaking and the project is a few weeks behind schedule. The final opening date
is a moving target. According to Ms. Lair, parents said it was more important to
start school on time rather than wait for the new building to be completed.
School will start on Sept. 8, as planned, but students will be housed off-site
for an as-yet-undetermined period of time. The plan calls for grades K-3 to go
to East School and grades 4-5 and multi-age to hold classes at Christ Church on
Waukegan and Hwy 60 in Lake Forest.”
2009 student enrollment: 952
At the
Open House, I asked about the late opening.
“Oh, nobody cares about that.
Just look at this great building, now that we’re here!”
Not the response I was hoping to get from a Board member, but not a
surprise either.
LBES will
stand just as it is for at least a hundred years.
By scraping both East and Central in favor of the super-insulated LBES we
expected operating efficiencies and tight, predictable budgets.
Instead the School Board has been taxing far beyond budget requirements
causing millions of dollars to rest in bank accounts.
At last this has drawn the attention of a few District 65 residents who
have the experience and wisdom to provide meaningful oversight.
There are
many “stakeholders” of District 65:
students, parents, teachers, administrators, vendors, the School Board and the
taxpayers. The first five groups
have only a temporary interest in the activities of District 65.
The students and parents take services from the District; the teachers,
administrators and vendors take money from the District.
It is only
the taxpayers and their representatives on the School Board who fund the District who have a long-term interest in its success.
It is only the people who have invested great personal wealth in property
within District 65 who have a continuing interest in the value reflected onto
that property by good schools. It
is only the real estate taxpayers who have committed to pay, whatever the price
will be.
I suspect
that some school boards are captured by parents.
Yes, they are taxpayers too, but parents as a lobby have a more focused
interest that may engender a greater, if temporary, passion.
And their priorities are not synchronous with the long-term interest of
the institution. It would likewise
be suboptimal if a school board were captured by teachers or other vendor.
Just think
what a school board would do if it consisted only of students!
It is the taxpayers alone who have an interest in the satisfaction of all
stakeholders. And it is the
taxpayers alone who can strike a proper balance between the competing interests
of the other stakeholders. Only the
taxpayers’ interests should be represented on the School Board.
2010 student enrollment: 933
In recent
years, the housing market has deflated.
Nearly four years of 8 percent unemployment levels have combined to cause
many foreclosures and distressed sales.
Some District 65 residents are “underwater” because the value of their
home is less than the value of the mortgage they are paying.
All District residents have had their ability to refinance or borrow
limited by their reduce equity.
So what
did the School Board do? Increase
the tax levy by a half-million to nearly $15 million, the highest it had ever
been. This higher collection for a
shrinking assessed base combined to make the tax rate skyrocket from $2.08 per
$100 of assessed value to $2.31 per.
If the
School Board would have reduced the levy by a million dollars, the rate would
not have changed from the $2.08 level where it had remained for eight years.
Budgeted spending would have been unaffected because the School Board had
many millions sitting idle in bank accounts.
Those many
millions had been collected from the real estate taxes of the District
residents. Collected for no
specific purpose, that slush fund imposed a hardship on the residents.
It could have been used to relieve some of that hardship.
It wasn’t.[4]
Whose interest
does the MJ Brady Board serve?
The next
year it got worse. The slush
fund continued to grow even as the tax rate skyrocketed.
Rates 2002 through 2009 were 2.08, 2.07, 2.10, 2.10, 2.06, 2.04, 2.07,
2.08 and then jumped last[5] year to 2.31 and now this year to 2.51!
2011 student enrollment: 906
The LBMS
Choir Room can get over-heated so the MJ Brady School Board is discussing a $2
million fix.
Déjà vu?
Sounds like the approach an earlier
School Board took toward Central School.
Why crack the window when $2 million does so much more?
And who will miss the $2 million when you have many times that in the
bank? Especially since a single
excess levy can replace it?
Exasperated, last summer District 65 resident Al Boese commented in the above
link, “I was rather astonished to learn recently of a plan by Lake Bluff School
District 65 to spend $2.0 MM for a new choral practice room and redesign the
Middle School entrance. Does some genetic transformation overcome anyone who
comes in contact with Education? Seemingly normal thinking people whom
heretofore would recognize excess, somehow, when associated with a school
district, become possessed by the Education genetic flaw that drives that person
to become devoted to spending money wisely or foolishly, but spend they do. We
see this on a national, state and local basis.”
What other
explanation could there be? We
don’t need to wait six months for the strategic plan to recognize this for what
it is: Indulgence.
This is the kind of thinking that results from the mere existence of
a
multi-million dollar slush fund.
If tax levies strictly conformed to tight budgets with no slush fund
providing a cushion, then the rigor of the process would give us all assurance
that spending was properly considered.
Budgeting
nickels and dimes is
revealed
to be a sham
when the School Board is
floating on a sea of off-budget millions.
In such an environment, when the question is raised, “Why don’t we apply
the East School façade to the Middle School entrance?” there is no basis for
objection. Anyone who asks, “How
does this further the interest of the interest of the taxpayers in supporting
educational purposes?” is dismissed as irrelevant to the discussion.
The only question entertained in such an environment is, “Wouldn’t it be
nice?”
To their
credit, the School Board has engaged Bill Melsheimer of ECRA consultants to
chart out a more rational approach.
He facilitated “focus groups” at the LBES recently.
Parents were invited to the second of the three one-hour sessions.
One parent commented about
the “Town
Hall” meeting
that was addressed by several of the Concerned Citizens and by concerned parent
Megan Miles. His comment was,
“Everyone spoke about lowering taxes.
No one spoke about spending more.”
The
perception was that the Concerned Citizens have a selfish agenda and that the
School Board does not. This is the
reverse is truth. But perception
trumps truth in a public debate that has already become polarized.
Again. And that is the fault
of the School Board for abandoning a more rigorous process where tax levies
strictly conform to tight budgets with no slush fund.
During the
visioning part of the parents’ session, several people made clear and balanced
comments like those of Nisha Burns.
But there were also reactionary comments.
One man said, “Lake Bluff schools should be the best in northern
Illinois” and he was followed by another man who said “I think they should be
the best in the country”.
Clearly
our curriculum should be synchronized with 67 so that our students can succeed
at 115. And perhaps we should have
a hot lunch program. Those are
decisions that should flow from that rigorous process that is trusted by all
stakeholders and this should not be a tug-of-war between parents and other
taxpayers. Any other perception is
the fault of the School Board.
Anonymous
hate mail
has started and that is the fault of the MJ Brady School Board too.
2012 student enrollment: 869
There is a
solution. There is a simple action
that the School Board can take that will immediately settle the rapidly
increasing polarization within the District.
There is a way that the School Board members can re-establish trust with those
they represent and return the process to orderly deliberation.
Immediately pay ten million dollars from the slush fund to the
Debt Service Fund.
By
committing this amount to debt service, one third of the excess taxes still
remain liquid and available for contingencies and an orderly transition a
rigorous and more rational decision process.
Because the County Clerk would not have to collect for debt service, the
tax rate would immediately fall some twenty cents.
And because this sum represents several years of debt service, that rate
reduction would persist.
The money
paid into the Debt Service Fund cannot be removed from it.
This is therefore one of the very few ways that the MJ Brady Board can
commit future School Boards. The
Board will continue to tax each year for budgeted spending and so this action
has no effect on the spending that results from the regular budgeting process.
It simply designates the excess taxes of recent past years to be returned
to the taxpayers in the near future years.
The LBES
bonds are first callable in 2018 so this will take us there.
You then on the School Board would be in an ideal position to refinance
and rationalize our debt structure before the programed repayments triple.
The accusation that you now on the School Board are hoarding cash to make
indulgent spending feasible would be refuted.
You would show good faith.
In all
three of the sessions that same focusing evening, the 2009 Fiscal Austerity Plan
was raised. Concerned Citizens,
parents, community – each of the
three groups independently recalled that document.
Jill Rosa had asked about it during the Town Hall meeting.
I followed-up with Liz Zoellick who sent me an email on 10/24 explaining
where I could find it on the lb65.org website at that time.
I note that the lb65.org website has been overhauled and that the 2009
Fiscal Austerity Plan has been deleted from it.
The
now-deleted document that was dated May 19, 2010 said, “The major intent is to
maintain a 25 percent operating fund balance at the end of five years.”
At every school meeting I have attended where President Brady was
present, she has said that there are “guidelines” for minimum fund balances but
“there is no statutory maximum”.
It is also
true that there is a 25 percent guideline for maximum fund balances but there is
no statutory minimum.
2016* student enrollment: 814
This
month, you will set the levy.
People who live in the 5.6 square miles of the District will be required to pay
you whatever sum you demand. People
can lose their houses for failing to “render unto Caesar”.
You collected $10 million the same year that the LBES bonds were
authorized by the voters. This year
you may choose to collect $16 million.
There will be discussion about a 3 percent increase of something and a 2 percent increase of something else. But the essential truth is that you could skip a year altogether – a 100 percent decrease. You have amassed enough cash that taxes could be ZERO this year and you would still be able to pay all your bills for 12 months. Very few residents within the 5.6 square miles keep that kind of cash on hand in managing personal finances. Imagine: Everything your family buys in a year, from gas to groceries, including 12 months of mortgage payments, sitting in your checking account!
Prior to
the Town Hall meeting,
Superintendent Sophie had written
about the following chart: “The
current Board of Education has expressed the desire to develop a policy on
maximum fund balance. This policy discussion will begin as part of the levy
discussion this fall and will continue as part of the district strategic
planning process this fall and winter.”
I thought
the chart was manipulative and provocative.
It was evocative of a lynch mob mentality:
“Other people are doing it so we can too.
In fact, we are right in the middle, so we must be correct.”
It is devoid of analysis or thoughtful judgment.
I was prepared to address the matter during the meeting but didn’t only
because Superintendent Sophie opened by disavowing her own chart.
She acknowledged that the presentation depends entirely on the choice of
other districts used for comparison.
Two
districts on that bar chart that are not arbitrary are 67 and 115.
And they are the two with the shortest bars.
There are
seventeen separate stories of how these seventeen districts got to where they
are. Still, new
Board Member Barry commented that 65 is in the middle and seemed to find comfort
in that. It is a false comfort.
Give me any metric for 65 and I will find eight districts with a larger
value and eight districts with a smaller value.
That proves nothing. But if
67 and 115 are together at one end of the spectrum, we must ask ourselves if we
shouldn’t try to be more like Lake Forest.
Prudent
stewardship demands the immediate transfer of $10 million to service debt, but
it also demands that the current tax levy be closely tied to the current
spending budget. The transfer and
the levy are the only concrete steps that the School Board can take to address
the burden that it has placed on its residents.
Everything else, from budgets to bar charts, is just paperwork and
promises.
On the
trading floor we sometimes joke cynically about “OPM” – other people’s money.
Board members are free to accumulate their loose change in a cookie jar
at home. Board members are free to
blow their cookie jar slush fund on any indulgence.
But when Board members are conducting public business, they must always
be mindful of OPM.
2021* student enrollment: 764
It’s not
your money. The $10 million payment
to Debt Service will return the excess taxes of the last six year to the
residents over the next six years.
Households that are resident throughout the twelve years will be made whole.
I think
there are about 2400 households in the District.
$16 million is $6,700 per household.
We will find the jobs and we will find the cash and we will pay our
bills…or we will move away. All we
ask is that the portion that you extract from us be used as carefully as we
would have used it ourselves. After
all, why build a child-friendly village if young families cannot afford to live
here?
Serving on
a public board is not about making friends.
It’s not an honorary position rewarding you for something in your past.
And it’s not about ideology.
If you really think we should spend more and tax more, we will have the nicest
empty school in Illinois.
Respectfully,
Don Russ
This
letter is also
web-readable.
*
According
to
a
February, 2012 study.
[1] name added after this letter was emailed to the School Board
[2] her name omitted at her request after this letter was emailed to the School Board
[3] this paragraph originally identified the speaker erroneously as a Park Board member, though not by name, as follows:
"Broken faith is the core issue. Accusations of hidden agendas are mere symptoms. At the facilitated focus group meeting, School Caucus member Jennifer Gleason witnessed the spectacle of a Park Board member recounting how a School Board member refused a discussion, turned his back and walked away. Presumably that is not the behavior advocated by board members in their Caucus interviews."
[4] link added after this email was sent
[5] year references changed from the December that the Board adopts a levy to the year that the May and September tax bills are received.