The Examiner U-46 News FeedU-46 status quo retained, bond referendum passes By Seth Hancock
Despite ongoing trends of declining academic scores and enrollment with increased spending, voters approved of a School District U-46 referendum to take on $179 million in new debt as well as elected the status quo candidates for four Board of Education seats.
The referendum passed easily with 11,122 yes votes, 6,559 no votes. DuPage County was the only county to reject the measure by a narrow 2,084 no votes to 2,081 yes votes.
The district advertised the new debt as a “zero-tax-rate-increase bond proposal,” but former Superintendent Tony Sanders previously admitted that was with “all things relative.”
One of those “things” would be the interest rate differential, something the board did not publicly inquire about. The Examiner did ask the district how much of the new debt would go to retire current bonds and what the expected interest rate differential would be.
“If approved by the voters, the $179 million bond will fund new projects to make safety and security improvements, renovate and replace infrastructure, add classrooms for early childhood education, improve accessibility, and construct STEM labs,” said Karla Jiménez, director of school and community relations. “None of the $179 million proceeds will be used to retire/refund current outstanding bonds.”
Jiménez added: “The interest rate the school district will pay to service its bonds is known once the new bonds are issued. The interest rate used to estimate the cost of the proposed $179 million bond is 4.73 percent, which includes a large interest rate cushion given market uncertainty.”
This year’s budget was the eighth straight with spending hikes along with enrollment declines, and spending has increased 62 percent and enrollment has declined 13.5 percent over the last decade.
In the board race, six candidates filed for four seats. Board members John Devereux and Eva Porter did not file with their terms up this year while Sue Kerr, the board president, and Kate Thommes, the board’s secretary pro-tempore, were the highest vote getters at 11,054 and 10,914 respectively.
Newcomers Chanda Schwartz (8,916 votes) and Sareen Khan (8,766 votes) also won seats ahead of Maureen Morris (7,496 votes) and Heather Manzella (6,724 votes).
The winning candidates were aided by a heavily funded divisive campaign by Democrat Gov. J.B. Pritzker which targeted school board candidates across the state, including Morris and Manzella, which labeled candidates as “extremist conservatives” who “support harmful measures.”
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