The Examiner U-46 News Feed
SRO contract renewals approved in Dist. U-46
By Seth Hancock
The Board of Education in School District U-46 unanimously approved the contract renewals for School Resource Officers (SRO), a temporary facility report and itemized bills at its meeting on Monday, Nov. 18.
The district has SROs at its secondary schools with 14 total officers from four police departments.
“The total salary cost of the contracts with the City of Elgin (7 SROs), Village of Bartlett (2 SROs), Village of Streamwood (3 SROs), and Village of South Elgin (2 SROs), increased from $956,018.00 to $979,703.00, or $23,685.00 (2.5 [percent]),” a memo from John Heiderscheidt, director of school safety and culture, stated. “The overtime/event security budget for all SROs for 2018-2019 was $89,500.00 and will remain the same.”
The memo added: “The total cost for all 2019-2020 SRO contracts, including the overtime/event security increased from $1,045,518.00 to $1,069,203.00, a 2.3 [percent] overall increase over last year’s costs.”
Elgin’s total cost is $505,242 (salary of $72,177, hourly overtime rate of $69), Streamwood’s is $209,763 (salary $69,921, overtime rate $50.43), Bartlett’s is $139,838 (salary $69,921, overtime rate $71.43) and South Elgin’s is $124,860 (salary $62,430, overtime rate $63.62).
The temporary facility report is in regards to a mobile classroom to be used at Lincoln Elementary School in Hoffman Estates. The double unit is expected to house 60 students.
Jeff King, deputy superintendent of operations, said that the school is “out of space” making the mobile unit necessary.
“We’ve added two classrooms to that school since school started in the fall,” King said. “We’re out of space, the mobile is already on site, it’s been there since prior to the last boundary change, we’ve never moved it and we do need approval from you… so we can move that classroom into the mobile.”
The report stated that the board has “diligently attempted to eliminate the need” for the mobile by commissioning “a capital/capacity study of the District to reduce and remove temporary facilities. A report was finalized and presented to the Board of Education in 2009.”
That 2009 study “does identify locations for alterations, additions and restructuring to reduce the use of temporary facilities” at the school, the report also stated.
The mobile unit to be used does include seven of 35 checklist items that are marked as either not in compliance or the information was not available. King said that any urgent issue will “be taken care of before we populate it with students.”
The approved itemized bills totaled $12.5 million.
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