BARBS WIN December 6-7, 2014 • $1.50
DeKalb’s Jace Kitchen
* daily-chronicle.com
SERVING DEKALB COUNTY SINCE 1879
DeKalb boys hoops defeats Sycamore in first meeting of conference rivals / B1
HIGH
LOW
37 22 Complete forecast on page A10
Facebook.com/dailychronicle
@dailychronicle
‘SO MANY IRONS IN THE FIRE’ School officials not pursuing sales tax hike – or burying idea By ERIC R. OLSON eolson@shawmedia.com Area school superintendents said they have discussed the possibility of a countywide sales tax for school facilities, but say school board members have not shown interest in bringing the measure to voters. DeKalb School District 428 Superintendent Doug Moeller said his district’s board members were more concerned with ongoing dis-
cussions about a proposed countywide enterprise zone than with proposing a new tax. “There’s so many irons in the fire with this enterprise zone and tax abatement and stuff, [the sales tax] is not really on our radar,” Moeller said. “… There’s not even a consensus among all the districts that they want to move forward with it.” A recent story posted online by the conservative think-tank Illinois Policy Institute said it had
Voice your opinion Would you support a 1 percent sales tax increase for DeKalb County schools? Vote online at Daily-Chronicle.com.
uncovered a plot by school districts to place a sales-tax increase on the ballot. State law allows counties to add a 1 percent County School Facility Occupation Tax to purchases in a county.
State law requires that revenue generated be used only for “school facility purposes.” In all, 24 of Illinois’ 102 counties, including neighboring Boone County, assess the school facilities sales tax. The measure has some appeal in DeKalb because the area’s largest employer and owner of much property, Northern Illinois University, is exempt from local property tax. Most counties with public universities do not charge the added sales
tax, although Champaign County, home to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, does. There is no countywide sales tax in DeKalb County, which pays the 6.25 percent state sales-tax rate, but the communities of DeKalb and Sycamore have added their own sales taxes, bringing their local sales tax rates to 8 percent. In Cortland, the rate is 7.25 percent.
See SALES TAX, page A8
University increases, streamlines tuition rates
NIU FOOTBALL WINS MAC CHAMPIONSHIP GAME
NIU trustees vote to abolish tiered rates By JILLIAN DUCHNOWSKI jduchnowski@shawmedia.com
CHAMPS ONCE AGAIN Huskies win their 3rd conference title in 5 years By EDDIE CARIFIO ecarifio@shawmedia.com
Bowling Green
F
or the third time in five years, the Northern Illinois football team is Mid-American Conference champions. Now the Huskies (11-2) play the waiting game. After beating Bowling Green on Friday, 51-17, at Ford Field in Detroit, the Huskies will find out Sunday which bowl will invite them to play in its game. A likely pick is the GoDaddy Bowl on Jan. 4 in Mobile, Alabama. The GoDaddy Bowl has the first pick from among the bowl-eligible MAC schools, but is not obligated to select the champion. The possibility still exists for a New Year’s Day bowl game, but Boise State (10-2) would need to lose to Fresno State (6-6) in the Mountain West Championship game, and even then the committee still could select Marshall if the Thundering Herd still have one loss.
17 51 Northern Illinois
Photos by Monica Synett – msynett@shawmedia.com
TOP: Northern Illinois football coach Rod Carey is presented the Mid-American Conference Championship trophy Friday after beating Bowling Green, 51-17, at Ford Field in Detroit. ABOVE: Northern Illinois tight end Luke Eakes celebrates after scoring a touchdown in the second quarter against Bowling Green.
For full coverage turn to SPORTS and visit Daily-Chronicle.com and HuskieWire.com. LIFESTYLE
LOCAL NEWS
NATION
WHERE IT’S AT
New wreaths
Santa visit
NASA launch
Today’s wreath might be a square, star or rectangle / C1
Santa, others stop by Sycamore on Friday night / A3
Orion, a new spacecraft, has successful mission Friday from Florida / A6
Advice ................................ C6 Classified........................D1-4 Comics ............................... C7 Local News.................... A2-4 Lottery................................ A2 Nation&World.......... A2, 6-8
DeKALB – Northern Illinois University will increase its tuition 2.3 percent for freshmen next year, but streamlined charges based on credit hours so students and their parents can better understand their bills. Presently, NIU charges new instate students $331.37 a credit hour for those taking 12 to 14 credit hours and $308.44 a credit hour for those taking 15 to 16 hours, which has resulted in students paying more to take 14 credit hours in a semester than those taking 15 credit hours. NIU trustees unanimously voted this week to abolish the tiered rates next fall, instead capping the tuition rate at 12 credit hours for freshmen and 14 hours for continuing students. That means a full-time freshman would pay $4,732 a semester in tuition regardless of how many hours he or she takes, while a continuing student would pay $3,965 for 12 hours, with rates established for 13 and 14 hours, too. “Our whole aim to begin with [was to simplify] so people can read our tuition schedules and quickly understand,” NIU trustee Bob Boey said. “Before there was some confusion.” Illinois’ Truth-in-Tuition law limited how administrators could restructure tuition for returning students. The law requires tuition rates to be frozen for each class from their freshman year through their senior year. As a result, upperclassmen pay less than incoming freshman students, in some cases for the same classes. Nonetheless, the hourly rate increased year-over-year for incoming freshmen, although it is similar to increases in recent years. The new hourly rate will be $348.84. In addition, trustees abolished NIU’s most expensive meal plan, which has been used in published reports on room and board rates. By dropping to the next most-expensive meal plan, the published roomand-board rate will drop $800, NIU spokesman Paul Palian said in a news release. That room-and-board rate will drop 7 percent from $11,292 to $10,492.
By the numbers Rate 1 credit hour 12 credit hours 13 credit hours 14 credit hours
New student Continuing student $348.84 $330.45 $4,732.80 $3,965.30 $4,732.80 $4,295.85 $4,732.80 $4,626.30 Source: NIU
Obituaries .........................A4 Opinion...............................A9 Puzzles ............................... C6 Sports..............................B1-4 State ...................................A5 Weather ........................... A10