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Ma rch 2 0, 2015 • $ 1. 0 0
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DAILY CHRONICLE
DeKalb baseball beats Elgin, but still looking to improve / B1
DeKalb’s Dani Garcia
daily-chronicle.com
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Forum focuses on DeKalb races City Council, District 428 board candidates address financial issues fielded several questions during the League of Women Voters’ forum, including one about deficit spending. Do you plan to vote in the election April DeKALB – With less than three “Whenever we get it from, we’re 7? Vote online at Daily-Chronicle.com. weeks until the April 7 election, cangoing to have to count on pushing the didates for the DeKalb School District learning first,” Solomon said. “And 428 board and DeKalb City Council deficits may be required.” made appeals to voters at Thursday’s mon, whose names will appear on the Based on projects presented to the ballot, met write-in candidates Ron- board Tuesday, the district will run a forum. Kerry Mellott and Howard Solo- ald Adamson and Rick Smith. They $1.8 million to $3 million deficit annu-
Voice your opinion
By KATIE DAHLSTROM
kdahlstrom@shawmedia.com
ally over the next five years. Smith and Mellott talked about the possibility of adding a 1 percent County School Facility Occupation Tax to purchases in the county, something school officials have discussed, but not brought forward to voters. “While I am inherently against increasing taxes of any kind,” Smith
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said, “I think we have to consider it.” Mellott, a 62-year-old retired science researcher, had more mixed feelings, but said he was against deficits. Meanwhile, toolmaker Adamson, 39, proposed investigating different options for revenues and cuts.
See FORUM, page A7
Illinois to divert ‘fair share’ fees from unions By JOHN O’CONNOR The Associated Press
Danielle Guerra – dguerra@shawmedia.com
First- and second-graders take fresh fruits and vegetables to add to their lunches Wednesday at Tyler Elementary School in DeKalb.
More than a third of DeKalb County students qualifying for meal program By KATIE DAHLSTROM kdahlstrom@shawmedia.com DeKALB – The number of low-income students in DeKalb County has nearly tripled in the past decade, a trend that state records show has led to more than a third of students qualifying for free and reduced-price lunches. About 60 percent of DeKalb School District 428’s students are low-income, according to data from the Illinois State Board of Education. That percentage has ballooned in the past decade from 32.5 percent in the 2004-05 school year, which Assistant Superintendent of Business and Finance
Andrea Gorla said strains district finances. “It’s a big impact,” Gorla said. “Now you’re talking about a majority of students. There are many levels of concern because you need to spend more money on those students.” All the districts across the county saw an increase in the number of low-income students in the past decade. Although District 428 has the highest percentage of low-income students in DeKalb County, it is not far from the state and national rates. State data shows 51.5 percent of all Illinois students are low-income. Meanwhile, a recent report from
the Southern Education Foundation shows that a majority of students in the nation’s public schools are low-income. Gorla’s concern is not so much about providing free and reduced lunches because the federal government and state reimburses school districts for the costs. The district received $4.3 million in federal funding through the federal lunch program and federal grants meant to benefit disadvantaged students, accounting for nearly 6 percent of the district’s budget, district documents show.
By the numbers Percentage of low-income students by school district 2004-05 2014-15 District 424 16 39.5 District 425 10 29.2 District 426 16.9 48.8 District 427 13.4 30.8 District 428 32.5 59.2 District 429 2.5 29.9 District 430 15.4 42.9 District 432 6.8 26.8
Source: Illinois State Board of Education
See LUNCHES, page A7
SPRINGFIELD – Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner, dogged in attempts to eliminate fees paid to unions by workers who choose not to join, has instructed state agencies to divert money from nonunion employee paychecks away from organized labor until a judge settles the matter. In a memo obtained by The Associated Press, general counsel Jason Barclay directs departments under the Republican governor’s control to create two sets of books, one of which Bruce w o u l d m o v e d e - Rauner ductions from nonunion members to the operations budgets of state agencies instead of to the unions, although the money would not be spent. The idea was immediately condemned by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the largest of two dozen unions that filed a countersuit over an executive order Rauner signed last month calling the fees a free-speech violation. He’s seeking a federal court’s declaration that they are unconstitutional. “This legally questionable scheme shows the lengths to which Gov. Rauner will go in his obsession to undermine labor unions,” Roberta Lynch, executive director of the Illinois council of AFSCME, said in a prepared statement. “To frustrate lawful fair-share agreements, Rauner is ordering payroll staff to make unauthorized reductions in employees’ established salaries.” The process outlined in the memo calls for preparing one payroll report with the “proper pay” and one, to be processed, that reduces the worker’s gross pay by an amount equal to what nonunion workers normally pay in so-called “fair share” fees. It is not clear how the deductions would affect federal tax withholding or health-insurance payments. Taxes are based on gross pay – if it’s lower, less is withheld, creating potential headaches down the line.
See FEES, page A7
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Sycamore museum to present importance of railroad / A3
The Board of Trustees seeks bids for new turf at Huskie Stadium / B1
“Be Reconciled” initiative starts Wednesday / B10
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