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1 • Thursday, January 19, 2017 - The Independent
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VOL. 14 • NO. 2
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TAKE ONE
THURSDAY, JUNE 8, 2017
State lawmakers pass education funding reform with last-minute Chicago sweeteners School District, with its 98 percent high poverty concentration, would receive an extra $237 per student while CPS, at 83 percent, receives more than $1,300 per student in additional funds. Illinois is last in the country in
state spending on local education, with the vast majority of funding coming from local property taxes. This is commonly blamed for the inequities in funding from one district to the next. High-poverty areas tend to collect less property taxes on less
valuable homes. In the continuing rift between Chicago Public Schools and the rest of the state, property tax money that should otherwise go to CPS has for years been diverted by designating tax-increment funding, or TIF, dis-
tricts over much of Chicago’s highly valuable downtown area, state Sen. Michael Connelly, R-Wheaton, said. “Do you want to know who backfills that money?” Connelly asked. “Every one of your constituents that doesn’t live in the City of Chicago.”
SUBMITTED PHOTO Bensenville Independent
All that jazz
The Fenton High School Jazz Ensemble has been accepted to perform at the Illinois Music Educators Association (ILMEA) Music Education Conference (IMEC) in January of 2018. The group is shown at a performance held at Hackney’s.
Inside:
Police Reports......4, 5 Sports �������������������� 19 Dining.................6-11 Classifieds..........22-24
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By Illinois News Network Democratic lawmakers passed sweeping reforms to the state’s education system that all sides agree is broken. Then, they put it in a drawer and went home. Late Wednesday night last week, the state Senate entered the final vote needed to pass a new formula for evidence-based funding that supporters say gives more equity to Illinois’ school funding methods. But after the vote, Senate Bill 1 was put on hold using a procedural move by Chicago Democrat Donne Trotter. A spokesperson for Senate President John Cullerton said that it was to allow for some time after a tense debate. He said in a statement Thursday morning that, “You heard a lot of heated, political and erroneous rhetoric from opponents yesterday. We’re going to give everyone a chance to get that out of their systems and let cooler heads prevail.” He didn’t have a timeline on when the bill would be released from its hold and sent to Rauner. State Sen. Jason Barickman, R-Bloomington, was one of those heated voices on the Senate floor. He said the longer Democrats wait to send this to the governor, the more chance people will see it for what it really is – a bailout for Chicago Public Schools. “It really underscores the politics of this bill,” Barickman said Thursday. “The more time this waits around and lingers, the more time the public has to scrutinize this. I don’t think they’re going to like what they see.” “When it comes to schools in high poverty areas like East St. Louis getting crumbs while CPS gets filet mignon, it’s not OK to just vote no,” Barickman said. “We need to stand up and explain why we’re voting no and try to defeat the bill.” Barickman said the East St. Louis
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