Daily Archives: January 20, 2009

General News

Koehler, Gordon town meeting outside their districts

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From Peoria County GOP Chairman Rudy Lewis:

Koehler and Gordon so out of touch they don’t even know where their districts are located

Sen. Koehler leads Jehan Gordon off on the wrong foot as she begins her term

(PEORIA) State Representative Jehan Gordon may be getting off on the wrong foot by holding a town hall meeting with State Senator Dave Koehler outside of both of their districts.

“How can you accurately represent citizens if you invite people to a town hall meeting to voice their opinions but that location is outside of your district?” said Peoria County GOP chairman Rudy Lewis. “I wonder if Koehler and Gordon are just taking people on the South Side, the East Bluff, West Bluff and West Peoria for granted by holding their town hall outside their own districts. In any case spending tax dollars to invite people to a town hall meeting outside of their districts is a slap in the face of those they are paid to represent.”

“Imagine a U.S. Senator from Illinois holding a town hall meeting in Indiana or Missouri,” furthered Lewis. “It defies logic.”

“If these two public officials care not where they hold their town hall meeting, it calls into question their judgment when voting to spend billions of state tax dollars,” concluded Lewis.

Gordon and Koehler recently announced they would be holding a Town Hall Meeting on January 22nd at the Lakeview Branch Library (1137 W. Lake Ave., Peoria). However, the Lakeview Branch Library is not located in either Gordon or Koehler’s legislative districts. The Library is located in the 37th Senate District and the 73rd legislative districts, represented by Sen. Dale Risinger and Rep. David Leitch.

Chairman Lewis confirmed that the Lakeview Branch Library is located in the 73rd legislative district (37th Senate district) and not the 92nd legislative district (46th Senate District) with both the Illinois State Board of Elections and the City of Peoria Election Commission.

For their part, Risinger and Leitch hold a series of more than 10 town hall meetings each summer throughout the four counties in the 73rd District—but each one is inside the district they both represent.

2009 Campaign, Peoria Public Schools

News release: Petelle running for school board

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From a news release:

Petelle Announces for District 150 School Board

Peoria – Laura Petelle formally announced her candidacy for the District 3 seat on the District 150 School Board today.

“As a professor at Illinois Central College, I get District 150 students in my classroom all the time,” Petelle said. “We have great students. They deserve a great school district. District 150 should be a first choice, not a last resort.”

Laura Petelle, 30, works as an attorney in private practice in Peoria and as an Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at Illinois Central College, teaching classes including philosophy and ethics.

“The school board term is five years. My baby will start kindergarten in five years. I’m very motivated to improve the District in that time,” Petelle said.

Petelle graduated magna cum laude from the University of Notre Dame in Indiana (BA, 2000); she then went to Duke University in North Carolina where she earned a law degree (JD, 2004) and a Masters in Theological Studies (MTS, 2004). She is a member of the Junior League of Peoria, where she volunteers on the Peoria PlayHouse Children’s Museum committee. Petelle serves on the community board of the University of Illinois Extension – Peoria County. She is married to Garth Madison, a litigator with Hinshaw & Culbertson LLP; they are expecting their first child in late May. Petelle and Madison are members of the Biltmore Heights Neighborhood Association and of St. Philomena’s.

The District 3 seat is currently held by Mary Spangler, who will not be running. District 3 encompasses most of the city of Peoria north of Forest Hill Avenue. The election will be April 7, 2009.

Petelle also writes a local blog under the name Eyebrows McGee.

Peoria Public Schools

D150: Fewer students, more administrators

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Peoria Board of Education member Jim Stowell has passed along a report he requested from staff on “Pupil-Teacher and Pupil-Administrator Ratios” from 1989 to 2008.

The report shows that, while enrollment has steadily declined over the past 20 years, the number of administrators has gone up. The pupil-administrator ratio in 1989 was 223.5:1. Last year it was 168.1:1.

Some questions remain. The report notes that deans used to be considered teachers by the Illinois State Board of Education, but are now considered administrators. That makes historical comparisons more difficult. However, the report doesn’t tell us how many deans there are in the district, or how big of a difference their change of status makes.

The report also does not define exactly who is and who is not considered an “administrator.” For instance, does this figure include the many consultants who retired, but were rehired on a per diem basis, like Cindy Fischer? Or does it only include full-time administrator positions?

Still, returning to the question of deans being changed from “teacher” to “administrator,” I don’t think this is enough to explain away the rise in administrators. In order for the district to have the same pupil-administrator ratio as 1989 (223.5:1) with 2008’s enrollment (13,642), they would have to have only 61 administrators. They have 81. No matter how you look at it, the administration is top-heavy.

Peoria Public Schools

Central or Woodruff campus? Pros and cons

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For all of you who wondered “why Woodruff?” here’s your answer. School board member Jim Stowell forwarded me the district’s “Merged High School Campus Selection Analysis.” It basically is a detailed pro and con list for each campus. I think it helps explain the administration’s recommendation that Peoria High be used for the new “merged” high school and Woodruff be used for grade school.

On a side note, did you know that “Woodruff [was] originally designed to be [a] junior high school”? I didn’t. I’d love to know the rest of the story on that. I wonder how it went from being a junior high school to another high school.