Daily Archives: October 26, 2008

Peoria Public Schools

D150: Where does all the money go?

44 Comments

This is the first year we’ve put our kids in District 150. Before this year, my oldest daughter had attended a private school. Private schools, of course, don’t get any public money. Here’s how much public money goes to District 150, shown both in aggregate and per pupil:

Instructional Expenditure Per Pupil*: $6,297
Operating Expenditure Per Pupil*: $11,521
Local Property Tax Revenue*: $65,921,368
Other Local/State/Federal Revenue*: $84,928,611

One would think with that much revenue and per-pupil expenditures, all the schools’ needs would be more than met. Not so. First, we had to pay an additional fee for book rental. For our two school-age children, that came to $100. Then there have been the fundraisers — lots of fundraisers — more fundraisers than we ever had at a private school with no public funding and considerably less per-pupil (tuition) costs:

School fundraising requests received
within first two months of school year:		 4†
PTO fundraising requests received
within first two months of school year:		 3‡
Charitable fundraising requests received
within first two months of school year:		 2
TOTAL: 9

Note that this is just the fundraising requests received in the first two months of the school year. Who knows how many more are on their way. I don’t begrudge the charitable fundraisers, but include them in the chart merely to show the totality of how many requests for funds bombard parents of District 150 students — parents who, like all taxpayers in District 150, are already spending an enormous amount of money in property taxes, state taxes, and federal taxes to support public education.

Lest you think I’m being petty here, take a look at those numbers again. Totaling the per pupil instructional and operating expenditures per pupil, that comes to $17,818… per pupil. High school tuition at Peoria Christian School is only $4,932 per year. According to Peoria Notre Dame’s website, their “projected cost for educating a student for 2008 – 2009 is over $7,000.” That $7,000+ is paid for by a combination of tuition, subsidies, fundraisers, and some miscellaneous revenue sources.

Meanwhile, at District 150, they receive nearly $18,000 per student in public money. So why the need for additional private funds in the form of so many fundraisers? My question is basically this: Where does all the money go?

__________

*Source: Interactive Illinois Report Card, 2005-06 Fiscal Year

†Magazine subscriptions for computers; General Mills Boxtops for cash; recycling of aluminum cans for cash; Usborne Books’ “Reach for the Stars” for school & classroom library books.

‡Spirit Wear for cash; Bergner’s Community Day for cash; Butter Braids frozen pastry/cookie dough for cash. Cash used for Accelerated Reader program, subscription to Time Magazine for Kids, and other programs.

City of Peoria, Form-Based Code, HOPC

Heart of Peoria Commission votes against temporary LDC changes

4 Comments

The city’s Planning and Growth Department is spearheading an effort to review the portion of the Land Development Code (LDC) that deals with form-based code districts “to determine if all the regulations are performing as anticipated and to ensure compatible development which meets the purpose statements of the code.” Toward that end, they have done two things:

  1. Established an LDC Review Committee. The LDC Committee is comprised of two representatives from the Heart of Peoria Commission, Zoning Commission, the Zoning Board of Appeals, and the Historic Preservation Commission. I’m one of the two representatives from HOPC. So far, we’ve had two meetings. No decisions have been made yet, but we’ve discussed street wall and parking setback requirements and worked on crafting definitions for “change of use” and “expansion of use.”

  2. Requested the City Council temporarily amend the LDC while the LDC Review Committee completes its work. This is on Tuesday’s agenda. Basically, they want to make it easier for projects in a form district to get an exception from the regulations. Currently, any exceptions to the regulations must go through the Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA). The ZBA’s decision is final; any appeals have to go through circuit court. Planning and Growth is requesting instead that any exceptions be handled as a special use request; that would require the City Council’s approval. Again, this request is just for a six-month period — long enough for the committee to complete its work.

During the Heart of Peoria Commission meeting Friday morning (which wasn’t attended by any media, incidentally), that second point was one of the topics of discussion.

Some commissioners felt the temporary LDC change was a good idea. They argued, like Planning and Growth, that the LDC Review Committee’s recommendations “could include rewriting of certain regulations or removal of them after a determination that they may be too extensive.” Hence, exceptions during this time should be able to be made legislatively (through the council) rather than judicially (through the ZBA). The applicant would still have to make their case either way; it would only change which body has the final say.

Others, like me, were skeptical. I didn’t hear a compelling reason why this change was necessary. First of all, there don’t appear to be a rash of requests before the ZBA (in fact, their last regular meeting was cancelled because they didn’t have a single case). Secondly, the issues that are being reviewed by the committee are limited in scope, so there’s no need to change the exceptions procedure for all form district regulations. Others pointed out that exceptions made under this proposed temporary change could set a bad precedent.

The Heart of Peoria Commission was split on the issue. A motion in favor of the temporary change failed 3-4. That was followed by a motion to make no changes to the exception process while the commission completes its work; that motion passed 4-3.