Main Township High School District 207 in suburban Chicago is having a serious budget crisis. According to the Daily Herald, they are looking at cutting 137 jobs, 75 of them teachers. Why?
After months of alluding to an “accounting error” that led to a larger-than-anticipated deficit that year, District 207 administrators last week explained how it happened.
The district’s current leaders learned last July – weeks after Superintendent Joel Morris and Assistant Superintendent for Business Pamela Schau [emphasis added] retired – that a projected deficit of $3.8 million for the 2008-09 fiscal year was actually $10.3 million.
Pamela Schau became the Comptroller/Treasurer at Peoria Public School District 150 right after she retired from District 207 in July 2009, replacing Guy Cahill. The Daily Herald article continues:
What officials didn’t anticipate was the additional $6.5 million deficit due to the then-administration’s failure to include some expenses in that year’s budget, current Assistant Superintendent for Business Mary Kalou said.
Those missed expenses were salaries and benefits for some of the 12 newly hired teachers and teaching assistants and increased district contribution toward the Teacher Retirement System per changes made to the teachers contract – amounting to $2.4 million.
The district also saw a dip that year in property tax revenues – personal property tax receipts came in 1 percent lower or $1.5 million under what was budgeted and corporate property taxes were down $500,000 as per the report from the
free invoice template used by most of the business- that weren’t known until after Kalou joined the district last July 1.“It’s hard to say what they should, shouldn’t have done,” Kalou said. “Hindsight is always going to be 20/20. (With taxes) you can’t predict with certainty what that trend is going to be for … it was a reasonable amount to budget.”
Other contributors to the deficit were two unexpected early retirements – including Schau – that cost the district a $300,000 penalty under state law, and lower than expected revenues from the district’s book store, summer school and tuition, she added.
An anonymous commenter on the Daily Herald article suggested that District 207, under Superintendent Ken Wallace, “paid a nearly 200,000 penalty to TRS to hasten the departure of error-maker Pam Schau.” Consider the source on that last comment. Sometimes anonymous commenters are ignorant cranks with an axe to grind; other times they are conscientious citizens with insider information they could get fired (or compromise their source) for sharing on the record. Wallace was quoted in the June 26 (2009) Journal Star as saying Schau is a “really, really bright, talented person … genuinely a nice person, good people skills, good problem solving – Peoria would be well served, lucky, to get her.”
A request for comment from Ms. Schau was not immediately answered.
Mystory: I am a little confused and do not understand for sure what you are saying. Did you report something and not they are going after you? And is “they” an administrator?
MyStory, I hope that you didn’t allow that to be the end of it. Frankly, I believe that as soon as something “bad” happens (that you know will be swept under the rug)–the best policy is to tell as many people as possible. Yes, there’s a risk; however, principals, 150 officials, etc., don’t expect employees to have the courage to speak out. You have just given an example as to why surveillance cameras at PHS will be of little value in making the school safe. To be effective, the tapes will have to be viewed and those enagaging in inappropriate activities will have to suffer the appropriate consequences (the ones promised by school policies). That just won’t happen without a drastic change in mindset.
Sorry, C.J.–this post has gone off on several 150 tangents–no longer on your topic.
FYI, regarding the McArdle case:
Latest information, MD has her own attorney for the CIVIL case that McArdle filed against the District. MD has filed her OWN response.
Doesn’t it seem odd that MD has her OWN attorney, from Decatur?
And why hasn’t that hit the paper? Is that not public knowledge?
Who knows why it isn’t in the paper. Many people think this lawsuit will just “go away”. Newsflash – IT WILL NOT GO AWAY NO MATTER HOW BADLY D150 WISHES IT WOULD!
I wonder when Mary Davis is eligible for retirement. I am sure she is hoping she can continue to collect her pay and then get retirement pay before she is dismissed from the district. I don’t know how any of this works, but if she is found guilty in a civil suit, she can still remain at the district can’t she?
If you were a district that had an employee that caused another employee to sue them for BIG BUCKS, would YOU keep that person on staff? Me thinks there is no question that MANY board policies were broken during MD’s tenure at Lindbergh.
The writing is on the wall. Everyone named in the suit, except the board members, is gone. The question is…will history repeat itself? Will The Titanic change its course, or just hit another iceberg?
Mary Davis sued the district in the past and won. I’m sure she is thinking she can do it again. And, is she the only one sued in a civil suit? Have none of the others been sued or hired their own attorney?
I know that district 150 is being sued by the former principal of Lindbergh. She is sueing Hinton, Broderick, Davis, and the School Board. I heard they only had one attorney for all four parties, until now. Looks like Davis plans to bushwack the district
When Davis won earlier, she was a teacher with representation. Administrators do not have union representation, hence the need to get her own lawyer. As for the PJS, I found it amazing how little “digging” they do to get a story, especially regarding District 150–or the facts to keep the public in the know. I would think that the competition from blogs (and their low circulation) would push them into doing more than reporting what they are fed by District 150.
No, that isn’t correct Sharon. She is being sued while acting as an agent for the district. The district should provide her and all others legal representation. This act by Davis leads me to believe that there is some sort of “blame game” going on at the district. Only time will tell.
sjt–That makes sense.