Unit 5 Tax Referendum – The Sequel is coming soon to a precinct near you. The same tax referendum that was on the November ballot and failed will be back on the ballot again in April. The Unit 5 School Board believes that explaining cuts that might potentially be needed in more depth, should the referendum fail, could change enough voters minds to get it passed.
At a special meeting on Wednesday, the board passed a resolution to put the referendum on the April ballot. The special meeting was necessary to get the paperwork for the referendum on the ballot. The deadline for that paperwork to be turned in is January 17th. Unit 5’s next regularly scheduled board meeting is January 19th.
Board member Jeremy DeHaai shared his thoughts during discussion of the resolution saying, “I think we need to dot I’s and cross T’s as far as if it doesn’t happen [pass] this is what it is going to take place to the point that I think we should vote on things that would be cut assuming it doesn’t pass in April and then if it does we can go back and review it after the fact.”
Board member Alan Kalitzky said during discussion, “There comes a point in which you are no longer going to be able to function as a district if you can’t supply the funds that are appropriate,” he said. “And that $12 million dollar deficit is really getting us to that edge. We are going to be insolvent. We are not going to be able to operate at a level that this community thinks that it is going to be able to and that it is hoping for us to provide.”
Also during discussion Unit 5 School Board Superintendent Dr. Kristen Weikle stated, “Frankly, we can’t cut our way out of this. You know, we don’t want to desecrate our educational system to a point where we can’t return. Because It’s not we as adults who are suffering. It’s our kids. And it’s not only our current students, but our future students in Unit 5.”
During open comment at the beginning of the meeting, school board candidate Brad Wurth spoke expressing his opposition to the referendum saying, “We heard pretty clearly from the community that this referendum is not something that the community supports. I think we heard that again in November when the vote the first time it went through was shot down.”
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Cities 92.9 spoke with Unit 5 School Board Vice President Stan Gozur after the meeting and he told us, “Last year the cuts were $2 million. That was approximately 40 to 45 positions.” Gozur continued, “So if you are looking at putting a numeric value roughly those $2 million in cuts in addition to other things that we did translates to approximately 45 individuals.”
Previously Cities 92.9 ran a scenario saying if the referendum failed 200 jobs might have to be cut by Unit 5. Gozurs method leads to an even scarier number, approximately 270 positions.
There is no question Unit 5 has serious budget issues. The question is can Unit 5 convince voters between now and April that the only way to solve this problem is by raising taxes without making any more cuts?