Elk Grove Township School District 59 on Monday again rejected what would have been the first charter school in the Chicago suburbs.
The school board rejected the proposed Thomas Jefferson Charter School twice before, citing a weak curriculum and a complicated transportation system. This time the problem was money.
“I agree with the idea of a charter school. But I can’t agree to squander taxpayer dollars on a bankrupt project,” said board member Eugene Diemer.
According to Diemer, the school’s operating budget falls short by hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The school board rejected the plan on a unanimous vote. Board member Laura Powell said that although supporters of the charter school plan had good intentions, “I cannot in good conscious spend taxpayer money on good intent.”
Backers of the plan said they were not ending their quest.
“This is far from over,” said Jackie Gallison, president of the board formed to push the plan.
“Changes are occurring in districts as a result of the charter school movement in the state of Illinois,” she said. “This is going to happen. Change is hard to swallow.”
Gallison said she was disappointed with the outcome Monday night but planned to appeal the decision to the Illinois State Board of Education.
Proponents of the proposed Thomas Jefferson Charter School estimate that the school would cost about $585,000 to operate with a minimum of 96 students. District officials said the cost would be more than $738,000.
The charter school would be primarily supported by District 59 tax dollars. Fees for out-of-district students, if allowed, would be covered by parents or the school district in which the student lives.
Beacon Management Services, a Uxbridge, Mass., company hired by the charter school proponents to manage the school’s daily operations, sought to assure board members at a March 16 meeting that the money to run the school would be there.
“If we need to invest more capital, we will,” said Michael Ronan, chief operating officer of the company.
Barbara Somogyi, president of the District 59 board, said she believed Beacon was a reputable company capable of operating the school.
Nevertheless district officials turned down the proposal.
“We’re not rejecting the charter. We are rejecting a proposal that doesn’t make sense economically,” said Diemer.
Jefferson would be the fifth charter school to appeal rejection by a local board since January, when the new state law went into effect. Three proposed schools in Chicago and one in Libertyville have filed appeals, but no decisions have been made.
The new state law allows the state to overrule a local school board if the charter school proposal was rejected for reasons other than technicalities. The charter school would then be run by the state.
Sally Vogl, a charter school policy analyst for the state, said, “When we review a proposal, we want to determine whether it would be good for the children and if the proposal meets with charter school law.”
Some questions the state might ask are: Will the building be safe? Is the staff qualified? Is the project’s budget financially feasible?
