Huntley District 158 recognizes outstanding students, talks 2020 tax levy, and more at the January 21 BOE meeting

HUNTLEY – Before jumping into the nitty gritty of the Board of Education’s agenda items for the night, some time was taken to recognize students who were chosen to represent District 158 (D158) schools, Huntley High and Heineman Middle School, in this year’s Illinois Music Education Association (ILMEA) Senior Festival and Junior Honor Band.

Leah Novak, the Department Chair for fine arts and world languages at Huntley High School, outlined to meeting attendees, what the honorary high school students who participated in the festival, did as part of their invitation.

While the festival was held virtually this year, the chosen high school students were able to attend a motivational keynote with University of Illinois Associate Director of Bands and Marching Illini Director Dr. Barry Houser. Afterwards, the students were given the opportunity to attend two master classes specific to their instrument and ensemble.

One of the student participants, Olivia Gatto, was extended an additional invitation to participate in the All-State Festival. Where according to Novak, “she’ll be performing on piano which makes her, actually one of the top high school piano players in the state.”

Speaking on behalf of the Heineman Middle School students who were selected for the ILMEA Junior Honor Band, was music and band teacher Pam Jorgensen.

Jorgensen made it a point to say that hundreds of students audition each year, but only half are selected.

“As you can imagine, the audition process is quite intense. The [students] had to submit a video of themselves playing extremely difficult music and any little mistake meant the difference between making it or not making it,” Jorgensen told meeting attendees.

Moving on from there, the Board began discussions to more serious topics of finances for the district, which meant expanding more on D158’s decision to move forward with asking for an increase in requested funds from the 2020 County tax levy to be paid by taxpayers in the 2021 tax bill.

Essentially what this means for Huntley residents, is in order to ensure D158 has the ability to cover potential shortfalls in finances for the year to come, they requested 2020 taxes for McHenry and Kane Counties to be levied at a slightly higher tax rate percentage.

According to D158 Chief Financial Officer for fiscal services Mark Altmayer, this would make the 2020 tax levy for both McHenry and Kane Counties balloon at a rate of 1.5% or an increase by approximately $1 million, also including a 2.3% increase in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) in accordance to the Property Tax Extension Limitation Law (PTELL), bringing the total levy request just shy of $70 million.

Altmayer noted that despite the district’s request for an increase in the 2020 tax levy, D158 is still considered having the lowest tax rate in McHenry County. He also explained that D158 is in need of significant additional funding due to being inadequately funded by the state and through means of commercial property wealth.

While there was an outcry from some Board members against the increase in taxes, the proposition for the 2020 tax levy was ultimately passed by the BOE in the December 17, 2020 BOE meeting.

In the Jan 21 meeting, Superintendent Dr. Scott Rowe discussed three possibilities in which the district could give back to residents, should there be a surplus of funds available.

“There could be a debt abatement and a debt abatement would have the goal of negating an increase to the 2021 tax levy where there are taxpayers listed. Therefore, our residents would not realize the tax increase next year to the extent that we are able to afford. Meaning if we’re able to declare a surplus of a certain number of dollars we can dedicate a certain number, say it’s a million dollars. We can give a million dollars towards abating those taxes that we can reduce the amount that they would have to pay assuming the levy is passed next December,” Rowe said.

He continued, “[The] second option, we can simply cut checks to our families of breaks that the percentage offers. Basically use [that] as a [registration] fee reimbursement for this year. The third [option], we could reduce the fees that we would be charging our families for next year. All options could be undertaken. They all have positives. They all have challenges.”

Rowe gave the Board members the opportunity to voice their opinions on what they believe would be the best approach for how the district could allocate the surplus in funds, should there be any.

The Board members offered various solutions into what they believed would benefit the most people, but ultimately BOE President Tony Quagliano put it best by stating the following, “We’re not the richest school out there. Should we really be pushing money back? But I think it’s more a function of the times and the function of this specific year as to the favorability of the year and to the cause of that favorability. Is it more compelling to focus on [our] families who [we] state have a contract with [us] or is it to the community as a whole that actually provided the money, and I think that I need to keep coming back to the, whose provided the money primarily in this case,” he said.

“Again, if you look proportionally at the registration fees to the property taxes that are generated, obviously the property taxes are considerably more, percentage wise and I just think that’s because that’s where the source of those funds is coming from…that’s why I suggested more of a hybrid approach so that you are pushing back some money on the registration fees but still focused more on the community as a whole type of thing.”

Rowe commented that there are no right or wrong answers and thanked the BOE members for their input on the matter. Since it is too soon to tell whether there will be a surplus of funds or not, no further action will be taken for the time being.

As a final note, Quagliano addressed some comments from the public regarding certain schools that have chosen a full return to in-person learning.

He reported that all but one school in McHenry County have elected a hybrid model of learning. That one school that returned to full in-person instruction, is Riley Community Consolidated School District 18 that serves roughly 300 students total.

Geneva School District 304 is the only school district in Kane County that is allowing a mostly full return to in-person learning, according to Quagliano. Though they do still dedicate at least a few days to remote learning for its students.