Unwelcome present from District 203

The letter to the editor below appeared in the January 12, 2006 online edition of the Daily Herald. This letter could have been written by a resident in any school district. These problems exist in school districts across the State.

Unwelcome present from District 203
Christmas time is finally over for me. Four days before Christmas, Naperville Unit District 203 gave me the typical present — over-taxation by levying more taxes than required for operation.

Last week ended the cycle with my health insurance company, giving me and my co-workers cost increases in excess of 25 percent.

These two points may seem unrelated but they both apply and are related to District 203.

Back on Sept. 1, the board voted 5-2 to approve a teacher contract that guarantees large raises, significantly higher than private industry and CPI. Included in this contract, again, is a very generous health insurance package that protects the teacher from health insurance cost increases, but will time and time again further hurt the district’s financial status.

Myself, I have to endure raises that the market will support to keep the consulting firm I work for in business and also have to bear much of my insurance increases for the same reasons.

Then, to further frustrate the community, they will again levy more money than needed for a next year’s operation with the same 5-2 vote. Fortunately there are two board members that fully understand the problem and want to make changes.

Next, there is one board member who understands that there are problems but has yet made the completely right decisions to try and fix the problem.

As for the remaining members, I am not sure what they are all thinking about, but hopefully the community will wake up and let them know there is a problem with the district.

Kevin Hausman

Naperville