Shutdown could force more borrowing at ISD166

Cook County Schools could face the prospect of more borrowing to meet current expenses if state aids don’t come though after a potential state government shutdown July 1. ISD166 Superintendent Beth Schwarz…

“The potential closure that’s going to happen as of July 1st will have a great deal of impact on the district depending upon what happen in the court decision about what actually will be shut down. One possibility is that we will not see our funding in July.”

Schwarz said the district would need to borrow in order to meet payroll and other expenses. She said how much would depend upon how long a shutdown would be. She also said there is some misinformation about whether or not the district would need to borrow.

“One thing I’ve heard since people have been talking about the shutdown is that ISD166 is kind of immune to that because of our levy that the voters graciously passed last fall. It’s really important for voters to recognize those were limited funds. We do not have an unlimited levy. The levy approved approximately $370,000 for the district.

“Out of that $370,000 actually our next year’s revenue is only $35,000. The reason is because the $370,000 was eaten up by fewer students – we have declining enrollment – so some of the funds go to cover that gap. There were also some changes in federal funding, stimulus money starting to go away. There were also some changes in the state funding with special education.

“So out of that $370,000 – which certainly has helped, if we had not received that from the voters, we would be having significant deep and very painful, painful reductions this spring. But fortunately our voters did come through and we’re avoiding that.”

Schwarz said the school’s biggest worry is that due to a shutdown, ISD166 will not receive its July aid payments, which will affect how much they would need to borrow, and that means interest payments.

“We actually have a line of credit we’ve had to go into because of our June payroll. We’ll have to go into that even further if our July payments are in fact not sent out.”

Hear the entire attached interview with Superintendent Schwarz. More on relocating school offices, budget and the temporary public library space in the school.