The Evanston City Council voted unanimously Monday night to give the city’s two school districts an extra barricade against the flow of border-crashing students by altering city regulations on residential rental agreements.
The council voted 9-0 in favor of changing the city’s landlord and tenant regulations to require that rental agreements contain the full names and birth dates of all occupants in rental dwellings.
The school districts hope this latest initiative, which takes effect Aug. 1, will deter non-Evanston students from Chicago and neighboring suburbs from illegally registering at any of the north suburb’s 16 schools.
Officials at Evanston school Districts 65 and 202 estimate that nearly 200 students last year did not live within Evanston boundaries and illegally attended Evanston schools. Students who attend Evanston schools must either be Evanston residents or live with a relative or legal guardian in Evanston. About 7,500 students attend Evanston schools.
Officials at Evanston/Skokie School District 65, who are considering cutbacks due to financial troubles, estimate that last year alone the district spent more than $600,000 to educate non-resident pupils.
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And officials at Evanston School District 202 said they spend several hundred thousand dollars each year on extra teachers and other services in order to meet the pressures put on the system by out-of-district students.
Starting this September, students claiming they live with a relative or guardian, other than their parents, will be required to bring the rental agreement with them as proof of Evanston residency when registering at either school district.
“Non-residents cost us a lot of money. I know these changes will help, and we’re not going to stop the other things we’re already doing,” said Robert Dawkins, director of pupil services with District 65.
Dawkins said families living outside Evanston send their children to Evanston schools because they believe the schools are safer or because they feel their children may get a better education.
The problem, he said, is that some non-resident students claim they are living with an Evanston relative or guardian, but upon checking officials discover the students actually do not live at the Evanston address.
The council’s revamping of the landlord-tenant regulations marks the city and school district’s latest effort to crack down on non-resident students.
The school districts already require that students coming from other areas to live with a relative or guardian in Evanston submit a signed affidavit in which the relative or guardian swears the student is living with them.
Truant officers from both school districts rountinely make late evening and early morning house calls to the Evanston address given on the affidavits, Dawkins said.
He said truant officers also stake out the Howard Street CTA station and trail suspect school-age children coming from Chicago who they believe may be headed for Evanston schools.
Dawkins said District 65 identified 74 students at its schools last year who did not live in Evanston. Most, he said, came from Chicago and were attending either Oakton, Washington or Dawes elementary schools.