DISTRICT 202 FORGOES $75 MILLION BOND PLAN

Officials in Plainfield Community Consolidated School District 202 on Thursday scrapped plans to submit a $75 million bond plan to area voters in March after learning the district would have a tough time qualifying for a state matching grant.

District officials had hoped to seek voter approval of the bond issue in the March 17 primary election in lieu of an $84.9 million bond issue approved by district voters in November.

The new plan was designed to take advantage of a state school construction matching grant program approved by the Illinois legislature last month as part of the state’s school funding reform bill. However, District 202 officials learned Wednesday from the Illinois State Board of Education that, “The way the rules and regulations with respect to the grant program came down, we didn’t see any way that we would qualify for a matching grant,” said Jon Balke, District 202’s assistant superintendent for administrative and instructional services.

“So, we said to ourselves, Why go through the hassle and confuse the voters by holding the referendum? Moreover, it was indicated to us that we might even jeopardize our chances of getting a debt service grant on the bond issue that was passed in November if we persisted in putting the new referendum on the ballot.”

The Plainfield district was one of two in the area that had referendum plans snarled by the new state program. The other was Naperville School District 204, long the most rapidly growing district in the state. That school district held an emergency session Thursday night to scrap plans for an $80 million bond issue it had voted to put on the ballot three days ago.

In Plainfield, voters approved the district’s $84.9 million bond-issue plan in November so that the district could expand Plainfield High School and build a second high school, middle school and two elementary schools.

The new facilities, according to district officials, are needed to meet the district’s rapid growth, which currently is increasing at the rate of 1,000 new students a year.

After the district succeeded in winning approval for the bond issue, the state legislature approved the school financial reform bill, part of which provides matching grants in 1998 and 1999 to school districts undertaking new construction.

Hoping to qualify for up to $26.5 million in state construction matching grants, the District 202 school board decided at a special board meeting Saturday to hold a new referendum in March, seeking voter re-endorsement of all but $9.9 million of the $84.9 million the voters approved in November.

“But, according to the state board’s interpretation, only school districts that are currently overcrowded qualify,” said District 202 board member Kenneth M. Hummel. “I guess they don’t consider the fact that our enrollment has been and is growing by leaps and bounds as fitting their definition of overcrowding.

“Hopefully, the state legislature will be able to rectify the situation so that school districts like ours, which are experiencing explosive growth, can qualify for the construction grants,” Hummel said. “For now, however, we don’t have much choice but to pull the referendum.”

All of this apparently stemmed from a huge misinterpretation by many local school districts and legislators, who thought all proposals passed since Jan. 1, 1996, would be eligible for larger construction grants. Officials at the Illinois State Board of Education announced last week, however, that construction grants only applied to those plans filed after Jan. 1, 1998. Proposals filed previously, such as District 204’s plan for $109.5 million approved in March , would only qualify for much lesser debt service grants.

The prospect of reapproving last year’s plan seemed absurd, but it had quickly won support.

Basically, the new plan was an attempt by the district to work around a technical loophole to obtain the money from the state it thought it was originally entitled to, and thereby lower the cost for local taxpayers, according to school board president Mark Metzger.

“When I was asked, aren’t you just maneuvering to qualify for this funding? I say, unashamedly, yes,” Metzger said.