Invest in students
I have spent years watching what happens in well-funded schools and what happens in underfunded ones. The difference is not effort or dedication. It is money, and where it comes from.
That is why the megaprojects bill moving through Springfield concerns me. The Illinois House passed a 377-page bill letting corporations negotiate their property tax bills for decades rather than paying what they owe. It started as a way to keep the Bears from moving to Indiana, but it goes far beyond football. Any development topping $100 million qualifies, meaning factories, warehouses, and corporate campuses across Illinois could lock in years of reduced tax payments while nearby school districts go without.
When developers stop paying their full tax bills, schools do not stop needing that money. Homeowners make up the difference. Gov. Pritzker’s own office called the property tax relief provision added to win votes “negligible.” On a hypothetical $20 million development payment, a typical homeowner would see $1.29 in relief. Meanwhile corporations walk away paying a fraction of what they owe.
Research shows every dollar invested in public education returns as much as 12 in public benefit through higher wages, reduced public assistance costs, and stronger communities. Illinois is already $6 billion behind on what it has promised its students. This bill makes closing that gap harder.
The McCaskey family has every right to negotiate the best deal they can find. But the rest of Illinois should not have to rewrite its tax code to make it happen, not when that cost falls on school districts and the families who depend on them.
Our students are the best investment this state can make. Springfield should start treating them that way.
Pankaj Sharma
Evanston
Sharma is Secretary-Treasurer of the Illinois Federation of Teachers and President of the North Suburban Teachers Union IFT AFT Local 1274. He teaches history and government at Niles North High School in Skokie, which is part of Niles Township High School District 219.
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