Park Forest
Residents seek
to save Rich East as district faces facility needs
“We are facing depopulation,” Park Forest Mayor Jonathan Vanderbilt told a small audience that gathered Tuesday night in the auditorium at Rich East High School to examine facility needs.
“District 227 has six ideas, but there are other things that can be done,” Vanderbilt said. “We can start talking about unified K-12 districts. (District 227) isn’t offering us all the solutions.”
Vanderbilt spoke at a forum hosted by the Rich East Boosters Club prior to a larger community meeting at which District 227 officials sought public input on a series of proposals to address facility needs.
Two takeaways from both forums seemed nearly unanimous: Park Forest residents do not want to lose their community high school, and District 227 taxpayers are highly skeptical of a proposal to bus students to the shuttered Lincoln-Way North High School campus in Frankfort.
“We do not want our school closed,” said Randall White, a Rich East alumnus and member of the Park Forest-Chicago Heights School District 163 Board of Education.
The audience loudly applauded residents who spoke out against the proposal to acquire Lincoln-Way North, which closed in 2016 after just eight years of operation.
“I think I’ve gotten some really good input on the Lincoln-Way piece,” District 227 Superintendent Johnnie Thomas told the audience of more than 100 people at Tuesday’s second forum. “I heard that loud and clear.”
During the earlier forum, the smaller audience heard a presentation about consolidation from Steven Cook, a resident of Summit Hill School District 161.
“Closing a school will remove tax dollars from your community and affect your home values,” Cook told the audience of Park Forest residents.
Summit Hill residents have received input on their proposal from the Illinois State Board of Education and are pursuing a feasibility study, Cook said.
Lincoln-Way North opened in 2008 after voters approved a $225 million bond issue. The school’s closing was blamed on enrollment not meeting projections but could have been avoided if the district managed its finances better, Cook said.
“The closing of Lincoln-Way North motivated people to seek answers,” Cook said.
About 45%, or 386 of the state’s 852 school districts are unit districts, Cook said. Consolidating elementary and high school districts can eliminate the need for some costly superintendent and other administrative positions, he said.
Consolidation may help in some situations, but it may not work in Park Forest because of the lack of businesses and commercial real estate to support the tax base, said Christina Dupee, a District 163 school board member.
“Park Forest loves Rich East,” she said. “It’s going to be expensive to repair. … We don’t have the businesses in Park Forest to sustain schools alone.”
District 227 must do something to address declining enrollment and aging facilities.
The district’s three high schools are Rich Central in Olympia Fields, Rich East in Park Forest and Rich South in Richton Park.
Part of District 227’s enrollment decline may be attributed to Southland College Prep, a 530-student public charter school established in 2010 to serve as an educational alternative for Rich Township students.
On Tuesday night, Thomas told the audience that the district expects its enrollment to continue declining to about 2,300 before leveling off after 2022.
The projections are based on enrollment trends in feeder districts, he said.
“We have low enrollment and we have significant repairs that are needed in every one of our buildings,” Thomas said. “Our state funding is predicated on enrollment.”
Alicia Evans, District 227 assistant superintendent of business and operations, presented the six options being considered based on studies and input from contracting, architectural and engineering firms.
The first option would be to repair schools without making any upgrades, she said. The plan would cost an estimated $169 million and would cost the owner of a $160,000 home an additional $239 annually in property taxes, she said.
The second option would be to repair and upgrade all three schools at a cost of $399 million, or $1,132 in additional taxes for the owner of a $160,000 home.
The third option would be to close one school and repair and upgrade the two others. The plan would cost an estimated $285 million if Rich South closes, $241 million if Rich East closes and $282 million if Rich Central closes, she said.
The fourth option is to demolish all three schools and build one new facility on the site of an existing school at a cost of $369 million, Evans said.
The fifth option would be to build a new school, repair and upgrade an existing school and close a third school at an estimated cost of $288 million, she said.
The first five options would require legislative action and voter approval of a tax-increase referendum, Evans told the audience.
The sixth option — to acquire Lincoln-Way North — would cost an estimated $105 million and would not require legislative or voter approval, she said.
Tuesday was the third of five community meetings held to gather input on the proposals.
The final two sessions will be held July 9, at 1 p.m. at the district office in Matteson and at 6 p.m. at Rich Central.
It is not clear when the school board will decide whether to pursue one of the six options or choose another course of action.
“A lot of people are saying a decision has been made,” Thomas told the audience. “A decision has not been made. We are still in the information-gathering stages.”
The district expects that its operating budget will reach deficit status by 2022 if no action is taken to address declining enrollment, he said.
“We are not in a crisis,” Thomas said. “If we don’t make a decision in the near future, we could possibly end up in a crisis.”
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