Country Club Hills Elementary District 160, where 69.6% of students are considered low income, has spent more than $25,000 in 2024 on conferences for board members, according to a Daily Southtown analysis of district financial records.

Between January 2024 to 2025, the seven-member board and Superintendent Duane Meighan spent $25,209 on registrations, travel, lodging and meals for conferences in Washington, San Diego, Dallas, New Orleans, Las Vegas and downtown Chicago, records show.

Over the course of the year, board members attended eight conferences including one each in January, April, September and October, and two each in February and November.

Expenditure reports for all eight conferences show the district did not initially allocate any money for travel when the fiscal budget was approved. Later, the budget was amended to include $63,177 which the district spent about 40% of that with a remaining $37,967.94 left to spend.

While it’s relatively common in Illinois for school boards to use taxpayer dollars for professional development opportunities, including out-of-state conferences, some parents in the district raised concerns about the frequency with which board members attend such conferences and the lack of actionable information they say is brought back to benefit students.

Meighan did not respond to messages from the Daily Southtown and declined to comment when approached after Tuesday’s school board meeting.

Jacqueline Doss, who was board president until Sharon Mack was recently appointed to the role, also declined to comment when approached after leaving the room during the meeting’s closed session, telling the Southtown she would “never” comment.

Mack, who became president at a special meeting May 8, said she does not yet have enough information to comment. Mack returned to the board in April, two years after she lost a reelection bid in 2023, according to the Cook County clerk’s office election results.

Travel expense reports show board members regularly use limousine services to go to and from the airport when traveling on the district’s dime, and have indulged in steak dinners sometimes for $300 a person on one meal.

In February 2024, board members and the superintendent spent $3,804 on O’Hare limousine rides to and from the airport, returning from a conference in Washington, D.C., and departing for another in San Diego, records show. Limousine rides ranged from $348 to $438 each, and receipts show board members took individual vehicles, with pickups and drop-offs at their respective homes.

“The spending is out of hand,” said Sequoia Williams, a district parent and outspoken critic of the school board.

“Typically, when you do a conference for work, if it’s like a 45-minute drive, you just drive to the conference from your house, you don’t go and get a hotel,” Williams said, referring to district spending on hotel stays for the annual Illinois Association of School Boards conference held in Chicago. “There’s no reason for you to stay there. It’s OK if maybe you had a conference you guys paid one night, it’s excessive money for anything else.”

Board members stayed at the 4-star Renaissance Hotel in Chicago for the 2024 state association conference held Nov. 21-23. Two rooms were booked for one night and one room was booked for two nights totaling $1,158 for the stay.

Meighan shared program guides for some of the conferences with the Daily Southtown, which showed the events focused on professional development, leadership training and policy discussions, with workshops, keynote speakers and networking opportunities.

Annie McGowan, policy and research director at the Civic Federation, a budget watchdog group, said there should be a per diem for meals and set parameters on travel expenses, including appropriate hotel and transportation standards.

“Typically, a government agency is going to be trying to find something that is reasonable, not necessarily the highest cost option,” McGowan said. “Parents and community members would want to know if money is being wasted on expenses, and maybe it’s worthwhile to be going to all of these things, but the way that they’re approaching booking the hotels and the travel could be done in a less costly way.”

A trip to Dallas

The Daily Southtown examined expenses accrued at the annual Consortium of State School Boards Association Conference held in Dallas Feb. 22-25, 2024. The conference is a national event for school board members and education leaders to network, learn about trends and best practices and discuss important issues facing public education, according to the consortium’s website.

Brian Bare, a partner at Petrarca, Gleason, Boyle & Izzo, the firm that represents the school district in legal matters, said the conference was attended by Meighan, former board members Michael Humphrey and Alesia Franklin and current members Doss and Doris Blackwell.

According to expense reports obtained by the Daily Southtown through a Freedom of Information Act request, board members spent more than $16,800 on the conference.

More than $8,200 of that went toward hotel costs at the four-star Hilton Anatole in Dallas, which hosted the event.

Three members stayed Feb. 21-25, with individual room charges of $1,510, $1,560 and $1,776. Another stayed Feb. 22-25 at a cost of $1,092, and one stayed Feb. 22-26 for $1,411. Additional lodging charges included $593 for another night at the Hilton Anatole Feb. 21 and $260 for one night at the DoubleTree Hotel Feb. 21.

Transportation costs included $1,320 for a ride with Dallas Black Car and Limo, $120 with Larry Limo and six Uber trips.

Dining expenses included $544 at SER Steak and Spirits, the high-end steakhouse on the Hilton Anatole’s 27th floor, and $1,605 at Nick & Sam’s, another upscale Dallas steakhouse.

‘It’s excessive’

Parents in the district, which includes Zenon J. Sykuta Elementary, Meadowview Intermediate and Southwood Middle School, say the schools are in disrepair, busing fails to meet students’ needs, academic performance is declining and students are forced to use outdated laptops.

Parents told board members Tuesday they largely feel left in the dark about what happens in the schools, and have advocated for the creation of a Parent-Teacher Organization to support student achievement.

“We want to know why fleets of limousines are being taken on the district’s budget, but we don’t have money for the children right now,” said Williams, who has children at Southwood Middle and Meadowview Intermediate. “We currently have a broken toilet in the girl’s bathroom, and there’s a bag over it that has been there for three weeks.”

“We need some answers.”

Latisha Hearon, a parent who enrolled her children in the district for the first time this year, criticized the district for failing to provide a curriculum that aligns with grade-level expectations in other schools. She said she has been trying to volunteer in classrooms to support teachers but claims the district has delayed her background check.

“There’s only two weeks left of school, but yet it’s been 30 days since my daughter came home with homework. For the last four months, she could only bring home four pages per week of what they’re doing in class,” said Latisha Hearon, a parent who enrolled her children in the district for the first time this year.

“My fifth grader cannot show me how to do exponents. For the last three months, we’ve been going back and forth with time tables and multiplication. She can’t add three digit numbers. She don’t know division,” Hearon said. “My third grader, I’m literally in the classroom asking the teacher what is going on with spelling words. I haven’t seen the spelling list all year.”

Mack told parents she approves of creating a PTO, and instructed Meighan to meet with parents and the school’s principals to come up with a plan before the next board meeting.

In the 2023–24 school year, 8.4% of District 160 students scored proficient in math and 18.1% in English language arts on the Illinois Assessment of Readiness, which measures how well students in grades 3–8 are progressing toward state standards, according to the Illinois State Board of Education.

While these figures represent an improvement from the previous year, when 4.9% were proficient in math and 8.5% in English language arts, they remain well below the state averages of 27.9% in math and 39.4% in English language arts.

Williams was outraged in December when she learned Southwood Middle was without heat for several days after students returned from Thanksgiving break.

The district attributed the issue to HVAC problems in a small number of rooms across two buildings, but Williams said it wasn’t the first time one of the schools had a problem and the district failed to notify parents.

Williams said the district also does not provide busing for all students, as those living within a certain distance are expected to walk. However, she believes this is unsafe, noting the lack of sidewalks near the schools forces students to walk along the main road.

Whenever she brings her concerns to the board, Williams said she does not get any answers.

Groceries, meals and flowers

District 160 credit card statements obtained by the Daily Southtown show monthly balances mostly exceeding $40,000 between November 2024 and March 2025. The only exception was January, which had a lower balance of $14,765. The highest was in March at $51,983, with the months averaging $45,000.

The statements show board members have used district funds to cover expenses including groceries, flowers and meals in a number of restaurants in the southwest suburbs, including Orland Park, Tinley Park, Homewood, Matteson and Hazel Crest, as well as donations, Amazon purchases and DoorDash orders.

In February, the district spent $3,095 at a store in Chicago and expensed it under groceries or sundries. Another charge was made for $254.65 at a Walgreens in Homewood. In December, $880 was spent at JA-ROCK Express Jerk in Country Club Hills, and in October, $1,857 was charged at the Apple Store in Orland Park.

“It’s excessive,” Williams said. “We don’t have money for anything else.”

Williams started a petition, which gathered 123 signatures, calling for Meighan’s resignation. She said she and other parents are urging families not to enroll their children next year unless their concerns are addressed.

smoilanen@chicagotribune.com