Noland now backing bill to fix District 158 shortage

Proponents of an effort to fix an issue costing Huntley Unit District 158 an estimated $2 million in lost state aid each year picked up another ally this week.

State Sen. Michael Noland, an Elgin Democrat, is now a co-sponsor of the school funding bill currently awaiting a vote in the state House after passing the Senate and a House committee.

The bill would allow multicounty districts to more accurately calculate the amount of state aid they will receive each year.

The issue arises when a county clerk makes a bad estimate on the value of property in a neighboring county, leading the state to overestimate the amount of property taxes a district will collect.

Because state officials think the district is getting more local revenue than it is actually collecting, the district gets a correspondingly smaller allotment of state aid.

The issue has the potential to arise in any school district that overlaps counties - including the state's second-largest district, Elgin Area School District U-46.

Tony Quagliano, a former District 158 board member and school finance expert who is leading the charge to get the legislation passed, says U-46, which includes parts of Cook, Kane and DuPage counties, could be losing millions of dollars in state aid each year because of the same issue District 158 is facing.

U-46 is Noland's turf. "They're a real hurting unit," he said of the district's receipt of state aid. "We have to stop the bleeding."

The bill has stalled in the state House after passing the Senate and a House committee.

Noland, who signed on after the bill passed the Senate, said he first began looking into the issue last week, at the urging of state Sen. Pam Althoff, a Crystal Lake Republican, one of its original sponsors.

He said he hasn't yet talked with U-46 officials about the legislation.

"In their defense, it's an obscure part of our state statute," Noland said.

The legislation would provide a formula fix to multi-county districts. However, U-46 spokesman Tony Sanders noted that the legislation would be written into a portion of the law where adjustments to districts' general state aid are capped each year at $25 million, a large portion of those funds doled out to Chicago Public Schools.

U-46 Chief Financial Officer John Prince said he has not yet had time to fully analyze how the issue might affect U-46, because of a tremendous amount going on internally at the district in recent weeks.

Noland said that he was planning to speak with state Reps. Keith Farnham and Fred Crespo about the bill Wednesday afternoon.

"The collective conscience of the General Assembly is just coming up to speed on this," he said.

The legislative session closes at the end of this month.