District 204 needs to change course

Next month, it will be three years since voters told Indian Prairie School District 204 "NO" to the idea of a third high school. But the district, undeterred by the vote and confident they could overturn the will of the voters, hired The Center for Community Opinion (CCO) to do just that. The CCO "surveyed" residents, surveys paid for with taxpayer money.

Then, using the results of these surveys against the residents who paid for them, the district set out to flip the vote by using scare tactics about overcrowding and split shifts as well as a carrot promising no tax increase.

But these deceptions weren't enough. The district wanted to ensure the yes vote, so the district went on a road show, promising certain boundaries based on a third high school site called Brach-Brodie. Now, two years after the district flipped the vote, the facts are starting to come out.

We now see that elementary school enrollment has declined the last two years in a row and the district has backed away from the high school enrollment numbers used to "sell" the referendum. The district now projects that high school enrollment will peak in 2011 and then decline. In fact, their latest projections show that in a few short years, enrollment will be back down to the same number of students that we have today.

But, the district isn't done wasting your money yet. Now the district is going to blow millions fighting district residents who are starting to see through the district's deceits. The district now wants to change the boundaries and the location of the third high school to a site surrounded by high voltage power lines on two sides and railroad tracks on a third! In addition, the site could be possibly polluted from a peaker plant.

Will the district stop at nothing? It's time to move on. The district should admit its past failings and apologize to the public. At a minimum, they need to cancel the third high school because the facts show there is no need.

Paul White

Naperville