Editorial: When school boards ride in limousines and students lack the basics

Chicago Tribune

02-06-2025

With inflation straining families and tax bills rising year after year, it's no surprise that public spending draws more scrutiny. The recent revelations about conference travel spending by Country Club Hills District 160 are a reminder that even small examples of waste can undermine public trust — especially when students are being left behind.
District 160 spent $25,000 last year on conference travel for board members — including limousines, four-star hotels and upscale dining — even as just 18% of students are proficient in reading, 8% of students are proficient in math, and parents report classrooms without spelling lists or winter heat.
Attending conferences is fairly normal, but high-cost travel, even if it may represent only a fraction of the overall district budget, is grating for folks who watch their property taxes go up year after year. Taxpayers are left wondering: Was this essential?
About 70% of that school district is considered low-income, and the median household income is $77,463, which is over $4,000 lower than the statewide level. District 160 serves just 993 students.
Yet, board members spent thousands on high-end hotels and limousine services, according to the Daily Southtown. Spending in 2024 includes $3,804 on limousine rides to and from O'Hare International Airport, which ranged from $348 to $438 each, with door-to-door service for individual board members.
District 160 board members spent over $16,800 on a conference in Dallas, including hotel costs at a four-star hotel and upscale dining, according to a Chicago Tribune report.
Meanwhile, parents in the district are wondering why basic needs aren't being met, including addressing student outcomes and building issues.
'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,' parent Latisha Hearon told the Daily Southtown. '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.'
Another parent expressed frustration over a school building being without heat for several days after students returned from time off over the Thanksgiving holiday.
Parents have every right to ask these questions and raise these concerns, and when students are falling behind, parents are right to demand answers about where the money is going.
And especially as families are feeling squeezed by their property taxes, the rising costs of good and services, and now as they stare down the seemingly endless prospect of tax hikes at the state and local level, every penny counts. When classrooms go cold in November, families don't want to hear that public dollars were spent on luxury airport rides.
This isn't just a one-district problem. Other Illinois school boards have also drawn scrutiny for spending large sums to attend conferences. An Illinois Watchdog investigation from before the pandemic showed that several suburban districts were spending big to attend the 2018 Illinois Association of School Boards' annual conference in Chicago.
Algonquin Community School District 300 sent 17 people and spent $17,050 total, with the majority of the cost on hotel and registration.
Crystal Lake District 47 sent 11 people and spent $12,213, including over $1,100 on parking.
Huntley District 15 sent 13 people and spent $16,561, with most of the cost on hotel and registration.
Bloomington District 87 spent more than $18,000 over the course of the three-day event, with all seven school board members in attendance — some accompanied by their spouses.
When a business has important needs to meet or is facing a funding pinch, they cut back on nonessential costs. School districts should employ the same principle, making sure resources are focused where they'll do the most good.