ROCHELLE — The Rochelle Elementary School District and the Rochelle Township High School District will have an item on their December meeting agendas on whether or not they will support placing a county facility sales tax on the ballot of an upcoming election, Shared Rochelle Schools District Superintendent Jason Harper said in an email Dec. 4. 

Both boards heard presentations on the topic at their November meetings. A law passed in 2007 to allow for a county-wide sales tax in Illinois to benefit schools for expenses including facilities, security, mental health services and school resource officers. The sales tax must pass in a county by referendum during an election. That has not taken place in Ogle County, and the measure failed on the ballot locally back in 2013. There are 57 counties in Illinois that have the county schools facilities sales tax.

Harper said at the November meetings that other Ogle County school districts are looking at passing resolutions in support of placing a county schools facilities sales tax referendum on the ballot for a future election. To get onto the ballot, school boards representing more than 50 percent of students must pass support resolutions. The referendum would have to pass on the ballot county-wide. The sales tax can be a maximum of one percent in quarter-percent increments. 

If the Rochelle districts and other county school districts wanted the sales tax issue on the next election in March, the deadline to pass resolutions of support is Jan. 2.

The additional sales tax would apply to items that are already taxed, with the exception of vehicles and unprepared food. Based on the most recent numbers, a county schools facility sales tax could net RTHS $443,491 per year and the elementary district $813,202 per year. Along with facilities, security, mental health services and school resource officers, the money can be used to abate property taxes and make rates lower for property owners within the district.

“Based on levy data from this year, these revenues represent up to approximately an eight-cent abatement on the high school district’s levy and an almost 21-cent abatement on the elementary district’s tax levy,” Harper said. “Together, the sales tax represents a potential 29-cent property tax offset for Rochelle residents.”

The RTHS district has a high school building that was built 20 years ago, and Harper said last month that the facility need is not present for that district. The elementary school district has seen large expenses recently as it deals with aging buildings. Tilton Elementary School was built in 1949. Central Elementary School was built in 1939 and May Elementary School was built in 1959.

It was said at the Rochelle Elementary School District’s November meeting that it could leverage that hypothetical $813,000 a year in new sales tax funds into about $8.8 million in projects. 

The elementary district is currently in the process of starting renovations at Tilton School. The board plans to pursue $14-16 million worth of needed upgrades at the school after finding in a health life safety evaluation that an estimated $7.8 million worth of work is required at the school for those issues. The district plans to issue bonds for that money in coming months and wants to utilize an additional $6-8 million from its reserves for other improvements involving security and spatial concerns including its pickup and drop off areas.

Harper stressed that the school boards’ only decisions will be whether or not to support putting the county schools facility sales tax on the ballot for the community to vote on. 

“Both districts support the voters in our community having a direct voice in determining how our community funds its schools,” Harper said. “If our voters want to stay with our current approach which is based on property taxes, the districts will continue to operate as we have. If the community chooses to include sales tax revenues as a way to help fund schools, both schools will decide how to spend these new revenues on allowable costs which in turn can lower property tax rates.”

Both Rochelle school districts utilize school resource officer programs, which is an allowable use for potential county schools facility sales tax funds. 

“And both districts will always have ongoing facility costs,” Harper said. “Both of these costs, plus any costs for mental health support for our students, are allowable uses of these funds. Since both districts have these costs now which we address through property tax levies, the districts could abate future property tax levies by using sales tax funds.”

The idea of sales tax helping to fund schools is not the typical approach for communities in Illinois, Harper said. In terms of public schools finance, the burden for funding local schools falls on property owners through property taxes each year. The facility sales tax offers a different way to collect revenues which could offset the typical property tax funding process.

Other Ogle County school districts are considering resolutions of support to place the county schools facility sales tax on the ballot for voters to decide on, and the support for it among those districts has historically been strong, Harper said. 

“Dating back to the first time a county schools facility sales tax initiative was on the ballot in 2013, there has been an ongoing level of support from other county school boards to allow the county’s voters to weigh in on this funding concept again,” Harper said.