We don’t need a new school
I have been reading about the new Hall High School where the school board approved building a new school building at a cost of $32 million and demolishing the current building.
Who says we need a new school? Speak up, and don’t use those phony arguments that we need the building to be compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. That argument was initiated in 1991. We solved that then. Even in 1999, they used that same argument along with bringing the building up to code. We solved that in 1999. Now they are using those same arguments again. Do they think we are stupid?
Did any of the board members note the gym is a fairly new building? Did any of the board members note the tax burden on the taxpayer is always higher than what they say?
Next year IVCC has increased its tax burden by 1.7 percent for their new construction. We also have to pay for Bureau County taxes and their retirement IMRF, Hall Township and their Social Security R&B, the Dalzell Grade School and its retirement IMRF, Hall High School and their retirement IMRF, IVCC Social Security, Dalzell Fire District, the village of Dalzell with its Social Security and Bureau County Soil and Water Conservation. Plus, every school district, every township, every town, every fire district will increase their taxing ability by a certain percentage.
The Social Security increased the Medicare medical insurance from $99.90 to $104.90 a month. The governor wants to place on the homeowner the tax of the $90 billion pension benefits they have to pay the teachers.
The politicians create these unsolvable pension benefit problems, and then they dip in the pockets of the taxpayer to bail them out. The sad thing is no one takes politicians to task to throw the rascals out.
The same thing is happening at Hall High School. We initially saw they were going to have the tax burden to be 20-25 years. Now they increased it to 30 years. Why not 50 years? We are presently paying taxes for the $12 million spent to refurbish the school in l999. And these characters are going to add additional taxes on to the taxpayers for the new school.
There are many students who go to Hall from parents who don’t own homes — they rent. Many people are opting out of home ownership. Eventually, there might be only one homeowner in all of the Hall School District, and he will have to bear the burden of the new school.
He and his wife and his children for the next thousand years will have to pay the taxes to benefit those board members and the superintendent who feel the need for a new school.
We don’t need a new school. What we need is a new board and a new superintendent. The country is going to hell with a tax burden that is unsustainable. Vote NO on the referendum; there is nothing wrong with the present school building.
Carlo Olivero
Dalzell
