By: Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner
Chicagoans are once again about to become victims of the city’s financial mess, meaning more property tax hikes are on the way.
This time it’s the troubled Chicago Public Schools that’s scrambling to figure out how to pay for $175 million in pension costs for its non-teaching staff, on top of the hundreds of millions of dollars in salary increases currently being negotiated with the Chicago Teachers Union. The junk-rated district is staring at massive deficits over the next few years.
That’s got Mayor Brandon Johnson and the CTU pushing the school district to borrow more money to paper over CPS’ cash flow problems. But more debt eventually means more tax hikes, and property taxes in Chicago have already grown at 3.5 times the rate of inflation over the last decade. Chicagoans can’t take any more hits.
Illinois and Chicago lawmakers won’t pursue the structural reforms needed to fix CPS, so the only real short-term fix is to cut the district’s ballooning costs, most of it fueled by the recent federal covid aid. All-in spending at CPS has nearly doubled to a whopping $30,000 per student since 2017, so there are plenty of places to find savings.
Like shuttering the district’s dozens of near-empty schools. Or rolling back the massive increase in non-teacher staff hired during covid. Or holding the line on teacher salaries, which have also jumped in recent years and are now among the highest in the country.
None of those measures will solve CPS’ core money problems, nor will they do anything to improve Chicago’s abysmal reading and math scores. They are only financial band-aids. But in the short-term, such cuts would protect Chicagoans, especially the city’s most vulnerable, from more tax pain. Just ask the residents of Pilsen, where property taxes have spiked in recent years.
Yes, we know Mayor Johnson won’t pursue cost cutting, but for the record, here’s what needs to happen.
Shutter empty schools. Operating more than one hundred schools at less than 50% capacity, especially when the district is shrinking and in dire financial straits, is ludicrous. CPS’ 20 most-empty schools are, on average, just 15% occupied. The schools have space for nearly 23,000 students, but they enroll only 3,500.
The worst, Douglass High School, has just 28 children in a building meant for 912 – a 3% occupancy rate. It costs the district $93,000 per student to keep the school open.
As for the “we need community schools” argument, that’s hard to justify. These schools are empty shells of their former selves. It would far better serve Chicagoans and students if the city’s children attended full, more thriving schools.
Shutting down those 20 schools would save about $100 million in operating costs alone. Close the district’s 100 most-empty schools, and it would save several hundreds of millions.
Roll back the massive hiring done during covid. The district’s budget documents show CPS went on a 9,000-job hiring spree during and after covid, for a total staff increase of 25%, even as enrollment fell by more than 35,000 students (down 10%).
That spree included more than 6,000 new administrators and support staff, which makes no sense for a shrinking district that’s moving towards insolvency. Rolling back those non-teacher hires would save the district – and taxpayers – hundreds of millions.
Freeze salaries. The average teacher salary at CPS is currently $96,000 – a result of Mayor Lightfoot’s previous contract that she called the “most generous offer in CPS history.”
Now that average is set to jump to more than $130,000 over the next four years, as the district is about to give 8% annual salary hikes to teachers in the new contract.
Everyday Chicagoans can’t afford such costs. They aren’t getting 8%-plus raises, nor do they have four-year contracts that guarantee them salary increases in the first place. The right thing to do is freeze CPS salaries.
Chicago’s teachers are already some of the nation’s highest paid educators. Contract data collected by the National Council on Teacher Quality shows Chicago pays its new teachers the highest starting salary among the nation’s 150 largest school districts, after adjusting for cost of living. More senior CPS teachers receive pay that’s 2nd- or 3rd-highest in the country.
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The district’s covid money is gone, its deficits are growing and city officials are trapped. Their go-to ideas of more debt and more tax hikes will only hasten the decline of the city and the outflow of residents.
Rather than hit everyday Chicagoans again, for now the right answer is to roll back the excesses at CPS, bringing costs in line with what residents can afford.
Read more from Wirepoints:
- Chicago property taxes rise 3.5 times faster than inflation in last decade
- Chicago Public Schools should reject union demands for 9% yearly raises and implement a salary freeze instead.
- One big reason Chicago Public Schools is facing a billion-dollar deficit
- One of the first targets for an Illinois DOGE? Chicago’s 20 nearly-empty, failing schools. Here’s the 2025 list.
Audio and summary 
If this bill passes, say goodbye to local control over all Illinois parks and expect to see open drug and alcohol use, needles, no sanitation and fire hazards, but no ordinary park users.
With Pedro Martinez on his way out, there is a golden moment of opportunity here. Martinez can push for these reforms, and the board can use him as a scapegoat, deflecting blame. Everybody in the city who does not work for CPS knows that these steps are not only necessary but common sense too. This would show that Martinez is a bold leader, willing and unafraid to do what is needed. Heck, his next job could even be mayor. But he has to take the first step. Is he brave enough to do the right thing?
The school board needs to run the schools like a business. Close near empty schools and have the staff follow the students. But wait, principals would loose their jobs and might have to teach again. Throwing more money at schools has not helped students test scores. CPS needs to be fiscally responsible in spite of CTU.
OH no, an empty school building might be turned into a charter school.Can’t risk that