Billionaire Illinois Gov. Prtizker rejects additional funding for Chicago schools, paving the way for massive cuts

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Billionaire Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker will not allocate additional state funding to Chicago’s public schools, he said in remarks to the Chicago Sun-Times published

Friday night.

The article was a public intervention by Pritzker in the ongoing contract negotiations between CPS and the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU). With the district facing a funding shortfall of more than $500 million, it is becoming clear that massive cuts are coming. A confrontation is brewing between teachers and the Democratic Party, which controls city and state governments, along with the Democrats’ allies in the union bureaucracy.

Since the last contract expired on June 30, CTU officials have largely kept workers in the dark about what’s coming. But in a recent member webinar on the budget, the union suggested that without additional funding, the budget presented by CPS CEO Pedro Martinez would require layoffs of between 2,000 and 3,000 teachers, along with additional costs and expenses that would be added to the budget, such as teacher pay raises.

An internal CPS memorandum reported on by Chalk stroke suggests that CPS was asked by Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson to accept a hypothetical 4 percent raise for the coming year, far below what would be needed to offset the record inflation of the past four years. Even that won’t be possible without additional funding, however. Johnson’s proposal for a $300 million loan to pay for the meager raises has been roundly rejected as not serious, given that the district’s credit rating is in junk status.

With aristocratic arrogance, Pritzker told the Solar Times: “I don’t think it’s the job of Springfield (the state capital) to bail out school districts that may have been irresponsible with the one-time money they received. Poor financial management by a local government is not necessarily the responsibility of Springfield.”

CPS, like many school districts across the state and nation, spent funds allocated for COVID relief to plug holes in its operating budget. With CPS having spent the last $300 million of its original $2.8 billion allocation this year, the district now faces a $505 million deficit, up from a previous estimate of $391 million and set to grow even larger next year.

The article, written by longtime state politics reporter Rich Miller, responds to claims by Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and the CTU that the district is being shortchanged by the state. The CTU has publicly called for Pritzker to be recalled and for increased state funding for the school district during negotiations.

Johnson and the CTU have argued that CPS should receive an additional $1.1 billion in state revenue annually. This is based on the “evidence-based funding” (EBF) formula for public schools that the state enacted in 2017. That law established “adequacy” levels for school districts and called for annual increases in state appropriations until districts reached 90 percent adequacy funding.

According to the Solar Times The article states that the $1.1 billion figure represents what CPS would receive in additional state aid if it were immediately funded at 100 percent.