Another Darien District With Tax Hike On Table

DARIEN, IL – Center Cass School District 66 is not the only Darien-area district asking voters to consider a tax increase.

Cass School District 63 is doing so as well. The third local elementary district, Darien 61, has no tax issue before voters.

The referendums are set for June 28.

Center Cass is asking voters to decide on a tax hike of nearly 25 percent for its portion of the property tax bill. By contrast, Cass' increase is about 10 percent.

For an owner-occupied home valued at $300,000, Cass 63's tax increase would amount to $246 a year, the district said.

If Cass voters approve the tax hike, the district would go into debt by $13.4 million. The money would pay for building needs and cannot be used for any other purpose.

The district has two schools, Concord Elementary and Cass Junior High.

According to the district, both buildings are structurally sound and well-maintained. But the district said the buildings' health, ventilation and air conditioning systems need major upgrades.

"We have carefully managed our HVAC life expectancy, but our existing HVAC systems are too old, unreliable and no longer cost-effective to maintain," the district said in a flyer.

The district also said it needed to replace fire alarm systems, modernize video surveillance and create integrated communication systems.

The last voter-approved Cass tax increase was in 1990.

According to the district, expenditures per student are 13 percent lower than the average operating costs among all DuPage County elementary districts.

In Center Cass, administrator and teacher salaries are higher than DuPage County averages.

In an email to Patch on Wednesday, Superintendent Mark Cross noted the district could not take a position on the referendum.

"Our intention is to simply provide detailed and factual information, be completely transparent, answer the questions as they arise and let people decide how they want to vote," Cross said. "This approach certainly led to wonderful dialogue with our community and taxpayers (on Wednesday)."

A virtual community meeting is planned on Zoom at 6:30 p.m. May 23, with the link to be posted later. A meeting will also be held at 6:30 p.m. May 25 at Cass Junior High.

The district has a frequently-asked-questions section on its website about the tax issue.