Local school districts are still financially dealing with the fallout of Cook County’s technology implementation that delayed tax bill distribution last year.
Tax bills that were supposed to be distributed in July 2025 were delayed to November due to a technology issue involving software from Tyler Technologies that was replacing a 1970s-era mainframe computer.
For the moment, Riverside-Brookfield High School District 208 is short $1.6 million in property tax levy revenue based on what was budgeted, according to assistant superintendent Dr. Kristin Smetana, who said it’s unclear when those funds will arrive.
“Fortunately for the district, we have a strong financial reserve we’ve been able to draw on the past couple of months, and we use that to pay our bills,” she said. “We have the ability operate for six months without seeing revenue. Beyond that would be a significant burden for the district.”
In an ideal world, those funds would arrive by the end of the district’s fiscal year of June 30, but Smetana said, “We don’t have any additional information.”
She said the district has not employed an Illinois Tax Anticipation Warrant, or TAW, which bridges the time between tax levy and tax collection, allowing public entities like school districts to pay imminent expenses.
The reason is it has cash on hand in its fund balances for six months and did receive about $11.9 million in property tax funds in late April. Still, she said, $1.6 million is not an insignificant amount of money.
“It is definitely a concern,” she said. “If we don’t receive it at the close of this fiscal year, I’m hopeful we’ll get it early next.”
Over at Riverside School District 96, interim finance director Dr. Mark Kuzniewski, who is retiring at the end of this fiscal year, said his district is still looking to collect $2.5 million for its education fund budget alone. While that may seem like a lot, he pointed out that District 96 has about 82% of its second collection property tax levy funds.
“Right now, we’d like to see that closer to 95% or 96%, but the bills were late,” he said. “We’re a little bit light, but to be honest with you, it’s not awful.
“Should it be better? Yes. Does everybody want the county to figure out the issues with its software? Yes. We have two months to collect this money … $2.5 million is a lot of money, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not an amount of money where the district should be panicking.”
Complicating matters, Smetana said, is the fact that the county can’t currently discern from what levy year funds are coming.
“The county would normally say the levies will come from 2024 or 2025, but they can’t tell us,” she said, adding the district has received 57% of levy funds through the end of April, but from what year is a mystery.
“The 57%, we don’t know if it’s coming from the 2025 levy,” she said. “We can’t track the money coming in to find out. At the end, we’ll all have to get reconciled.”
Does this situation run the risk of becoming a financial vicious circle that will take years to unravel for local districts?
“I wish I had a crystal ball to know,” Smetana said.
Kuzniewski was more concrete.
“I think this has the potential to do that,” he said. “I don’t know that we’re there yet. I think this idea of now knowing what collection the money comes from is as crucial as the timeliness of the collections.”