Are school districts really going for transparency?

By Kerry Lester

DAILY HERALD 10/03/2009

The aim is increased transparency. But for taxpayers in a number of suburban school districts, the effect is anything but.

A new state law, passed in August and effective Thursday, requires all school districts in the state to post administrators' salaries on their Web site.

While almost all suburban districts were in compliance Friday morning, a number required a scavenger hunt of sorts to unearth the information.

The law mandates districts must post an itemized salary compensation report for every employee with an administrative certificate who is working in that capacity.

That means superintendents, assistant superintendents, principals and assistant principals. The report must include each individual's base salary, along with bonuses, pension contributions, retirement increases, health and life insurance costs, paid sick and vacation days, annuities and any other types of income they might receive.

The law does not get into specifics on how - or where - information should be posted. There is also no specific state penalty for districts that do not comply. However, state board of education attorneys pointed out that county regional offices of education are able to take action against districts that willfully refuse to comply.

A Daily Herald analysis found that by noon Friday, 80 of 82 local districts had information on their Web sites.

Wheeling Township District 21 had plans to post salary information as of Monday, officials said. Calls to Woodland Elementary District 50 were not returned about where its information might be.

Of the districts that had salaries posted, a few made things simple.

District 207 had a link right on its Web site's home page, along with a note explaining just why it is now posting the information.

Elgin Area School District U-46 sent out a news release announcing the move and its decision to go a step further and provide information on noncertified administrators as well as all teachers' salaries.

Kane County's nine school districts met together, looked at different forms, and discussed how to post them, Kane County Regional Office of Education Superintendent Doug Johnson said.

"We wanted to make this as easy as possible for the public," he said.

After all, he said, "districts don't have anything to hide."

But elsewhere, finding information was trickier. Nine of 29 DuPage County districts checked, including Salt Creek Elementary District 48, used a maze of drop down tabs and links to access salary information.

"It was handled with our finance people in cooperation with information services. They grouped it where they felt it was appropriate," Superintendent Janice Rosales said.

Kildeer Countryside Elementary District 96 also made things difficult. After clicking through several pages, administrator salaries could be accessed, but no names were posted. Assistant Superintendent Beth Dalton said she felt their posting was both logical and accessible.

Disparities, she said. "May come from fact that their isn't clear direction from the state on how this should be labeled," she said. "School districts have different interpretations."

Editor's Note: Can you find the adminstrative salaries on Pleasantdale's website? We did, but it wasn't so easy.