Snow Asks for Preferential Treatment for Sun City; Wants Extra Money Spent to Mail their Surveys First Class

Some school districts elect their board members by ward, or by area of the community. District 300 does it this way. So does Chicago. But District 158 elects all seven of its board members “at-large,” which means each of them represents the entire community. Or at least they are supposed to.

So Bongo was surprised when he tuned into the video feed of the board meeting last Thursday night to hear Larry Snow suggesting that the people of Sun City deserved preferential treatment over other neighborhoods with regard to the upcoming survey about high school capacity.

For those humans who are unaware, District 158 is getting ready to mail a survey to every District resident, so that opinions can be gathered for how the district should house its high school students in the future when the current building’s capacity is exceeded. The board discussed who would get the survey and how it would be mailed at length at a recent meeting. It was decided that to be fair, all residents would be treated equally and every single household would receive the survey. To keep costs down, it was decided that bulk mail, similar to how the monthly newsletter is sent out, would be used.

But Snow wants Sun City’s surveys to be sent first class mail, which is much more expensive. How much more expensive? The difference between first class and bulk mail is significant; thousands and thousands of dollars different for a community the size of D 158. He says this should occur because a lot of the people who live in Sun City are snowbirds and bulk mail would not be forwarded to their winter locations.

Bongo has this to say to Snow: What about the two sets of senior citizens who live on my block and are in Arizona and Florida right now? Are you going to mail their surveys first class mail too? What about the condo section of Manchester Lakes in Algonquin? Most of those residents are senior citizens. Are you going to mail their surveys first class too?

This is not the first time that Snow has shown favoritism for one part of the community over another, and Bongo suggests that this type of divisive behavior is one key reason why Snow should be shown the exit door on April 7. This community needs board members who want to unite all segments of the community, not continue to pit them against each other.