I wish I could say I’m surprised that I need to do this, but I knew I’d be correcting or adding missing information to their report. Since I am quoted in this article, I feel the need to address a few confusing parts of their story.

First, the headline. Outside of one or two sentences from Rodney’s initial comments, the entire tone of the remaining presentation was about partnership and cooperation. The presentation did not bash Rantoul or talk about how Gifford is “hurt” by having RTHS as the school district. The main gist of the talk was that choice could be a good thing for ALL the involved communities. I think most of the quotes from me in the story reflect that tone. But, I guess that’s not an interesting enough headline.

Second, this paragraph: “During their presentation to the board, bother Rogers and Willard said there would be an increase in housing development in Gifford if families were allowed to choose high schools, but neither provided reasons as to why that would be the case.”

I’m sorry, but we provided many reasons why choice was a good thing for all the involved communities. The entire presentation was about how choice could be a benefit to the area (especially Rantoul & Gifford), and I’m sorry if the reporter didn’t make the connection.

The committee feels as if having 2 great high school options would help initiate development in the area. Honestly, I don’t think that’s hard to believe, as schools are a big reason people pick where they live. Gifford having 2 schools that cover a wide spectrum of curriculum, extracurricular activities, location, and fit would definitely appeal to a wider range of folks in my opinion. But, I also stated that we were polling many local realtors and builders in the area to get confirmation of this idea.

And finally, there was this mess: “We have about 50-55 empty lots right now in Gifford,” Willard said. “On a $100,000 house that’s about $800 in tax revenue for the high school, and $1,600 on a $200,000 house. So, that’s money the high school is losing out on right now.”

Willard said that if those houses are built and families move in, there would be an increase of about $60,000 in property tax revenue for the high school.”

The first paragraph is accurate (although I don’t remember saying they were losing money), but the correlation with the second paragraph is horribly wrong.

I’m pretty sure you could do the math here and figure out that either 50 or 55 times either 800 or 1,600 does not equal 60,000. The reporter took one column of one slide and then associated that with completely different data from earlier in the presentation. The 60,000 figure came off a slide where we showed an estimated projection of 10 new houses per year built in Gifford. Year 4 would be 40 houses with an estimated property tax value of 1,600 per each house for a total of 64,000. 60,000 was listed at the bottom of that bar graph column.

And, finally let me say this, we provided them many estimates and figures rooted in property tax value information from the Champaign County Treasurer, Assessor, or County Clerk’s offices. We were very clear when the numbers were estimates. We also discussed how the potential paid tuition factors into all of these decisions. We would have loved to have provided more than just estimates in some instances, but we did the best we could in 10 days to put a presentation together.

The idea of providing these estimates, figures, and other information was to show that Gifford has great property value, and as Gifford prospers, so does Rantoul and surrounding communities. The main goal of presenting to the RTHS board was to show that the idea of an intergovernmental agreement to allow choice was at least worth discussing and bringing both sides together at the table.

Oh and then there’s this: ” Rodney Rogers and Jed Willard of the Gifford Choice Community Committee spoke to members of the Rantoul Township High School board of education last Monday regarding Gifford Grade School detaching from RTHS. “

Regarding GGS detaching from RTHS? All but 1 minute of the talk focused on an intergovernmental agreement. The detachment point was brought up at the beginning, as that has been the main focus of talk, speculation, and rumors to this point, and we felt the need to address that situation. We then immediately shifted gears to the agreement and spent the rest of our time on that topic.

http://www.rantoulpress.com/news/education/2014-11-18/gifford-group-spec…