In a nutshell, Tax Increment Financing (TIF) is how one city compensates another when students from one district attend schools in the other city’s district.
Cedar Center North is in the southwest corner of South Euclid. Students who live in that corner of South Euclid go to the Cleveland Heights-University Heights schools. South Euclid compensates the CH-UH
district with a portion of taxes paid on the land at CCN.
Here’s Bob Rosenbaum’s take on the situation
That article presents the argument from the Heights’ point of view. Their concern is legitimate. But there is another side to the story.
Right now, based on the reduced value at CCN, CH-UH schools are getting less money from South Euclid. It’s also true that South Euclid bought and tore down the existing shopping center just before the 2008 financial meltdown. The recession hit, and we’ve had an empty lot for the past few years. Construction is finally slated to start on the first phase, which will include a high-end grocery store. But it will be years before CCN is filled again. South Euclid officials can be faulted for rolling the dice when they didn't have to, but they can’t be faulted for not being psychic.
In the long term, the redevelopment of Cedar Center North is going to mean more money for CH-UH schools. The revenues will far exceed what was possible with the old, run-down strip. But with recessionary budget restrictions, school districts and municipalities are not thinking of the long term – they must focus on day to day budgets. Additionally, the taxes from CCN are but a small portion of the CH-UH total budget.
I should point out for those who don’t know: the partitioning of school districts is determined by the state board of education. What the citizens of the various municipalities want is irrelevant to the state. But this is
another example of how public officials and private citizens in surrounding communities have viewed South Euclid with suspicion and condescension. Back in 1924, when the South Euclid-Lyndhurst School District was created, there was a vocal group in Lyndhurst opposed to the district. They wanted Lyndhurst to have its own district. Why? They spouted some vague generalities about local control. But the real underlying reason was that South Euclid was home to a large Jewish population, which was not the case
in Lyndhurst at the time. Since Jews have historically excelled academically, the concern among Lyndhurstians was that this would put their kids at a disadvantage. Despite Lyndhurstians’ concerns, South
Euclid-Lyndhurst was for generations one of Ohio’s great success stories until Reaganomics came along and slashed federal education funding. In more recent years, there have been renewed calls for Lyndhurst to separate from South Euclid. Mostly these comments have surfaced in internet forums, and they’re clearly driven by the increased number of African-Americans in the district, most of whom live in South Euclid. One kind of bigotry has been replaced by another.
Students in the southwest corner of South Euclid attend schools in the CH-UH district because they are geographically closer. But if they had a choice, most parents would send their kids the additional distance to go to SE-L schools. Our schools are safer, and rated higher by the state board of education. As of 2010, CH-UH schools were rated as continuing improvement*, while SE-L schools were rated as effective*. This has nothing to do with race, as both SE-L and CH-UH schools have a broad ethnic mix. But the fact is that the SE-L board does a better job of running their schools and educating kids than the CH-UH board, which is riddled with corruption and overrun with pot smoking hippies. What’s worse for the kids is that the schools are not safe. This is not a new situation. The cover of Heights High’s 1978 yearbook notoriously showed a student running with a knife in his hand. The declining reputation of the CH-UH schools really gets in the craw of those who live there. After all, CH pays some of the highest taxes in northeast Ohio: high property tax, high local income tax, and metered parking in most shopping districts. But they get very little value for their money. And CH-UH’s problems have nothing to do with a temporary reduction in TIF funds – but that issue provides a convenient excuse for Heightsters to bash South Euclid.
But where would you send your kids?
*A thumbnail explanation of how local school districts are rated:
Continuing Improvement: Meets between 50-74.9% of state goals.
Effective: Meets between 75-93.9% of State goals.
For the full calculation criteria, click this link:
http://www.ode.state.oh.us/GD/Templates/Pages/ODE/ODEDetail.aspx?Page=3&TopicRelationID=1266&ContentID=50598&Content=96758
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