13 NW Cook Agencies Don’t Meet Transparency Standards, District 54 Gets “A”
An audit of the Schaumburg Township area in Northwestern Cook County revealed only 4 of 17 local government agencies graded received a passing grade on basic online transparency guidelines.
An audit of the Schaumburg Township area in Northwestern Cook County revealed only 4 of 17 local government agencies graded received a passing grade on basic online transparency guidelines.
The “Local Transparency Project”, a project of the non-partisan Illinois Policy Institute, consists of two separate transparency audits 6 weeks apart on 10 different online transparency categories including elected & administrative official contacts, meetings, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), budgets, financial audits, expenditures, employee’s salary & benefits, contracts, lobbying, and taxes & fees information.
“It is critically important to improve government transparency,” said Brian Costin, Director of Outreach at the Illinois Policy Institute. “Transparency allows voters and taxpayers to get educated about the issues and actively participate in democracy, and it is an important tool citizens can use to root out government corruption.”
Overall Transparency rankings for the Schaumburg Township area are listed below. Full details attached in excel file.
| Schaumburg Township Scoring | Points out of 100 | Letter Grade | Improvement |
| Passing Agencies | |||
| School District 54 | 90.0 | A | 52.3 |
| Township High School District 211 | 82.7 | B | 55.5 |
| Village of Schaumburg | 77.2 | C | 18.2 |
| Village of Hoffman Estates | 63.0 | D | 11.4 |
| Failing Agencies | |||
| Schaumburg Township Library | 56.0 | F | 39 |
| Rolling Meadows Park District | 45.5 | F | 44.3 |
| Village of Hanover Park | 40.4 | F | 5.5 |
| Village of Streamwood | 38.5 | F | 2.5 |
| Village of Roselle | 28.6 | F | 8.5 |
| Village of Elk Grove | 28.6 | F | No Change |
| Village of Rolling Meadows | 26.0 | F | 4.1 |
| Hoffman Estates Park District | 25.8 | F | 6.8 |
| Schaumburg Township | 17.8 | F | 6 |
| Elk Grove Village Park District | 12.5 | F | No Change |
| Hanover Park Park District | 11.8 | F | 4.8 |
| Streamwood Park District | 10.6 | F | 4.1 |
| Schaumburg Park District | 10.5 | F | No Change |
| Average Score | 39.1 | F | 15.5 |
The first audit, conducted in early February, showed an average transparency score of 23.65 out of a possible 100 points. 60 points or better is a passing score. All agencies were notified of their initial scores and given suggestions for improvement via a 10-point transparency checklist. The scores in the second audit, conducted in mid-March, showed a 66% overall improvement with an average transparency score of 39.2.
School District 54, which serves K-8 students in Schaumburg Township, achieved the highest score by raising the 37.75 original score up to 90 points in the final audit. Costin said, “School District 54 clearly embraced the local transparency project. District 54’s elected officials and administrators understand the importance of proactively providing information to the public.” Within 48 hours of being notified of the results of the first audit, District 54 placed thousands of pages of documents online.
Costin said, “Achieving transparency reforms is largely a matter of the will to do so, rather than ability. With all the items in our transparency checklist being legally obtainable in 5 business days through FOIA requests, it’s surprising other agencies couldn’t improve their scores as much as District 54.”
The other agencies receiving passing scores are Township High School District 211 with 82.7 points, the Village of Hoffman Estates with 63 points, and the Village of Schaumburg with 77.7 points. Of the 13 agencies receiving failing scores, only Schaumburg Township Library and the Rolling Meadows Park District showed significant improvements (more than 10 points) over the 6 weeks of the project. Schaumburg Township Library improved by 39 points to score a 56. Rolling Meadows Park District unveiled a new website and improved 44 points to score a total of 45.5 points.
The category with the highest average scores was the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) category. The group’s average was 7.7 out of 10 possible points. On January 1st, 2010, a new state law went into effect which requires every public body that maintains a website to also post certain FOIA information.
Even with this stricter new law, 3 area park districts—Elk Grove Village, Hanover Park, and Streamwood—had no FOIA information on their websites and were not in compliance with the state laws during the second audit in mid-March.
Costin said, “Local agencies should follow basic state FOIA laws which give Illinois citizens the opportunity to access information that isn’t reliably available on public websites.” The 3 agencies not in compliance with state FOIA laws also scored poorly on other transparency measures with total scores of 12.5 or less on the audit.
Employee salary & benefit transparency had the lowest overall score, with agencies averaging a .9 score out of 10. Costin warned, “Salary & benefits is usually the biggest expenditure for government agencies and it’s critical for citizens and watchdog groups to have access to this information. Transparency has led to numerous revelations of cronyism and questionable political hires in Cook County and all across the state. Employee compensation transparency also lets the citizens know if we are paying our public sector employees too much or too little, and allow us to adjust accordingly.”
Overall, while the improvements in transparency are promising, most local government agencies in the Schaumburg Township area fall far short. District 54 proves that it can be done and be done in rapid fashion. When we do our follow-up audit in 6-months, we will see how many other agencies have taken the necessary steps to excel in transparent government.
The Illinois Policy Institute is conducting other Local Transparency Projects all across the state of Illinois, including audits in the Palatine and Barrington Township areas, with the help of many volunteers.