Supporters of the St. Louis County School District’s floundering restructuring plan have reacted angrily to passage in the House of approximately $150,000 in taconite production tax funding to study the district’s long term financial viability and the possibility of splitting the district.

This misguided reaction demonstrates yet again how little regard plan supporters have for the very legitimate concerns raised by elected officials, business owners, and residents of Cook, Orr, and Tower, where the plan calls for shuttering community schools in favor of long bus rides and consolidated schools.

It remains far from clear whether the funding for a study will ultimately receive final legislative approval, or whether the study will even happen, given that the money is being allocated to St. Louis County. Whether the county board wants to wade into such a bitter political battle remains to be seen. More likely they’ll just take the money, go through a few motions, and call it a day.

That’s would be unfortunate, because the county has more at stake in this issue than officials in Duluth realize. The school district’s restructuring plan is an unmitigated disaster for the county’s northwest, and it’s going to have long term, negative implications for the county’s tax base, the viability of longstanding communities in the region, and the St. Louis County school district itself. If commissioners don’t care about that, they should be considering another line of work.

Forget for the moment the economic impact to local Main Streets. The plan that the school district has adopted is fatally flawed, and its implementation as currently configured will not save the struggling school district— it is more likely to destroy it. Were St. Louis County to actually hire a credible and independent financial consultant, they would likely conclude the same.

As folks in Duluth have learned, Johnson Controls, Inc., the consultant that created the St. Louis County School District restructuring plan, makes a habit of overpromising. The city of Duluth found that out the hard way, when JCI failed to deliver on the terms of an energy improvement contract in which they had promised millions of dollars in energy savings at the city’s steam plant. Savings proved to be half of what JCI had claimed and the upgrades the company did implement were falling apart after just two years. The city sued and the city and the company recently reached an out-of-court settlement.

JCI used the same tactics with the St. Louis County School District, when the school board hired them to do strategic planning. First, JCI exaggerated the district’s actual financial situation, claiming a looming $4.1 million budget shortfall--a shortfall that never really existed. Then, it crafted a restructuring plan that overstated achievable savings, and inflated revenue projections at the same time. Those revenue projections, of course, are based on enrollment, since the operating funds the district receives is almost entirely dependent on the number of students it serves.

And as is now becoming clear, there are likely to be far fewer students served by the St. Louis County School District than JCI calculated. Take the planned new school north of Cook, which is supposed to serve the Orr and Cook areas. JCI projected the school would serve 630 students when it opens in the fall of 2011. Yet, current enrollment in Orr and Cook combined is just 570, and that includes 60 students from Nett Lake. As we reported last week, the Nett Lake School District has issued a Request For Proposals for a study of the feasibility of building their own regional high school, to serve Nett Lake students as well as those from Orr and surrounding areas. The RFP is a direct and predictable response to the restructuring plan created by JCI—and it is a potential disaster for the financial future of the St. Louis County School District. If Nett Lake moves forward with its plan, the St. Louis County School District’s new school north of Cook will be lucky to see 450 students on opening day, not the 630 JCI predicted. And the district will see 450 students only if the Cook area can tamp down open enrollment losses to Virginia, which will likely accelerate now that Virginia is planning to send a bus to Cook. At $10,300 apiece, that’s a revenue shortfall of nearly $2 million from the school district’s original projection.

And it gets worse. JCI is projecting 150 students in the planned Tower-Soudan elementary. Current enrollment is 112, and expect some of those to leave next year to open enrollment. Those losses will jump sharply in 2011 if the school district follows through with its plan to shutter the Tower-Soudan High School after next school year. The school district is looking at another million dollars in projected revenue going up in smoke.

If you sit down and crunch the numbers, as I have, you quickly realize that the St. Louis County School District stands a good chance of ending up in worse financial shape than ever as a result of this restructuring plan.

But don’t try telling that to the school board majority. They’re not listening, just as they never listened to the communities’ pleadings in the north prior to the Dec. 8 vote. They’ve inexplicably accepted every juggled number and excuse from JCI as gospel, even as JCI has badly bungled the permitting process for the two new schools.

I don’t expect the board would listen to a second opinion from another financial consultant either. They are so vested in implementing their disastrous plan that they will attempt to forge ahead no matter how ridiculous it becomes. But the public is paying attention, and that’s why school officials, particularly Cherry board representative Darrell Bjerklie, are so adamant about blocking a study of alternatives. They don’t want the public to see how badly their plan is flawed economically.

They passed their plan by misleading the public. Now they want to keep the public in the dark about the damage they’re doing not only to communities in the north, but to the district itself. Legislators and county officials should step in to protect the public from such abuse, and provide the means for a fair and independent assessment of the district’s financial viability.