Elmhurst Schools Seek Bids: Why Not Before?

ELMHURST, IL – In the next few months, Elmhurst School District 205 plans to go out to bid for certain services for the first time in years.

Those services include copiers, garbage pickup, energy, and HVAC.

"I'm not looking to look back and judge other people's decisions, but why haven't we been doing this?" school board member Courtenae Trautmann said at a finance committee meeting last week. "Why are we not trying to find the most competitive contract that gives us the best services for the best price for our taxpayers' money?"

In response, Superintendent Keisha Campbell said the district had "very established" relations with certain vendors and contractors.

"Now we're at the point where we value relationships, but we equally value getting the best value of those services, so we can assure that we are allocating our resources in the best way possible to support our student programming and our student needs," she said.

She also said new members of the district's team are assessing the relationships and the services.

In July, Joe Blomqust started as the district's assistant superintendent of finance. Brent Braski, director of facilities, was brought on in February.

Braski replaced Todd Schmidt, who resigned last December after being arrested in his hometown of Rockford. Schmidt is accused of stealing tens of thousands of dollars from his mother.

After his arrest, Patch reported that Schmidt spent about $50,000 on his district-issued credit card for personal purposes such as booze, cigars, restaurant meals, airfare, groceries, and country club and sorority payments.

Schmidt reimbursed the district monthly. He was essentially getting short-term loans from the district.

Elmhurst police are investigating.

After the spending became known, the district announced it was launching an investigation. In March, Chris Whelton, then assistant superintendent of finance, resigned under the terms of a severance agreement.

Whelton had been in his position for nearly 14 years.