The property tax bill that a guy I’ll call Joe recently received for his commercial building in Edgewater was quite clear as to how the $44,191.04 he owed would be spent. The Board of Education would get $21,630.96, the city $8,817.56, the county $3,242.82, and the Park District $3,127.44. The rest would go to, among other things, libraries, forest preserves, water-treatment operations, hospitals, pensions, and museums. It also had a line item for something called “TIF-Bryn Mawr/Broadway Ave,” but it said the TIF, or tax increment financing district, would get $0.00.
The county budget official is even more to the point. “Yes, it’s misleading,” he says, after asking to remain anonymous. “If you were to take every tax bill sent out to every property tax payer and add them up, you would find that schools and parks and all the other taxing bodies are supposedly getting more than what they actually get or what they’re actually budgeted to spend.”
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
And how will the $2,000 that goes to the TIF be spent? It will pay back money the city’s planning department borrowed to “seed” or “leverage” development, as planners like to put it. The borrowed money can be spent directly by the city to install new sidewalks or streetlights or build schools (though that doesn’t happen very often)–anything that will entice development or increase a community’s economic value. Or the borrowed money can be turned over in the form of low-interest loans to developers to build shopping centers or malls or to rehab run-down buildings. The beauty of a TIF is that all of this development theoretically pays for itself because the loans are repaid out of the increase in property value that comes when a community starts thriving and pays more in taxes than it would have without the loans.
Even under the new guidelines TIFs aren’t inherently evil. They do serve a function, particularly in low-income communities starved for investment. And Daley has used them to fund good things, such as the newly built Simeon Career Academy. But enough is enough.
Well, let me make a few suggestions. The CTA’s so busted it’s raising fares and cutting services. The schools are so hard up they’re laying off teachers and ending early-child-care programs. The parks are slashing programs and raising fees. Daley wants city workers to take unpaid furloughs. And, as I recently discovered, there’s a monthlong waiting list if you want a city crew to get a wild animal out of your house.
