$10 million budget surplus for DuPage County

Hmmm, maybe they can abate more than the paltry $100,000 [across the ENTIRE county] in property taxes that Hot Pants Olson likes to brag about.

And this?

quote:

He [Backfield] also noted that the county's additional quarter percent sales tax enacted in 2008 as part of the Regional Transit Authority bailout collects more revenue each month than the county's other quarter percent sales tax. That's because the newer tax is levied on food and drugs, he said. That amounted to roughly $3 million extra in 2009, according to Backfield.

This is the Blago "Free Rides For Seniors" RTA Tax that GOP board chairman primary winner Dan Cronin voted for in 2008. The same one that Hot Pants [and Pankau and Grasso and yada, yada] gave him guff for.

I wasn't aware that this regressive tax was levied on food AND drugs.

Good Lord - Now DuPage is collecting TOO much money?

You can't borrow more without the cash flow . Watch and see if in a few months there isn't a pitch to float more bonds.

I don't think it is too late to abate more of their 2009 property tax levy. I think a fair amount would be $3 million - as opposed to the current $100,000 - the extra cheese picked up from applying this regressive RTA sales tax to food and drugs.

Still small potatoes but any form of property tax reduction would be welcome right now.

This would simply make a $10 million overage into a $7 million overage, no?

Actually I think they should use it to help pay down some of the 100's of millions of $ the County borrowed every few years over the last 20 some years. But a rebate would be good too- but I don't think it amounts to squat as a portion of the County real estate tax assessment.

Long term relief vs. short term I guess. Neither IMO.

Speaking of property taxes....I always thought Cook had some of the highest taxes the way the complaints about it were publicized....then I found out that DuPage's were higher. Don't know if they still are or not, but if the taxes are higher in the 'burbs, why are all those people in the city complaining about theirs?

No, Cook for awhile had much lower property taxes. They didn't have to pay to build schools etc. And they got more money from the feds and the state.

But they've gone up quite a bit lately.

Cook has a population about 7-8 times that of DuPage. It also has far more commercial and industrial real estate parcels to help take the load off residential - to some degree. My brother-in-law, a Chicago cop, pays about $4,400 per year - peanuts. That's what I was paying back around 2001, 2002.

My sister, a Berwynite with a paid-off bungalow, just saw her taxes go up by over $500. Did I mention that the Village of Berwyn jacked their levy rate up by 16% for 2009-pay-2010 taxes? They have Home Rule you see as do many towns and villages round these here parts, Glen Ellyn being a Home Ruler, fer sure.

Statistics prove anything you want them to. When my wife and I were first married, we moved to Greenwich, Connecticut. Our real estate taxes — in real dollars — were high.

A friend of ours was a realtor. We became aware that he was telling prospective home buyers that the tax rate (”mil rate“) in Greenwich was lower than in any other municipality in the suburban New York City tri-state area.

When we questioned him about his claim, he admitted that — although the rate was low — the appraised house values were so incredibly high that the actual dollars paid were higher than in almost any other suburb. Of course, he didn't bother mentioning that little bit of fine print to potential buyers.


Some years later, we moved from our one-acre home in Connecticut to a 15-acre place in exurban Minneapolis/St. Paul. Our tax rate went up dramatically... but the appraised value of the Minnesota property was less than half that of our acre in Connecticut. Bottom line: our annual real estate bill — in dollars — dropped to about one-third of what we were used to.

In other words, looking at only the tax rate or only the appraised value is meaningless. All that matters is the actual real-dollar check you have to write when the two are taken together.

Of course, in order to really compare what you're paying in taxes with anyplace else, you have to also figure in state income taxes (which vary dramatically from state to state) and all the other local, regional and state nuisance taxes and fees.)

Lets Borrow!

Yup, $ burning a hole in the Boards pocket already. Want to start borrowing as they think (and only them) apparently, that sales tax revenue will rise enough to cover the borrowing and budget.