By: Diane Benjamin
I heard from a reliable source yesterday Assessed Values will increase another 8-9% this year.
Your property taxes will increase even if the 1% sales tax passes. Schools drool over rising property values, as does every taxing body listed on your property tax bill. The assessor will be blamed instead of the huge pot of money school districts will claim they need. Even if the property tax rate stays the same or decreases slightly, that isn’t the “relief” they claim they want to provide.
Local governments hurt you far more than state or national ones. Sitting out local elections and never attending or watching a board meeting is lethal to your prosperity.
This Letter to the Editor actually got published in the paper. I was holding it to see if they would:
Vote NO on the Sales Tax Referendum
McLean County taxpayers pay some of the highest property tax bills in the nation. A vote to raise the sales tax to 9.75% will put us among the highest sales tax areas in the nation as well. Where does it stop?
Trading a permanent sales tax increase for a promised temporary reduction in property taxes is a poor bet for taxpayers. Some schools in the county are managed better than others. I do recognize some of the need for more school revenue. However, our lawmakers in Springfield need to stop prioritizing Chicago schools and concentrate more on funding downstate school districts. If the supermajority in Springfield took even a small portion of the wasted taxpayer dollars spent on all the “green” projects as well as all the other areas of waste and redirected it to our local schools we would have no need to dig into McLean County taxpayer’s wallets time after time. Vote NO April 1st.
Carl Hinshaw
Meanwhile, Tri-Valley (at $0.69 per piece) and Unit 5 are electioneering with identical propaganda. Probably other school districts too.
Yes, where in the world does it end????
When we all leave this 💩 hole state 😡
Anyone can leave that is really serious about it. Relieve yourself of the angst. Nothing is ever going to change there that will make an honest person’s life better. The corruption will never end.
Everyone loves to blame the assessor, but it is 100% each Separate government entity that raises your taxes in their own. Take schools for example: the district superintendent proposes a projected tax levy annually, which is how much money they are requesting from property taxes. They can elect to take the full assessed value, or may request any amount under that, including matching the Levy from last year (which would be na effective tax hike of 0% YOY). Heck, they can even request a tax levy lower than last year, even if the assessed values go up!
The district superintendent proposes the tax Levy to the school board, and they approve it. So the schools and the elected school board control 100% of what the Levy will be, and are responsible for 100% of the effective property tax increase or decrease for the next year.
Am sure the county and local and city “leaders” will get some special fake awards this year for all their “value” to the community and county.
Clown World