By: Diane Benjamin

Once again it’s time for every unit of local government to raise your property taxes. You will hear the average homeowner will only pay X more a year. Look at your property tax bill from last year. How many units of government are listed? Each one of them wants more money, not because they need it – they have to have more because they “create” things to spend it on. Inflation made you spend less on frills, government created more of them.

Tonight the McLean County Board will raise your taxes by passing a tax levy of $50,075,698. That’s $751,516 more than last year. Since assessed values increased dramatically again, the County will be taking more of your money. It is a smaller amount than most years, can you tell an election is around the corner? The levy is the amount of money they want from all properties.

The below information can be found on the County Treasurer’s page: https://mcleancountyil.gov/590/Taxing-Dist-Distribution-Settlement-Shee

Many years of data are available showing how much was distributed to all those taxing bodies on your bill.

I chose to look at how much property taxes have increased in 5 years for a few. Note: The 2025 distribution is NOT recorded as final. The final payments will not occur until December. The actual percentage increase on the chart below will be slightly higher. The Village of Heyworth is the worst offender, McLean County is next based on the percentage increase. Government grew faster than the rate of inflation and salaries.

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Why did Heyworth show this huge increase? I added them to the chart because I got a tip they are about to increase them again. Development is suppose to lower taxes because the cost of government is spread over more properties. If you live in Heyworth you should be asking questions!

Heyworth links:

Paid in 2021: https://www.mcleancountyil.gov/DocumentCenter/View/21099/District-101—228?bidId=

Paid in 2025: https://www.mcleancountyil.gov/DocumentCenter/View/30028/Districts-101-230?bidId=

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If you are wondering how much inflation was, multi-year Inflation chart: https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/inflation/current-inflation-rates/

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Expect a huge increase in the City of Bloomington this year, they need money for their never ending projects. Rents will increase because of it.

Breakdown of what the County levy was by year, note the huge increase between 2023 and 2024:

Passed in 2024 to collect in 2025 – $49,324,182 which makes the % increase above even higher.

2024: $46,125,155 PDF page 187 https://www.mcleancountyil.gov/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/9872

2023: $40,644,315 PDF page 148 https://www.mcleancountyil.gov/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/9258

2022: $38,240,358 PDF page 122 https://www.mcleancountyil.gov/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/8448

2021: $36,929,912 PDF page 188 https://www.mcleancountyil.gov/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/7857

$12,394,270 more in 5 years.

Other than some resurfaced roads, where did the money go?

If you want to look up others, start by finding the taxing bodie number here: https://mcleancountyil.gov/DocumentCenter/View/21445/Alphabetic-List-of-Taxing-Districts-2022?bidId=

That number will tell you which database the settlement sheets are in: https://www.mcleancountyil.gov/1583/Tax-Year-2020-Final-Distribution-Release