By: Diane Benjamin

Something else to watch first: PDF page 144 https://mcleancountyil.gov/AgendaCenter/County-Board-1#docaccess-2ffafebe6a9a4388fd0c969f31ff6b40

The County will be creating a parks master plan. After they hire the firm revealed on the numerous following pages they will of course have to follow the plan. There will be community engagement, surveys few people take, and then fabulous plans that will contribute to your taxes staying high.

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I found this while looking for something else: PDF page 54 https://mcleancountyil.gov/AgendaCenter/Finance-Committee-12#docaccess-2052fe58cde5777197f2619b54bbc7e1

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If that means nothing to you, let me explain.

In 2023 the Supreme Court ruled that government can not sell your property because of past due property taxes and allow the tax buyer keep whatever equity you had in your home.

Just this year Illinois decided to comply with that ruling. For as long as I can remember there were investors lining up to buy properties at tax sales and making a killing off equity. If your $150,000 house was sold for the past due property taxes of $10,000 – the investor kept $140,000.

This is a summary of the changes:

Since I don’t see why anyone would pay past due property taxes and get nothing for doing it, I think the County abolished an entire industry. Keep reading, it was abolished.

I asked Assistant State’s Attorney Don Rood if return of the equity has to be requested since the above isn’t clear. It gets murkier from here. His answer was:

Yes, it is my understanding that surplus equity awards will be determined by the same court that ordered the issuance of the underlying tax deed.

Next I sent him a follow-up email:

Sorry for a follow-up but I’m confused.  The deed can be transferred to whoever pays the property taxes and they still get to keep the equity?  That sounds like the County is on the hook for it.

Of course I don’t know why anyone would pay the property taxes if there wasn’t a profit in it.

Please unconfuse me!

This was his response:

I believe you are correct on both points. It’s the counties that will be liable to former property owners for any surplus equity, not the tax buyers themselves.

This issue was before the Finance Committee on September 9th. Even though the minutes were approved at the October 7th Finance Committee meeting, they hadn’t been posted yet when I wrote this. Since they weren’t, I watched the video.

All of the above is not exactly what happened. These 2 items were on the agenda:

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The Finance Committee voted to quit selling delinquent property taxes to investors and instead appoint a Trustee.

This is PDF page 18: https://mcleancountyil.gov/AgendaCenter/Finance-Committee-12#docaccess-2052fe58cde5777197f2619b54bbc7e1

The Finance Committee passed this with no dissent. The same documents were presented to the County Board on September 17th. The minutes aren’t posted and I am assuming they passed it too. The County will be acting as Trustee, of course the County isn’t a person who can act. I don’t see any explanation for who will actually be responsible.

The County Board has now put taxpayers at risk because of long standing policies that never took into account that EQUITY is owed to the homeowner. Of course ridiculous property taxes based on unrealized gains in value contributed to homeowners not being able to pay them and therefore losing their homes.

All of these changes are about collecting taxes and distributing them to all the taxing bodies. It appears the cost of doing that is immaterial since claims will be paid out of the tort fund and could exceed the taxes collected. We don’t know from this presentation how much risk the County put on taxpayers with this action.

If you want to hear Rebecca McNeil explain this to the Finance Committee, just hit play: