“TIF districts have become a “secret slush fund” for the Mayor (Daley) and aldermen to subsidize private developers (many of them friends or campaign donors to the politicians)” - Ben Joravsky, of the Chicago Reader

On February 17th, the Village of Schaumburg and the Joint Review Board will be discussing the proposed STAR line Transportation Oriented Development Tax Increment Financing district that would be on the north side of Schaumburg.  The intention of the proposed Schaumburg TIF district is “to encourage redevelopment of the area near the proposed STAR line station along the Northwest Tollway by the convention center.”

While definitely smaller in scale, this sounds a lot like what is going on in Chicago. Here is a decent video about what a TIF District is.

I will be making a public comment on behalf of the Schaumburg Freedom Coalition about this issue. The Joint Review Board will be making a motion to appoint a public member to the Joint Review Board on this issue. Concerned citizens should attend and voice their views on the various candidates for this post and the subject of the proposed TIF district.

Village of Schaumburg
Tuesday February 17th, 6:30 p.m.
Atcher Municipal Center
101 Schaumburg Court
Schaumburg, Illinois (Meeting agenda here)

Historically, the Village of Schaumburg has been very elusive about their existing TIF District. The Olde Schaumburg Center TIF District collects over $2 million in property taxes every year but has very little transparency and public oversite. There is no TIF district page on the Village of Schaumburg website. They do not detail how the money is being spent, for what purposes, and who is receiving the money. The Schaumburg Freedom Coalition wants to do something about it before it becomes an even bigger problem.

Finding little information online about the project, the Schaumburg Freedom Coalition has filed a number of Freedom of Information Requests and posted the information as a part of our Schaumburg Transparency Project.

Schaumburg’s Proposed STAR Line TIF District
Schaumburg STAR TIF Housing Impact Study
Schaumburg  STAR TIF Eligibility Report
Schaumburg STAR Line TIF Plan

Still there are many questions that have been left unanswered by the Village of Schaumburg. The public is deserving of more information.

Here are some big problems, and proposed solutions, for the TIF districts in Schaumburg.

1.  Schaumburg’s current Olde Schaumburg Center TIF district is severely lacking in transparency. There is  no information on the Village of Schaumburg’s website. There is no map of the TIF district, no detail of the expenditures, no account of how much money is in the TIF fund, no annual budget proposal, and no mission statement of the TIF district online. 

These shortcomings should be addressed immediately. The Schaumburg Freedom Coalition (SFC) will push for more transparency for the existing and proposed TIF districts in Schaumburg and Cook County. The SFC will push for comprehensive transparency of all essential TIF district information. This information should be posted on the Village’s website so taxpayer’s have full information about how their tax dollars are being spent. Schaumburg should adopt these comprehensive transparency reforms for their existing TIF district prior to any vote for approval of a new TIF district and tax increase.

2.  There is no funding for the STAR line proposal. This TIF district proposal is a tax increase in search of a program to spend it on. 

No STAR line TOD TIF district should even be considered until the STAR line receives full funding and construction is underway. Collecting tax dollars for transit oriented redevelopment without the transit is counter productive and wasteful.

3.  This proposal will make property taxes in Schaumburg & Cook County higher. The more important question is by how much? There are no publicly available details on how much revenue the Village anticipates to receive from this TIF district and how it will affect property tax rates. There is no mention on how the various taxing bodies and their taxpayers will be affected by this TIF district.

The Schaumburg Freedom Coalition wants the Village of Schaumburg to make this information available to the public online prior to any vote for approval of the TIF district and tax increase.

4.  There are no publicly disclosed plans on what type of expenditures are going to be made with this money. It is a recipe for waste when a government proposes a new tax and unveils no plans on how to spend the money. 

The Schaumburg Freedom Coalition asks that the Village of Schaumburg publicly post the proposed expenditures for TIF district project online prior to any vote for approval of the TIF district and tax increase. The taxpayers deserve to know how this money is going to be spent.

5.  While Mayor Larson has stated in a public meeting that they will not use eminent domain on the people of the Fieldpointe Apartments and others in the proposed TIF district, there has been no commitment through ordinance to taking eminent domain powers off of the table. The existing Olde Schaumburg Center TIF district has used taxpayer dollars for eminent domain forcible evictions of business tenants and there is the threat of this happening again.

The Schaumburg Freedom Coalition asks the Village of Schaumburg to pass an ordinance banning private-use eminent domain powers that would allow the Village to force people out of their homes and sell that property to a redeveloper prior to any vote for approval of the TIF district and tax increase.

6.  Currently in Schaumburg and Cook County, TIF district taxes show up as a $0 line on citizens tax bills. Even though in 2007 TIF revenue exceeded $892 million, and individual taxpayers could be sending thousands of dollars every year to a TIF district. The $0 amount is the only reference to TIF districts on their property tax bills.  Property tax payers who believe they are sending their tax dollars to the Schools, Park Districts, and Libraries are actually sending their money to TIF districts that they know little about. This is severely misleading the taxpayers, and is an elusive way to run government agencies. 

The Schaumburg Freedom Coalition endorses “Truth in Tax” proposals that would require TIF district taxes fully disclosed on property tax bills.

The TIF situation in Schaumburg is not unusual or different from what happens elsewhere in Cook County and Illinois, but isn’t it about time the citizens demanded something other than “politics as usual”?  Together we can help make our government more transparent, accountable, and ethical. 

From the Illinois Policy Institute, an ally of the Schaumburg Freedom Coalition.

Our Solution 
The first step to bringing more public understanding and oversight to TIFs starts with implementing transparency. All information about a TIF, including its name, any parties involved (such as developers or vendors), the amount of spending, who authorized the TIF creation, contracts, and the TIF’s purpose should be posted on a local government’s official website. A complete, detailed, clear, and user-friendly list should be easily accessible to the public so they can understand where their property tax dollars are going and who is involved in the project. 
 
Full transparency in the TIF process would foster more government accountability. There’s too much money involved in TIFs for the public to have such a lack of knowledge about them and for the government to have no accountability in creating and managing them. $892 million in tax dollars during 2007 is no small sum. TIFs need transparency.

Why This Works
TIF transparency would: 

• Allow for more oversight of spending and openness to public scrutiny.
• Help clear up the vague understanding people have about TIFs, where they’re located, how much money goes into them, and how much of their property taxes flow into TIF districts.
• Improve the cloudy knowledge most people have regarding the TIF process.
• Foster more government accountability in handling the enormous amounts of tax dollars flowing into TIF funds, which the public currently knows little to nothing about.
• Enforce ethical behavior for everyone involved in TIF financing.

Sounds like a path towards comprehensive government reform to me!

For those interested in further education on Tax Increment Financing districts and why they are in desperate need of comprehensive reform, please refer to the two excellent resources below:

Time to Throw a TIF: Illinois Policy Institute

The Chicago Reader TIF Archive

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