Tax increment financing (TIF) districts do not freeze property tax revenue available to other taxing districts in Cook County; the principal effect of TIF is to raise tax rates higher than they otherwise would have been.…
100-Day Accountability Report This 100-Day Accountability Report gives a progress update on recommendations to reform…
The purpose of this report is to describe how property taxes are extended in Cook County, Illinois. It defines tax extension, explains the mechanics of calculating rate limits and tax caps, and describes the effects of Tax Increment…
The Cook County Transparency Initiative provides citizens of the County access to transition reports, commissioner reports and research about attempts to reform Cook County. Its purpose is to improve the public's access to informationabout…
This report compares effective property tax rates in selected communities around metropolitan Chicago and finds that while all communities’ effective tax rates increased in 2008, rates have mostly declined since 1999. The report also finds…
At a Cook County Board of Commissioners meeting, held on June 15, 2010, Cook County Commissioner Joseph Moreno called on County staff members to explain a series of errors in the meeting’s agenda, noting a lengthy list of deletions,…
On July 14, 2010, Cook County Commissioners approved by a vote of 9 to 3 a strategic plan to reorient the County’s health system more toward outpatient care and away from inpatient hospital services. The five-year plan calls for closing…
The Illinois Department of Revenue has announced that the tentative equalization factor for the Cook County 2009 property assessment year (taxes payable in late 2010) is…
The sales tax rate on general merchandise in Cook County declines by 0.5 percentage point on July 1, 2010. This rolls back half of the 1.0 percentage point increase imposed by the Cook County Board of Commissioners effective July 1,…
