Peoria Plush Pension Panic

By on October 3, 2018   /   Illinois, Latest, News Releases, NTUI in the News  

This story was featured in the Peoria Journal Star. Click Here to view their coverage.

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Peoria – Taxpayers United of America (TUA) today released its updated study on Peoria, Illinois government employee pensions, publishing the top 200 pensions for Peoria Illinois Municipal Retirement (IMRF) fund, the top 200 pensions of the Teachers’ Retirement Fund (TRS), and the top 200 pensions of State University Retirement System (SURS).

“Peoria is one of 20 cities in the USA that are still struggling with high foreclosure rates despite the robust national economic recovery,” stated Jim Tobin TUA’s president and former economist. “But the government hacks couldn’t care less about the people who fund their lavish salaries and pensions. When sluggish economic conditions are compounded by ever increasing property taxes you get a lot of foreclosures.”

“But the elected politicians worry only about securing votes and funding for their campaigns. They have no problem putting people out of their homes to deliver on the pension promises that keep them in office.”

  • Click here to see the top 200 Peoria TRS pensions
  • Click here to see the top 200 Peoria IMRF pensions
  • Click here to see the top 200 Peoria SURS pensions

“High taxes don’t scare gubernatorial candidate J. B. Pritzker out of increasing Illinois’ taxes. He openly supports an immediate income tax increase and will gladly help Illinois House Speaker, Michael J. Madigan usher in this assault on Peoria taxpayers.”

“Pritzker also supports the Income Tax Increase Amendment, which would change the current flat-rate state income tax to a graduated state income tax. He and his buddy Madigan plan on placing the amendment on the November 2020 statewide ballot.”

“If the amendment passes, you can expect the state’s middle class to be decimated. Here’s why: House Bill 3522, filed by state Rep. Robert Martwick, D-Chicago, would tax incomes between $7,500 and $15,000 at 5.84 percent. For incomes between $15,000 and $225,000, the rate would be 6.27 percent. And for incomes over $225,000, the rate would be 7.65 percent.”

“Illinois taxpayers would be defenseless. Some politicians are whispering about a maximum income tax rate as high as 9.85 percent,” added Tobin.

“The pension data speaks for itself. The average Peoria taxpayer’s Social Security pension is about $17,000 and is funded completely with private money from taxpayers and their employers. IMRF pensioners also collect Social Security on top of their very generous pensions so taxpayers are forced to shell out an additional 15% of the local government employee salaries.  IMRF pensions are funded by property taxes.”

“There are two government school employees in SD 150 whose current annual pensions exceed $200,000 each! Francis H. Hilton II gets $211,087. His lifetime payout is estimated at $4,809,075. Annette T. Smith rakes in $201,663 a year!”

“Of course, the Illinois Central College retiree, Thomas Thomas, tops our Peoria pensions at $218,517 this year. He will enjoy an estimated taxpayer funded lifetime payout of $4,838,752.”

“If Pritzker gets elected, he and Illinois tyrant Madigan will see to it that these lavish pensions are continued.  They bring in thousands of union and government employee votes. Taxes will increase at a devastating rate and more and more Illinoisans will leave the state, driving up the tax burden for those of us who stay.”

“It is just unreasonable to allow people to retire in their 50’s and early 60’s and expect taxpayers to foot the bill, but if Madigan gets his way and Pritzker wins the governor’s race, government pension reform won’t occur anytime soon,” concluded Tobin.

 

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NEW TAX FOUNDATION REPORT: ILLINOIS NOW 5TH WORST STATE FOR STATE AND LOCAL TAXES

By on September 26, 2018   /   Illinois, Latest, News Releases  
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CHICAGO—A report released Sept. 28, 2018, by the non-partisan Tax Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, shows that Illinois is now the 5th worst state in the country for state and local taxes, surpassing California, which comes in at number 6. A link to that report can be found here.

“Last year, Springfield Democrats shoved a $5 billion state income tax increase down the throats of Illinois taxpayers,” said Jim Tobin, president of Taxpayers United of America (TUA). “Now, the Democrat candidate for Illinois Governor, J. B. Pritzker, should he win, will clobber the Illinois middle class with another huge increase in the state income tax. This will be the payback for the votes he will get from the 107,000 retired government employees who receive over $50,000 a year in retirement benefits for doing nothing.”

“And in two years, Pritzker will push approval of the Income Tax Increase Amendment, which would convert Illinois’ flat-rate state income tax to a graduated income tax, with a top rate possibly higher than California’s.”

“The money from last year’s $5 billion income tax increase was funneled into the bankrupt state pension funds for retired government employees, but the funds are in such bad shape that the money hardly mattered. These leeches are getting lavish, gold-plated retirement benefits while the middle class is fleeing Illinois in increasing numbers. For four straight years, Illinois has led the nation in population outflow, and this will increase if Pritzker has his way. The state’s middle class will shrink, so even more tax increases will be necessary to prop up the state.”

“Pritzker’s proposed two state income tax increases will put Illinois into a death spiral. That will be the end of

our state, unless voters wake up and elect persons who will vote against additional tax increases.”

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Home Rule is Home Ruin

By on September 25, 2018   /   Illinois, Latest, Taxpayer Alert  

From the Taxpayer Education Foundation

“Home Rule means Home Ruin.”
– Jim Tobin, President of Taxpayer Education Foundation (TEF).

In 1970, Illinois adopted a new constitution that designated any municipality with a population greater than 25,000 as a home rule unit. In addition, municipalities can vote to adopt Home Rule, or repeal Home Rule if they already have it. “Illinois Home Rule gives unlimited taxing power to bureaucrats,” said Jim Tobin, President of Taxpayer Education Foundation (TEF).

In some cases, Home Rule even takes away citizens’ right to vote on vital city issues and limits citizens’ voice in government mayoral and council elections. “Taxpayers are effectively muzzled, except at election time, and even then, their choices are limited,” according to Tobin.

The Constitution of the United States of America does not mention local governments. Local governments are created by and regulated by the states. This means that to speak about cities or other forms of local government in the United States is to speak about fifty different legal and political situations.

The Illinois version of so-called Home Rule strips citizens of control over local politicians’ power to tax, to regulate, and to incur debt. The Illinois version denies citizens the right to have a local charter or constitution to protect taxpayers from abuse or incompetence by office holders and from the hazard of easy access to public funds for developers, lawyers, bankers, and government workers.

Illinois bypasses the people of the community and puts all the power of local government into the hands of politicians. That’s why students of government and political science have described the Illinois version of so-called home rule as the most insidious form of government anywhere in the United States of America. It is government by personality instead of government by principle.

Without the controls of a local charter or constitution, and with citizens stripped of their right to vote on city issues, so-called Home Rule in Illinois empowers politicians to:

1) Raise taxes without citizen permission.
2) Impose new taxes in the form of fees, licenses, and regulations.
3) Expedite seizures of private property.
4) Give city property to private interests without competitive bidding.
5) Take greater control over citizens’ lives, livelihoods, property, and liberty.

The solution: Local taxpayer groups in Home Rule municipalities need to mount a massive educational campaign to alert the taxpayers in their areas, and must run a well-organized petition drive to place the issue of repealing Home Rule on the local ballot. Taxpayers United of America has used TEF’s Home Rule research to educate the public for nearly four decades, resulting in 206 victoriesagainst Home Rule in Illinois. Dismantling Home Rule unlimited taxing power will take research, education, and organization to fight back against the bureaucrats – but it can be done.

*This synopsis is largely based on an excellent, extremely thorough analysis of Home Rule by John Gile, who was the chief spokesperson for the repeal movement in 1983 that repealed Home Rule in Rockford, IL.

The full report can be found at http://citydesk.us/homerule.html

 

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