News Releases

Click here to view a PDF of the motion filed with the court.
Click here to view a PDF of the Illinois Tollway Top 100 Salaries and Pensions.
CHICAGO–Attorneys for Taxpayers United of America (TUA) will ask Circuit Court Judge Rita M. Novak for a restraining order against the Ill. Tollway Authority and Electronic Transaction Consultants Corporation, a Texas Corporation, seeking to prevent huge increases in tolls scheduled to take effect on Jan. 1, 2012. The restraining order is on behalf of Jim Tobin, TUA President, Christina Tobin, TUA Vice President, Rae Ann McNeilly, Director of Outreach for TUA, and two Wisconsin drivers, Glenn Westphal and Carol Westphal. The lawsuit is asking the Court to certify the case as a class action on behalf of all tollway users.
“The Illinois Tollway System was created in 1953, and the Tollway Act requires the tollways to be converted to freeways and the Tollway Authority to dissolve itself,” said Tobin. “It has done neither. Instead, the Authority adopted a 15-year, $12 Billion Capital Plan on August 25, 2011, with no intent to comply with these statutory requirements, but to perpetuate its existence and convert the Elgin-O’Hare freeway into a tollway.”
“TUA will ask the court to enforce the law and end the Illinois tollway system,” said Tobin. “If the Court allows the temporary restraining order, it will then have time to consider an injunction to stop the 90 percent toll tax increase.”
The motion is scheduled to be heard on Oct. 26, 2011, at 11:15 a.m. in Room 2402 of the Richard J. Daley Center, 50 West Washington Street, Room 2402.
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CHICAGO—Jim Tobin, President of Taxpayers United of America (TUA), one of the largest taxpayer organizations in America, today filed a lawsuit against the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority, its Chair Paula Wolff and Electronic Transaction Consultants Corporation in the Circuit Court of Cook County. The complaint seeks to roll back the recently adopted, back-breaking toll increase. It also alleges the Tollway Authority has violated state law by failing to convert tollways to freeways and by failing to plan for its own dissolution, as required by law.
“The tollway is a creature of statute that went into effect in July 1953,” said Tobin. “The slogan of the authority was ‘Toll Free in ’73.’ That was when the toll roads were to be paid off and converted to freeways.” Read more →