Rockford Taxpayers Can’t Catch a Break

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Winnebago County increased property taxes by nearly $1 million for the 2021 tax year despite Rockford’s effort to keep taxes stable. While this tax increase was made in daylight, several tax increases have been heaped upon taxpayers under the cover of the corrupt and massive Illinois State government.

“Rockford taxpayers have been tolerating some of the highest tax rates in the state and the country,” stated Val W. Zimnicki of Taxpayers United of America. “Now they have state bureaucrats dumping on them as well.”

“Now that Gov. J. B. Pritzker signed SB508 into law, the state can sneak in new property taxes. Specifically, SB508 allows the state to increase this year’s property tax by the amount of refunds due to adjustments from last year.”

“So, when I get my senior discount, the amount I save is covered by everyone else in my district. A classic ‘redistribution of wealth’. That phrase, redistribution of wealth, is a misnomer. It conveniently leads one to believe that only the wealthy are negatively affected by it when, in reality, it affects the middle class by supplanting the tax burden to them.”

“The big guy in Springfield also keeps reducing the amount of revenue collected by the state income-tax that is returned to the local district. When Local Government Distributive Fund (LGDF) was enacted, the amount was set at 10% of the total state income-tax revenue collected to be returned to the local governments. Pritzker just decreased it to 6.06%! Bureaucrats want nothing else but to see property tax increases to offset this.

“Which brings us to the $64 million question: why are bureaucrats so despite to raise our taxes? Their own benefit, that’s what.  Many government employees are paid lavish salaries using our property taxes, which in turn sets their starting state pension. Furthermore, pension plans in the Illinois Municipal Retirement System are primarily funded with property taxes.”

The pensions and salaries of the local government retirees take the biggest bite out of the property-tax revenue pie. The government schools impose the greatest property tax hikes. Approximately 58.8% of property-tax increases went to the government schools.

“Rockford area government pensioners are bleeding the area’s taxpayers dry. How can a Winnebago County retiree soak the taxpayers for more than $5 million in property taxes? Simply by retiring at the age of 57 with an annual pension of $175,970. Winnebago County retiree Paul A. Logli did just that and will collect $5,074,976 over a normal lifetime.

“Retired Rockford teacher, Alan S. Brown, began draining taxpayers at the age of 55. His current annual pension is $194,493 and will accumulate to a stunning $5,322,245 when he reaches 85 years of age.”

“Kishwaukee College’s David Louis is on track to collect $4,735,522 by age 85, thanks to his constitutionally protected 3% cost of living adjustment (COLA) on his current annual pension of $197,577.”

“There are no quick fixes for Illinois’ dire financial situation, although the solutions are painfully obvious: stop adding new hires to the same broken system and place them in a defined contribution plan like a 401(k), increase the amount that government employees contribute to their own pension, get a referendum on the ballot to end the 3% compounded COLA.”

Click here to view top 200 Rockford IMRF 2020 pensions

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Pritzker Needs To Give Emergency Relief To Taxpayers

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Chicago- As the Coronavirus known as Covid-19 sweeps over the United States, calls for Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker to give emergency relief to taxpayers are escalating.

“According to basic economic theory, in times of crisis and recession, you cut taxes,” said Jim Tobin, economist and president of Taxpayers United of America (TUA). “Covid-19 is a crisis that will slow economic growth. The intelligent move for Pritzker is to ask the Illinois General Assembly to pass emergency tax cuts as soon as they are back in session and sign the bill immediately. Otherwise, we may see unnecessary hardship for Illinois middle-class taxpayers.”

“Businesses are already telling employees to stay home, or are closing entirely because of Covid-19,” continued Tobin. “I have also heard that bureaucrats are considering shutting down the Chicago transit system. If middle-class taxpayers are unable to work, they will have trouble paying their mortgage, let alone their property taxes.”

“Pritzker is always going on about a ‘fair tax’ on taxpayers. If Pritzker believes what he says, he will call for and pass emergency tax relief measures. Otherwise, Pritzker will reveal what he really is: a gangster kicking a man while he’s down, and stealing from him everything of value.”

“INFRASTRUCTURE” TAXES HELP POLITICIANS, NOT COMMUTERS

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Raising taxes for “infrastructure” is a scam that helps politicians but not commuters, according to Jim Tobin, president of Taxpayer Education Foundation (TEF).

“Politicians want to raise taxes for infrastructure because new projects give taxpayers the impression they are getting shiny new things for their money,” said Tobin. “But, in fact, these projects actually harm commuters.”

“Several studies by transportation expert Randal O’Toole, Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, show that with the exception of New York City subway ridership, the future for the rest of the government transit industry is dim. Yet billions of dollars are still being poured into declining government transit systems instead of improving roads.”

“O’Toole provides some startling statistics to illustrate these facts.”

  • Other than New York City subways, nationwide ridership fell 1.2 percent for 2019 as a whole.
  • When compared with 2014 ridership, 2019 ridership fell in 44 out of the 50 largest urban areas.
  • Transit buses, including commuter buses, trolley buses, and bus-rapid transit as well as conventional buses, carried fewer riders in 2019 than in any year since 1939.
  • Light rail is also doing poorly, losing more than 4 percent of its riders in 2019.
  • Government Transit is not healthy in almost all urban areas. Los Angeles and Washington ridership peaked in about 2008; Chicago in 2012; and the others in 2013 or 2014.  If government transit can’t thrive in Chicago, which has the nation’s second-largest downtown, then it is really becoming a one-urban-area industry (New York).
  • Whenever it opens a new light-rail line, Los Angeles loses five bus riders for every light-rail rider it gains, and even light-rail ridership declines in years that it doesn’t open new lines.

“O’Toole shows that building government rail transit usually does more harm than good to a transit system. Gasoline is cheap and autos provide people access to far more jobs and other economic opportunities than transit,” said Tobin.

“Interstate Highways, called the world’s best transportation system, were paid for entirely out of federal and state highway user fees. There is little justification for raising more taxes and trying to get people out of their cars and onto transit, which in turn means there is little justification for the tens of billions of dollars of annual subsidies American taxpayers give to the government transit industry.”