The Civic Federation co-hosted a conference with the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago on April 19, 2017 entitled, “Chicago’s Fiscal Future: Growth or Insolvency?” Experts, practitioners and academics from around the country gathered to discuss the best and worst case scenarios for Chicago’s economic future. Attendees to the sold out conference included government, civic and business leaders.…
While Illinois lawmakers remain gridlocked over a State budget plan, another area shows promise of compromise in Springfield: government consolidation. With over 6,900 local government units, Illinois has more units of government than any other state. The multiplicity of local units of government, many of which are funded predominantly by property taxes, is often cited as a reason for high…
The Civic Federation supports the Chicago Park District’s proposed FY2017 operating budget of $449.4 million because it continues to reduce the District’s reliance on fund balance to close its budget deficits and keeps the property tax levy relatively flat. At a time of increased pressure for local governments across Illinois, the Chicago Park District’s proposed FY2017 budget furthers the…
The Civic Federation recently released its analysis of the CTA’s FY2017 Budget. The Civic Federation supports the Chicago Transit Authority’s FY2017 operating budget of $1.52 billion because it holds base fares flat and continues to make strategic capital investments despite ongoing state funding uncertainty. As part the Civic Federation’s annual analysis of the CTA budget, the Federation uses…
The Civic Federation supports the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District’s FY2017 Tentative budget of $1.13 billion because the District continues to demonstrate a sensible and proactive approach to meeting its financial challenges. As mentioned in the full report, the FY2017 Tentative budget is 9.0% less than the FY2016 adjusted budget of $1.24 billion, which is due to the variance that often…
Click here to read the full report. The Civic Federation supports the Forest Preserve District of Cook County’s proposed FY2017 budget of $192.4 million because it includes measures to reduce costs and generate additional revenue in order to offset rising personnel costs and a reduction in the Personal Property Replacement Tax (PPRT). The District’s FY2017 budget proposes management…
The Civic Federation supports the Chicago Transit Authority’s proposed FY2017 operating budget of $1.52 billion because the budget holds base fares flat and continues to make strategic capital investments despite ongoing state funding uncertainty. As detailed in the report, the FY2017 budget does not rely on one-time revenue sources or service cuts despite declining fare revenue and …
The Civic Federation recently released its analysis of the City Colleges of Chicago FY2017 Tentative Annual Operating Budget. This blog examines City Colleges of Chicago tuition rate changes for in-district, out-of-district and out-of-state tuition rates per semester hour over a ten year period. This blog also compares City Colleges of Chicago in-district tuition rates with the in-district rates…
The Civic Federation supports the City Colleges of Chicago’s proposed FY2017 operating budget. The $523.7-million budget is a reasonable plan given the unprecedented uncertainty surrounding funding from the State of Illinois as it enters a second year without enacting a comprehensive balanced state budget. In FY2017 the District is not planning to increase its property tax levy or tuition rates…
In April 2016, the Illinois Department of Revenue announced that it discovered a misallocation totaling an estimated $168 million in extra Personal Property Replacement Taxes (PPRT) distributed to 6,527 local government taxing entities throughout Illinois. This misallocation equals 6% of the total $2.8 billion PPRT payments made to local governments in tax years 2014 and 2015. Each local…
