No D200 Lakewood TIF Action

The Woodstock District 200 School Board.

The Woodstock District 200 School Board.

That’s the short story of what happened about the potential of Woodstock School District 200’s Board suing the Village of Lakewood over its Tax Increment Financing District.

About 6 people spoke against the TIF.

Then, the school board went into closed session regarding potential litigation. They came out of closed session and adjourned. No action was taken on TIF.

McHenry County Board member Donna Kurtz was one who spoke during public comments

She urged school board members to be thoughtful and careful how they handle this potentially horrific situation for the district.

She urged them to seek a tolling agreement to preserve legal rights for D200.

There is no agenda item on voting on lawsuit.


Comments

No D200 Lakewood TIF Action — 4 Comments

  1. Thank you to County Board members for your show of interest in this matter!

    And County Board Member Donna Kurtz for speaking.

    And and County Board Member Michael Rein, for attending.

    The Attorney for Woodstock’s School District D200 says it’s an Illegal TIF in Lakewood.

    The District Superintendent Moan recommends to the board that they sue Lakewood’s TIF (as the money is already in the budget) Yet the Chairwoman of D200 Camille Goodwin and Superintendent Moan are having closed door meetings with the Vlg Pres. Erin Smith instead of taking action against this illegal TIF.

    Kind of makes one wonder what is ‘IN IT’ for these D200 school board members NOT to take action to do what’s right for the people that THEY REPRESENT???

    This Lakewood TIF Low Income Housing Development would cause all students from this development to attend Woodstock schools but all real estate and business taxes to go to Lakewood.

    This will rob Woodstock taxpayers and cause them to shoulder the burden causing their taxes to go up considerably.

    Affluent Lakewood is pulling this on an impoverished neighboring town?

    Yet Woodstock’s school board members are not so anxious to take action?.

    The money is already in the budget to sue, so what is their incentive NOT to take this to court????

    The deadline for them to take action is the 27th of this month!!!

    Citizens opposed ARE NEEDED at these meetings along with speakers during public comment to ‘demand’ that the board to follow thru with whats right for the people that D200’s board represents!

    HELP!!!

    This proposed TIF Development of Low Income Housing will go at the corner of Rt 47 and 176 (where Crystal Woods Golf Course is. (TIFs are meant to develop ‘blighted land’. This golf course isn’t blighted land- It’s PRIME REAL ESTATE!!!)

    Lakewood annexed this woodstock property years ago when they proposed the Sportsplex nobody wanted thru a TIF (TIFS give developers our tax dollars to put up housing/retail etc with no investment on the developers end)

    If a TIF project fails the developer doesn’t hurt-the taxpayers are hurt, as they will have to clean up the mess!-and tax more to cover the losses.

    TIFs also rob schools of a portion of money that would go to them for up to 35 yrs!!!!)

    Each ‘no-pay’ student will cost Woodstock a ~minimum~ $9,000 per year each!

    This isn’t sustainable as our taxes/rents are already too high, but will have to go up to cover this monumental liability that should not be ours to shoulder.

    We cannot let this go thru!

    Erin Smith your political career is over and so will any of the D200 board members that allow this to go thru. (not to mention possible personal lawsuits)

    INTERESTINGLY, Camille Goodwin is chair of the D200 School Board and is a self admitted Lawyer that has ‘defended TIFs.’—–

    Conflict of interest? I do believe so!

    There is another D200 School Board member who has had international middle eastern dealings with investment/real estate projects.

    This TIF is surprisingly a developer of a middle eastern investment real estate project.

    —- I’m smelling the aroma of impropriety as the puzzle pieces start to fall into place!!!

    And what are the other board members ‘interest’ in letting this go thru??

    A $66 million TIF has a lot of taxpayers money to ‘work with’.

    Why not screw two birds with one stone?

    PLEASE SHOW UP AT THE D200 Board Meeting Jan 26th at Clay Street School in Woodstock.

    Demand to know:

    *Why are they having continual closed door meetings with Lakewood’s Vlg. President, shady lady, Erin Smith?

    *Why are the people not apprised of the dealings regarding these closed door meetings with Lakewood?

    *Why will Lakewood AND D200 prohibit a member of Lakewood’s Trustees to attend the meeting when he has shown interest in this?

    *Why they are not following thru with what’s right for the people they represent?

    AGAIN, Under the veil of darkness of closed door dealings, SOMETHING STINKS, ON ICE, HERE!

    WAKE UP PEOPLE

    – or pay thru the nose (and other various bodily orifices), when you are Once Again SCREWED by your local Elected Officials!!

  2. Amazing!!!

    How about people check their facts before they go off and question someones integrity based upon assumptions.

    I happen to know Bill Nattress quite well.

    A very honest and committed individual to the community.

    He works in technologies not development.

    Why don’t you just call him and ask your questions instead of slinging mud!

  3. I have written many emails to The D200 board, spoken at most board meetings about this tif.

    My emails have asked the board to litigate, based on an expected value return of $35 million dollar loss to Woodstock D200 taxpayers if D200 does NOT litigate.

    (Unless Lakewood citizens would rise up and demand their leadership rescind this despicable aggression against Woodstock citizens, judicial review is the ONLY self-defense recourse we have against being legally burdened with the costs of educating all Lakewood tif children for 35 years)

    D200 Board members voted to ignore advice of counsel (a prepared legal compliant document contained in 12-15-15 agenda packet) to litigate this invalid tif.

    There are supposedly negotiations ongoing between school board chairwoman and Lakewood president.

    I asked that D200 insist on a tolling agreement (to protect legal rights as time passes and statute of limitations may be exceeded). That has not happened.

    I asked school board to make public how PILOTs by Lakewood can safely legally exceed the tif statutory maximums, without putting D200 at risk of claw-backs when tif bondholders sue Lakewood 10-20 years from now over those illegal payments.

    No public explanations have been offered as to any rational motivation for D200 school board members to be so assiduously avoiding inconveniencing Lakewood management in any way.

    I had asked for D200 board members to submit public statements about any conflicts: personal or business relationships with Lakewood managers or tif landowners or prospective developers.

    This request was ignored.

    With the motion to file suit tabled, and no agenda item posted for voting ion it, and coming up on the one year anniversary of Lakewood tif creation,
    Woodstock citizens must conclude that D1200 board members are acting against the interests of Woodstock taxpayer citizens.

    It is predictable that D200 chairwoman will on her own authority and without public disclosure enter a legal waiver agreement protecting Lakewood from litigation.

    The stalling also serves the interest of protecting Lakewood from private citizens who would act to challenge this invalid tif.

    Citizens of Woodstock will lose $35 million in hard costs in the first 23 years of the tif lifespan and multiples of that in its 12 year extension to 35 years.

    Citizens of McHenry County will be paying millions of dollars to Lakewood managers in order to pay Lakewood tif residents’ fair share of cost burdens which are supposed to be shared by all property holders in the County.

    The lost potential revenue which would flow naturally to schools, government, MCC, MCCD, and taxcing bodies which we all must pay…that revenue will flow to Lakewood manager to distribute at her will.

    If we all have to pay more to make up for the serices which we are legallyy obligated to provide for free to the tif residents, too bad for us.

    We must look ahead to recourse available for citizens against a rogue school board, re-districting opportunities to put the tif into Lakewood school districts (an elegant and equitable solution for Lakewood and Woodstock), and Lakewood boycott mechanisms.

    National retailers may have second thoughts about siting a store in a tif with such a shameful history and consequences–the tif money they would receive is to be blood money extracted by wealthy Lakewood from impoverished Woodstock citizens.

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