This year McHenry County Clerk Mary McClellan has made it easy to find what Tax Increment Financing Districts are extracting from our pocketbooks. Since my tax bill is composed of most of the tax districts into which Crystal Lakers pay, … Continue reading
Category Archives: Vulcan Lakes TIF
Since McHenry County Blog was started in reaction to the Crystal Lake City Council’s putting Route 14 next to the Vulcan gravel pit in a Tax Increment Financing District, perhaps you will excuse me for returning to the subject once … Continue reading
Included on the Tax Rate Calculation page of the McHenry County Clerk’s Office are totals for taxes levied on property within TIF Districts. Tax Increment Financing Districts are mechanisms that allow municipalities to pry money out everyone in McHenry County … Continue reading
A 2007 Cub Scout meeting caused me to miss Springfield politician-developer Bill Cellini’s appearance before the Crystal Lake City Council the day it awarded the contract for the development of the Vulcan Lakes TIF District. It wasn’t until a Northwest … Continue reading
One of the several deputies fired by McHenry County Sheriff Keith Nygren has brain cancer. Unfortunately, his firing, coming after he was deposed in Zane Seipler’s Federal wrongful termination suit, came when he apparently needed health coverage. His daughter tells … Continue reading
In Friday’s Chicago Tribune column, John Kass wrote about Bill Cellini’s laugh. I sensed Kass believed that when Cellini laughed incriminated him. Read the piece and draw your own conclusion. And, if you want to hear Cellini’s laugh listen to … Continue reading
I claim no knowledge that the Crystal Lake City Council might be contemplating another Tax Increment Financing District east of the one altering the “streetscape” between the stone cemetery monuments at Pizza Hut and across the street from Kwik Kopy. … Continue reading
In a meeting of Crystal Lake governmental bodies about the Vulcan Lakes/Route 14 Tax Increment Financing district, which the city council will vote upon next Tuesday at 7:30, its consultant revealed that $115 million is expected to be generated. And, … Continue reading
Content of the leaflet being distributed by Jim Young: Citizens Against TIFS, Jim Young, Chairman Mayor Shepley/Council Plan TIF Tax Hike The Crystal Lake City Council is planning to divert money from our school, park & college districts to benefit … Continue reading
Crystal Lake’s Jim Thompson, Chairman of Citizens Against TIFs, leafleted much of the Coventry subdivision today. The man is indefatigable. Under his supervision, thousands of leaflets explaining how the Crystal Lake City Council’s passage of two Tax Increment Financing districts … Continue reading
With both Crystal Lake school districts and the park district opposing the Vulcan Lakes/Route 14 TIF, the Crystal Lake City Council approved a pre-meeting agreement to postpone the vote until December 6th. With the seven council members were unanimous in … Continue reading
In Friday’s Northwest Herald is an article about the $23 million that the City of Crystal Lake is scheduled to haul in over a twenty-year period as a result of a proposed Waste Management garbage transfer station to be located … Continue reading
Speaking of the old Crystal Lake Dump, as I do in the post below, I once had a phone conversation with Dick Tracy cartoonist Chester Gould about Gravel Gertie. It was when I was state representative in the late 1970’s. … Continue reading
In the “better late than never” category is the Crystal Lake Park Board’s resolution last night to oppose the city council’s two Tax Increment Financing Districts. Had the board known the rules of the TIF “game,” it is likely it … Continue reading
Introducing himself as the chairman of Citizens Against TIFs, local activist Jim Young stated that he believed the General Assembly made a very serious mistake when it passed the Tax Increment Financing law. “It violates the principles of equity,” the … Continue reading
Over one hour and twenty minutes after the Crystal Lake City Council meeting began, Grade School District 47 Superintendent Ron Miller was the first one to get a chance to offer the first public comments in the Vulcan Lakes/Route 14 … Continue reading
When Crystal Lake Mayor Aaron Shepley says so. Or, at least, that is what he would have the audience and fellow council members believe if his performance at Tuesday night’s city council is any indication. Apparently, he was smarting from … Continue reading
High School District 155’s consultant Joe Christofanelli of the firm of Ernst and Young has conservatively estimated a net loss of $10 million should the two Tax Increment Financing (TIF) districts be approved by the City of Crystal Lake. “The … Continue reading
Wouldn’t you have thought that the City Council would have made certain that its employees could drive a vehicle into the Vulcan Lakes property when it cut the deal with Vulcan Materials? Did you assume that the road between the … Continue reading
Crystal Lake neighborhoods who received the leaflet entitled, “Mayor Shepley/City Council Plan Tax Hike,” can thank Crystal Lake Libertarian Party member Jim Young. Young, who does not believe that tax dollars should be spent to subsidize developers got back into … Continue reading