A map of McHenry County showing its seventeen townships.
After reading about State Rep. David McSweeney’s bill to freeze the amount of money that the Town Funds of township government can get for one year, a friend of McHenry County Blog did some research on population and voting information for all of McHenry County’s seventeen townships.
There is no similar limitation proposed for the budgets of Road Commissioners.
The bill affects only those with less than 100,000 people, so it appears it would apply to all townships in McHenry County.
Thought some might be interested in it.
| Township | Census Pop | AFR Pop | Cty Clerk Reg. Voters | Ballots 2013 | Census voting age |
| Burton | 4,974 | 5,003 | 3,529 | 522 | 3,490 |
| Richmond | 6,654 | 6,683 | 4,941 | 783 | 4,995 |
| Hebron | 2,060 | 2,628 | 1,738 | 518 | 1,646 |
| Alden | 1,136 | 1,523 | 1,162 | 230 | 1,018 |
| Chemung | 9,128 | 9,134 | 4,799 | 1,118 | 6,023 |
| Dunham | 2,832 | 2,844 | 1,666 | 347 | 2,297 |
| Hartland | 2,593 | 2,063 | 1,610 | 333 | 1,966 |
| Greenwood | 13,934 | 13,990 | 8,866 | 1,157 | 10,229 |
| Seneca | 2,951 | 2,944 | 2,378 | 317 | 2,440 |
| Marengo | 7,584 | 8,000 | 4,962 | 1,041 | 5,646 |
| Coral | 3,536 | 3,552 | 2,592 | 433 | 2,745 |
| Riley | 2,887 | 2,922 | 2,028 | 342 | 2,028 |
| Dorr | 20,975 | 20,911 | 13,907 | 1,689 | 15,647 |
| McHenry | 47,615 | 47,653 | 32,617 | 7,097 | 35,677 |
| Nunda | 38,299 | 37,900 | 26,365 | 4,946 | 28,273 |
| Grafton | 52,306 | 40,457 | 33,085 | 4,049 | 35,169 |
| Algonquin | 88,699 | 103,121 | 57,817 | 8,041 | 65,396 |
| TOTAL ALL | 308,163 | 311,328 | 204,062 | 32,963 | 224,685 |
Some townships have lowered their levies to have zero increases in their tax collections.
McSweeny is ignorantly planning to penalize those Townships!
The bill should be amended to NOT apply to Townships which had no increase in their levy.
If Schools, Counties, Park Districts and municipalities were as responsible as Townships, the negative impact from property taxes would be lessened but then the teachers and other union members would go on strike!
So, we pick on the Townships because they are not unionized!!
Chicken feces politics!!
McSweeney is targeting extensions, not levies.
McSweeny is really out of touch with reality .
He should include all taxing bodies in his bill if he really wants to change anything.
Just to include the town funds is foolishness when in reality that is probaly the smallest item on any ones tax bill.
Knowledge voter, I would call it Pig feces on a Government Farm . . . stinks for miles.
What does the AFR population stand for?
I would assume that the AFR would be the acronym for Annual Financial Report but then, remember what the word assume can mean.
Applicable Federal Rate.
Dave McSweeney must be studying Jack Franks populist playbook with his property tax bill that will not pass.
McSweeney the Taxfighter.
What a joke!
On average property tax bill, 50% goes to school.
25% goes to municipality.
10% goes to McHenry County.
The remaining 15% goes to townships, MCC, MCCD, library district, park district, fire protection district, police & fire pension.
Township accounts for less than 5% of tax bill.
So capping any increase is meaningless.
Want to impress me Mr. McSweeney, then file a bill seeking to cap school, municipal and county tax levies.
Leave the meaningless populist bills to Jack the Grand Wizard of the McHenry County Combine.