Sunday, December 6, 2009
Politics / Clout City The City Releases the "Shadow Budget"
Posted by Mick Dumke on 12.06.09 at 04:00 AM
- Paul John Higgins
The document demands further analysis, but a few early observations from myself and my colleague Ben Joravsky:
1. Mayor Daley and his top aides defend the TIF program as the city’s chief tool to fight economic decline in depressed neighborhoods. But the budget itself shows that the wealthier downtown TIF districts bring in far more extra tax funding—and thus have far more to spend—than impoverished neighborhoods on the south and west sides.
To cite one example: the Ogilvie Transportation French Market, a project Mayor Daley touted yesterday, got $12 million from the River West TIF district (whose projections are on page 132 of the budget document). That’s nearly twice as much TIF money as the total available next year to the Englewood Mall, Englewood Neighborhood, Roseland/Michigan, 95th/Stony Island, 69th/Ashland, and 63rd/Ashland TIF districts combined.
2. What qualifies as an “economic development” project varies so widely—among the various projects are school construction, ornamental street lighting, traffic studies, and subsidies for corporations, a bakery, and a theater troupe—as to make the term either all-encompassing or meaningless, depending on your perspective.
3. The premise of the program is that it generates funding for development in blighted communities. For instance, a TIF subsidy might be used to turn a vacant lot into a strip mall, which would produce more property tax revenue than the vacant lot. For the life of the TIF district (up to 24 years), that money goes back into the pot to fund more development.
But in one TIF district after another the anticipated yield for next year is lower than it was for this year. Take the LaSalle Central TIF district (whose projections are on page 99). County clerk David Orr has reported that this year it brought in about $26 million in property taxes. In 2010, the city predicts that number will drop to about $18 million, a 30 percent decline.
Which brings us back to the newly released document, which projects that many of the TIF districts will actually be running a deficit over the next few years.
4. It shouldn't have been so hard to get this document.
City officials shared portions of it with aldermen this fall, and several passed to us on what they’d received. On September 21 we submitted a request for the complete TIF budget under the state’s Freedom of Information Act. On October 14 we got a letter from the Department of Community Development informing us that our request had been denied on the grounds that "the information contained in it is comprised of staff-determined estimates. . . . They are not final or official projections."
In a letter to the city’s chief FOIA officer, Jenny Hoyle, we argued that the budget involved both projections and allocations and was no more preliminary than the city’s regular budget, which is similarly based on estimates of the next year’s revenues and spending. We also noted that the state FOIA specifies that “all information in any account, voucher, or contract dealing with the receipt or expenditure of public or other funds of public bodies” is considered public and open to inspection.
In the meantime, our cover story on the shadow budget hit the street just as the city was debating how to deal with a huge hole in its regular budget. Calls for TIF reform came from the public, the daily papers, and even members of the City Council.
On November 24 Hoyle e-mailed us saying she would grant our appeal. She said she would send us the budget once Community Development had redacted the names of companies involved in development deals that had not been formally approved.
We finally received it today.
Comments (15)
Showing 1-15 of 15
As with Jon Conroy's years of stories on police brutality, the Reader's steady insistence on covering this important topic is finally making a difference. This is journalism at its finest. Thank you.
like
dislikeThanks, Ben and Mick! You were lonely voices in the wilderness for a long time. It must feel great to say "I TOLD YA!"
We need to get this "budget" for the last 5-10 years. It's as important to know what the money has been spent on as what it was supposed to be spent on.
Thanks for your dogged persistece. It is a disgrace, the city's stonewalling, whether on this shadow budget or on police internal investigations (such as the one reported in the issue on stands now, involving a cabbie who claims to have been threatened at gunpoint by a drunk, off-duty cop) or any variety of other fronts.
"We need to get this "budget" for the last 5-10 years. It's as important to know what the money has been spent ... "
for prior years the TIF annual reports itemize expenditures over $10K
Saffold: "Chicago taxpayers and their aldermen are involved in every step of the way. "
" ... the city’s chief FOIA officer, Jenny Hoyle ... said she would send us the budget once Community Development had redacted the names of companies involved in development deals that had not been formally approved."
Mystery projects
CALUMET / CERMAK
4. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Proposed ($60,000,000)
CHICAGO / CENTRAL PARK
16. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Pending ($300,000)
17. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Pending ($400,000)
DEVON / WESTERN
6. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Pending ($3,000,000)
GALEWOOD / ARMITAGE
5. Potential Redevelopment Project 2009 Committed ($1,100,000)
HOLLYWOOD / SHERIDAN
9. Potential Redevelopment Project 2009 Pending ($1,125,000)
LASALLE CENTRAL
23. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Pending ($2,000,000)
24. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Pending ($3,500,000)
25. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Pending ($15,000,000)
26. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Pending ($20,000,000)
36. Potential Redevelopment Project 2011 Pending ($1,300,000)
37. Potential Redevelopment Project 2011 Pending ($13,000,000)
MIDWEST
41. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Committed ($2,500,000)
49. Potential Redevelopment Project 2011 Committed ($2,500,000)
50. Potential Redevelopment Project 2011 Committed ($5,000,000)
STONY ISLAND / BURNSIDE
20. Potential Redevelopment Project 2011 Pending ($1,500,000)
WESTERN / OGDEN
15. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 On Hold ($3,000,000)
16. Potential Redevelopment Project 2010 Pending ($1,000,000)
21. Potential Redevelopment Project 2011 Pending ($1,000,000)
My God! Congratulations on finding this. But now to analyze is going to take a lot of time. YIKES!
What people see and notice needs to be shared into a central wiki or something.
For Wilson Yard is the annual "Truman College IGA Annual Payment" and "Clifton/Magnolia Apts. Annual Payment"? These amount to $1,510,660 Annually. If the district takes in $5,164319, that means these two line itmes sucks up almost 30%.
That seems to be a huge chunk. Does anyone know what these funds are intended for? Is this simply the government re-allocating funds from taxpaying parcels to non-taxpaying parcels (school and low income housing)?
DESIGNATION OF COMMUNITY HOUSING PARTNERS XI, L.P. AND
VOICE OF THE PEOPLE IN UPTOWN, INC. AS PROJECT
DEVELOPERS, AUTHORIZATION FOR EXECUTION OF LOAN,
REDEVELOPMENT AND LAND-USE RESTRICTION
AGREEMENTS AND ISSUANCE OF CITY OF
CHICAGO VARIABLE RATE DEMAND MULTIFAMILY
HOUSING REVENUE BONDS
(UPTOWN PRESERVATION APARTMENTS)
SERIES 2007 FOR ACQUISITION
AND REHABILITATION OF
AFFORDABLE HOUSING.
see PDF page 21 Journal page 94065
http://www.chicityclerk.com/journals/2006/…
Thank You Hugh. Now we need to track how the bond funds are/were spent by these two organizations. I imagine Truman spent the majority of that money on the parking deck. What do you wanna bet piece of those housing funds are kicked back as campaign contributions to the 46th ward? I'd like to see that balance sheet....
What the feds need to do is to find the "bookkeeper" (like they did in the movie "The Untouchables") and make him decipher the numbers' true meaning. Then they should nail Daley's butt right to the wall of Terre Haute Federal Prison!
A portion of every Chicago TIF dollar ends up in campaign coffers. In Chicago, TIF amounts to public funding of elections; unfortunately, so far it's only for incumbents. Chicago's TIF program re-enforces incumbency and denies Chicagoans their right to representation.
For example, the afore-mentioned developer of the Clifton/Magnolia project in Uptown, COMMUNITY HOUSING PARTNERS XI, L.P., is controlled by Chicago Community Development Corporation (CCDC), a FOR-PROFIT Illinois corporation, a privately held residential housing provider. It is closely held and owned by two men:
Anthony J. Fusco, Jr., Director, President, & Treasurer 75%
Daniel J. Burke, Director, Vice President & Secretary, 25%
CCDC projects are funded largely through TIF subsidies, loans from the City of Chicago Department of Housing (DOH), and Low Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) from the Illinois Housing Development Authority (IHDA). As you might guess from their business model, CCDC and its owners are major campaign contributors. CCDC has made 71 contributions totalling $64,280.00 since 1998. Pols who Fusco & Burke feel strongly about include Richard & John Daley, John Stroger, George Ryan, Rod Blagojevich, and several aldermen, including Aldermen Ed Burke and Helen Shiller. Although Mr. Fusco lives in River Forest, and Mr. Burke lives in Oak Park, they are both deeply fascinated by Chicago politics.
For more information:
1. http://www.chicagocdc.com/
2. http://www.elections.state.il.us/CampaignD…
3. the Vendor, Contract and Payment Search under the Procurement Dept on the City website
I really think, as a possible candidate that my alter-ego Henry George, The Ghost Who Walks, as both Mayor of Chicago and Governor of Illinois, he can do the job, and he definitely needs and wants the wider active participation, and consideration by fellow citizens if he is finally and ultimately to be elected to both positions. That Democracy certainly and definitely demands wisdom, and yet, are his fellow citizens willing to become SUPER-WISE as Super Democracy demands also, or are they pigeons waiting to be pounced on by the eager, overly ambitious, and militarily, economically and demographically leveraged Chinese and their some-time erstwhile extremist and so-called moderate alllies, the Moslems? Has anyone asked an extremist, or better yet an ordinary moderate Moslem if he/she thinks the spires of the Muezzeens are really Holy Swords of Jihad reaching to the sky, ready to be used at a moments notice, by both extremely eager Allah and Muhammad? And ask yourselves: who wants our society-culture-nation-state more? Us or them? Is this prejudice? No. It's simply historical fact. 1212: Tours, France, also, the Byzantine-Khazar-Empire connection. If the Moslems won, and the Byzantine Empire lost, the Moslems would have had a lot more Eastern territory back then. And, thanks to the Khazars, the Byzantine Empire lasted say, at least 500 to a Thousand Years more. Why? Because the Khazars and the Byzantines wanted it MORE! Oh, and By the way, this is according to someone in the U.K. who said, and I qoute: "I have it on excellent authority that a school in Ontario, Canada was mixed; one (1) Moslem young person was said to have said": "I smell Jew stink," this place smells of stinky "Jew(s)". "Kill the (d**n( sic) Jews". "No one in charge at that school, not the teacher(s) who heard it, or the administrative staff who were mixed caucasian did anything about this incident or took this young man aside and read the riot act to him, to be more cognizant of his hateful-hurtful words". The incident passed, and the school then ultimately passed into the more aggressive hands of the Moslems". Again I say to you: Super Democracy Demands Super Wisdom. So who wants our nation-society-culure-land more? You or them? There is a connection between what is happenning historically, and what is happening economically and socially. We owe our huge defecit to the Chinese both principal & interest. The Moslems want the world as a religious empire. The're allies now. But when the war for the West is won, will they still be allies? Stay tuned!
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