South suburban towns are leaving more tax dollars on the table than every other portion of Cook County, according to a new study by the treasurer’s office that investigates municipal collection rates.
Only 86.4% of billed taxes owed by residents were collected by local governments in the south suburbs, according to the analysis of the recently concluded 2022 tax year, far below the average tax collection rate in Cook County of 96%. That means Southland towns are losing out on $185 million in funds for services such as public safety, education and infrastructure.
“It looks pretty doomy and gloomy,” said Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas. “Low collection rates are a symptom of an underlying disease.”
The two leading diagnoses are residents who cannot afford to pay their taxes and vacant land that is not providing tax dollars, according to Pappas. Only the south suburbs and south Chicago are below 90% collection rate.
There are some actions that can help improve collection rate, such as increasing taxes sparingly and buying up vacant land, said Brad Bettenhausen, administrative and financial consultant for Tinley Park and finance director for the village for almost four decades.
“We have, overtime, worked with the county to acquire some of the delinquent property parcels that go unpaid year after year after year,” he said. “We’re actively trying to clean out some of the deadwood where taxes get extended against property that never gets paid.”
Tinley Park has a collection rate of 97% while South Holland’s tax collection rate is 90.8%, which is higher than the average around the south suburbs.
Mayor Don DeGraff pointed to a variety of village ordinances that demand South Holland residents adhere to unique rules in the name of “faith and family.” One requires residents closely look after their homes and lawns. These demands, he said, makes the village a desirable place to live and leads to high property values which reduces vacant land and attracts residents and businesses.
“We’re continuing to work on making sure that people pay their taxes on time and we’ll help them in any way, shape or form that we can,” he said. “But I think a lot of it comes down to a value system.”
Many of the suburbs struggling with low tax collection are towns that have long had issues bringing development and investment into neighborhoods, such as Harvey and Robbins which have collection rates of 51.7% and 52.6%.
But just as Bettenhausen and leaders of high percentage collectors say, they cannot take all of the credit for their high percentage of collection because a lot of uncontrollable factors affect a town’s tax collection rate. Leaders of towns that are below average say there is not much they can do to boost their return.
“A tax collection plan, that’s something that has got to be apprised by the assessor and Maria Pappas’ office,” said Robbins Mayor Darren Bryant. “It’s Illinois law that deals with tax collection.”
Robbins had $3.5 million in uncollected taxes, according to the study from Pappas’ office. But Bryant said the village can always do more to bring development to town.
Burnham Mayor Robert Polk agreed increased development is how his town can reduce its $2.5 million tax collection gap.
Pappas agreed with Bryant and Polk that development is the best way to increase collection percent, and said state legislators could do more to bring additional investment to the south suburbs. But she said the state’s resources are focused elsewhere.
“The problem right now is all the dollars are going to migrants,” she said, without specifying which spending packages were actively drawing resources away from suburban investment plans. “All the extra money, it’s going to this migrant situation which is what’s causing a lot of controversy between African Americans and Latinos. African Americans are saying ‘where’s my end?’”
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