Kendall County municipalities say major cuts in state funding proposed by Gov. Bruce Rauner would force them to cut services and staff or try to find more local revenue sources, even as they are still recovering from the deep recession.
Photo by Judy Harvey

Kendall County municipalities are looking at all kinds of what-ifs, should revenue sharing cuts proposed by Gov. Bruce Rauner go through.

Last month, Rauner proposed a 50 percent reduction in funds local governments receive from state income tax. Cities and counties rely on those funds and would be faced with either cutting services or increasing local property taxes, scenarios that are never popular with residents.

Metro West Council of Government is a non-profit organization that represents municipalities throughout Kendall, Kane, and DeKalb counties.  After meeting last week, the organization issued a strong statement against Rauner’s budget plans calling them “severe” and “extremely disappointing.”

“The idea that the governor would not only strip half of the money earmarked for local services, but also suggest freezing property taxes, is devastating to Illinois municipalities. In essence, this would leave non home rule communities with no way to replace the funds that pay for essential public services such as police and fire protection, snow plowing, infrastructure projects, and street maintenance and repairs,” the organization stated.

State revenue amounts to 11 percent of the city of Yorkville’s annual budget or $850.000.

“Obviously, we are opposed to it,” said Bart Olson, city administrator for Yorkville.  To put it in perspective, the costs for police officers’ salaries alone $1.6 million, and that does not include sergeants and support staff and administrative.

For the Village of Plano, reduced state revenue would mean a 10 to 15 percent  hit, more than $530,000 to its general fund, the one which covers such services as police and snow plowing.

“I talk to a lot of residents all of the time and I haven’t heard anyone say they would like to see less services. No resident has said that,” said Plano Mayor Bob Hausler.

Metro West COG pointed out that many municipalities are still recovering from the deep recession and still struggling with lost property and sales tax revenues.

“We had played out every possible scenario of revenue cuts four years ago, when we were in our valley of low funds. We are already down 30 percent in staff from our pre-recession numbers,” Olson said.

Hausler echoed that, saying Plano is just now beginning to get back to pre-recession levels on some departments. “We’re just now getting the police department staff up to where it should be,” he said.

During the first few years of the last deep recession, municipalities had to combine some services. Yorkville, Oswego and Montgomery do partner on some areas such as city inspectors and negotiating bids for common needs. But combining public safety departments can be much more complicated, Olson said.

In fact, Hausler believes such mergers of police and public safety departments could end up being less efficient.

The Village of Oswego also stands to lose approximately $1.5 million, representing a 9-percent reduction in the village’s general fund. Oswego Administrator Steve Jones has said the proposal “would likely lead us to consider alternative revenue and expense options.”

Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, is pushing for a 3 percent income tax surcharge for high income residents, those earning more than $1 million.

“The state needs to look at other revenue sources,” Hausler said, adding that Plano has been conservative with its budgets..

The revenue sharing plan has been in place since 1969 when the state first enacted an income tax. Local governments agreed to not impose their own income tax in exchange for receiving 10 percent of the income taxes collected from residents within their municipality.

“We respectfully acknowledge the serious challenges the governor faces, however the state should not balance its own budget on the backs of those who have employed sound financial practices all along. We look forward to working cooperatively with the governor on future legislative issues,” said Metro West COG.

The municipalities are being asked to “pay for” decades of bad budgeting at the state level, Hausler said.

Olson acknowledged it is a “pretty unprecedented” time in the state’s budget history but said the Rauner proposals are a ‘starting point.’ We will see what ends up coming down.”

While negotiations go on, Kendall communities will be going into local budget preparations with a great deal of uncertainty.

“It does make it difficult,” Olson said.