One More Study: Property Taxes Are Wack

By vouchey in News on Nov 19, 2004 8:11PM

Ben Joravsky's column in the The Reader this week addresses something every property owner is thinking: Cook County's property tax assessments are wack. We briefly mentioned this fact earlier this week, but Joravsky's article picks up on an interesting study by Merlin Tripp, of Citizens for Fair Assessments and Taxes.

Tripp's study uses the financial disclosures of various Chicago public officials to get a sampling of how much property tax bills have actually risen over the past year for different people across the county. His finding? Just about everyone's bills went up, but some went up more than others, and there's no real trend to track. Not byt nieghborhood, not by amount of power, not by value of property. For instance, Gov. Blagojevich's Ravenswood Manor home tax bill went up 25%. Congressman Rahm Emanuel's North Center home's bill went up 80%, and Cook County Commissioner Forrect Claypool's North Center home's bill went up 125%. Alderman Vi Daley's Old Town home's bill went up 47%.

Wack.

Another thing that's wack is that after decades of top-notch reporting, the Chicago Reader still doesn't post Joravsky's articles on the web. His stuff, while not always Pulitzer-quality material, always shines a light on some corner of city life that could use some light. The Reader is doing the public, and Joravsky, a disservice by not making his work more accessible.