There’s no place like home
My town of Palatine, all 68,000 of us as of the last census, home to (as far as I know) Illinois’ only dual funeral home/mini golf course, is rarely in the news. It’s the standard idyllic, upper-middle class suburb, and most people are easy-going enough. Granted, along with Barrington, it’s one of the only townships in Cook County that votes consistently Republican (it went by a margin of 10% for Bush in ‘04), but as much as people gripe about “the machine,” Cook County administration, and the Daley family, we’ve never been the confrontational sort.
Desperate times, however, call for desperate measures. The latest hike in the Cook County sales tax will bring the rate to 10% in Palatine, as opposed to 7% in communities just across Lake Cook Road, in Lake County. The long-suffering Palatine Chamber of Commerce sprang into action, and started protesting publicly to anyone who would listen. Now, Palatine, along with several other townships at the border, hopes to secede from Cook County and form Lincoln County. Failing that, the rebels split into two camps: those willing to join Lake County, and those opposed to Lake County’s higher property tax rate.
So far neither option looks likely. A majority of Palatine residents may, in fact, be persuaded, but they’ll have a tough time persuading the rest of the County. So, for now, the Jaycees gripe on.
Comment by JayBandit on 10 March 2008 at 7:44 pm:
I’d say the Barrington folk have better luck at getting into Lake County rather than forming some new county. A great deal of Barrington is already in Lake County (including my parents’ home), so it would make sense.
Cook County is a gigantic county, and they’ll fight this tooth & nail. They need the money from the northwest suburbs to pay for all the riff-raff throughout the “bad areas”.
I suggest people check out the hilarious post I linked to in my latest post…
JB
Comment by Anna on 10 March 2008 at 9:20 pm:
Unincorporated Palatine stretches into Lake County as well, I believe… As the Trib has noted, though, that would require not just Cook County’s consent, but also Lake County’s.
Great link, by the way.
Comment by Allan Niemerg on 10 March 2008 at 11:28 pm:
The 10% total sales tax is so incredibly obnoxious. As if this city isn’t expensive enough.
Still, I suspect when it’s all said and done that Chicago subsidizes the burbs much more than the other way around.
Comment by kofi the 10% of everything i spend for the privilege to call a daley my mayor? sounds like a steal on 11 March 2008 at 12:00 am:
I’d be interested in the numbers, Alan. While I would agree the city contributes more tax revenue, I wonder how much spending is sent back to the burbs.
I also wonder how expensive Chicago is to New York. I know the buzz after this recent tax rate makes Chicago the ‘highest taxed’ city, but New York has a steep city income tax — does anyone know how Chicago shapes up?
Comment by kofi the we need to raise your taxes to buy all our friends hybrids - the chicago machine is going green on 11 March 2008 at 12:09 am:
And let’s not forget (or for those of your from down state, let’s not forget to learn) that a significant portion of the discontent has to do with Todd Stroger. Nobody (except for crazy liberals like J. Prescott or Hanno) are happy with more taxes, but the big issue in Chicago is who is responsible for these taxes. The scapegoat (rightly or wrongly — most likely rightly) is Stroger who was on the county board because of his daddy, who swooped in on his daddy’s seat after months of hiding the truth about the man’s health condition, and who has been repeatedly exposed as employing his family and friends in overly lush city jobs. A lot of Chicagoians could stomach a tax hike if it meant more police or more health care or more education money. Unfortunately, the entrenched Democrat machine is raising to taxes while cutting police, cutting health care, cutting education while unqualified second cousins of politicians are pulling down six figures.
Comment by J. Prescott on 11 March 2008 at 7:12 am:
I am not liberal. I advocated the dissolution of the corporate tax and only suggested increasing personal income taxes to make the move revenue neutral. Other than that I do not advocate raising taxes.
Comment by Hanno on 11 March 2008 at 10:19 am:
I love taxes. If you earn money the government should take it all because after all, an elected body is completely accountable to the people and will invariably spend it more in the common good than those silly individuals would anyhow. In fact, we should collectivize all housing so that the government could decide on the best and most equitable distribution of housing. And y’know while we’re at it why bother with taxation? I mean really it’s just the government getting the money it printed back. Why not just sort of have “necessity ATMs” or something so that people could get their government rationing portion of jeans, t-shirts, lingere, food, etc? I mean that’d simplify the process. None of this silly cash stuff. But yeah. Go taxes!