{"id":575877,"date":"2010-05-22T22:40:45","date_gmt":"2010-05-23T02:40:45","guid":{"rendered":"tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d8341c60fd53ef0133ee4a056c970b"},"modified":"2010-05-22T22:40:45","modified_gmt":"2010-05-23T02:40:45","slug":"more-than-160000-homeowners-skip-daleys-property-tax-relief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/575877","title":{"rendered":"More than 160,000 homeowners skip Daley’s property tax relief"},"content":{"rendered":"

From Sunday’s print edition<\/em>:<\/p>\n

160,000 homeowners forgo small rebates<\/h2>\n

Property-tax refunds, linked to parking meter sale, drew only
\n36,600 applications<\/h3>\n

More than 160,000 Chicago homeowners left money on the table \u2014 in
\nsome cases, as much as $200 \u2014 by failing to apply for a property-tax
\nrelief program that Mayor Richard Daley pushed to be included in this
\nyear’s budget.<\/p>\n

City Hall said about 200,000 homeowners could apply
\n for the money, but records show only 36,621 applications were filed by
\nthe March 31 deadline.<\/p>\n

That means the city stands to pay out less
\nthan $4.5 million of the $35 million set aside for the payments, which
\nstart at $25. There also will be promotional and administrative costs.
\nSo far, less than $900,000 has been paid out to 6,991 homeowners,
\nofficials said.\n<\/p>\n

The money is coming from Daley’s much-criticized
\n$1.15 billion lease of the city parking meter system. When Daley
\npromoted the property-tax relief idea last fall, some aldermen
\nquestioned the value of spending millions on a program they said would
\ndo little, if anything, to help cash-strapped homeowners.<\/p>\n

"It was a
\n political gimmick, and the voters saw it for what it was," said Ald.
\nJoe Moore, 49th. "Most people didn’t even see any value in taking the
\ntime to apply for it."<\/p>\n

Daley has been criticized by some aldermen
\nand budget watchdogs for relying too heavily on the parking meter
\nproceeds to balance recent budgets. Much of the one-time windfall was
\nsupposed to be set aside. So, some aldermen aren’t lamenting the small
\nnumber of property-tax rebate applications.<\/p>\n

"I guess the good news
\n is that we didn’t spend as much of our reserves on this gimmick," Moore
\n said. "The bad news is the mayor probably has more to raid for next
\nyear."<\/p>\n

The administration, however, is satisfied with the number
\nof applicants to the heavily promoted program, said a spokesman for the
\nOffice of Budget and Management.<\/p>\n

"You can’t expect everyone who is
\n potentially eligible to make an application, and we’re satisfied with
\nthe results," spokesman Pete Scales said. "Thousands of people got
\nproperty-tax relief."<\/p>\n

Aldermen initially balked at approving the
\nprogram, but the opposition withered after Daley suggested homeowners
\ncould politically punish aldermen who voted against it.<\/p>\n

Daley said
\n it is designed to blunt the impact of the phasing out of a state law
\nthat limited property-tax increases caused, in part, by rising home
\nvalues.<\/p>\n

That break, which ended this year in Chicago, was recently
\n reauthorized by the General Assembly, in an effort fraught with
\npolitical implications as November elections approach. It awaits the
\nsignature of Gov. Pat Quinn.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From Sunday’s print edition: 160,000 homeowners forgo small rebates Property-tax refunds, linked to parking meter sale, drew only 36,600 applications More than 160,000 Chicago homeowners left money on the table \u2014 in some cases, as much as $200 \u2014 by failing to apply for a property-tax relief program that Mayor Richard Daley pushed to be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3992,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-575877","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/575877","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3992"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=575877"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/575877\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=575877"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=575877"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=575877"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}