Governor Bruce Rauner Planning to Freeze Property Taxes

Back in late November 2016, Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner announced that he plans to freeze property taxes throughout the state. Illinois has gained an increasing reputation for its high property tax rate.

As a matter of fact, SmartAsset states that "the state of Illinois has the second highest property taxes in the country. The statewide average effective tax rate is 2.13%, nearly double the national average."

In response to this, Governor Rauner is attempting to create a permanent property tax freeze. But along with high property tax rates, Illinois has also been without a budget for nearly two years as Democrats in the Illinois House of Representatives face a continual standoff with Governor Rauner.

As a theoretical win-win solution, Governor Rauner "told legislative leaders Wednesday that he’d consider a partial budget only if term limits and a permanent property tax freeze were included", according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

But when we dive deeper into the issue of a permanent property tax freeze, the issue may not be as cut and dry as it seems.

According to NPR, "none of the freeze legislation introduced over the last couple of years would guarantee that taxes never increased on a particular piece of property. Rather, like the existing tax caps law, they all would cap the total amount of money a government body could ask from all property owners within its borders."

Essentially, an individual could potentially pay more money in property taxes in the coming years with a government-induced cap on what that amount could be.

NPR continues to discuss how many municipalities, especially those in smaller districts, depend largely on property taxes for their funding. Without property taxes, pensions are in danger, municipality employees (such as teachers) can be laid off, and infrastructure as a whole can see a decline. This leaves the local municipalities to find another route to gather their funding.

Ultimately, time will tell whether or not a property tax freeze is included in a budget deal between the governor and state lawmakers. But with any policy decision, there needs to be an investigation into solutions for the potential pitfalls.

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