Five months after the City of Park Ridge was scheduled to make its annual Uptown TIF payment to Park Ridge-Niles School District 64, the District is telling the City it is time to pay up or face potential legal action.
The City owes District 64 approximately $600,000 under terms of the 2003 agreement in which the City agreed to share a portion of Uptown TIF revenues with the District to partially offset the impact of the TIF on schools. The City has made the annual payments for the past 11 years, but has balked at making the payment due last December despite the District’s efforts to collect it.
Loss of the TIF dollars, which were factored into the school system’s budget for the current fiscal year ending June 30, could force District 64 to consider future program cuts and increased class sizes.
“This issue is about as clear-cut as it gets. We have an agreement with the City dating back to 2003, but the City is not living up to it,” said member John Heyde on behalf of the Board of Education. Heyde served on the District’s Community Finance Committee in the years immediately after the 2003 TIF agreement was signed. “This agreement was made in good faith and has been honored by the City for 11 years. You can’t rewrite history just because it no longer suits you.”
With the Board’s unanimous support, the District delivered a letter to the City on May 9 setting a final May 28 deadline for payment. The letter was sent on behalf of the District by attorney Ares Dalianis of the Chicago law firm Franczek Radelet.
“Failure to pay will leave the District with no choice other than to pursue its legal and equitable remedies in court. The District owes the community nothing less than a vigorous pursuit of funds it is contractually owed from the City,” the letter reads.
Board of Education President Anthony H. Borrelli underscored that the entire Board is unified in its demand that the City meet its commitment to District 64.
“We want to resolve this problem as quickly as we can, before it has an impact on our students and families,” said Borrelli. “There is still more than a decade left in this agreement, and we cannot afford to let the City go back on its word. The City owes it to students and taxpayers to live up to its legal obligations.”
The Board does not take legal action lightly and hopes the City will meet its obligations without it, the Board members said. They noted the issue is not merely a dispute between two units of local government, but one that fundamentally affects families and children throughout the community.
“The District’s budget depends on this money, and without it, we’ll have fewer resources to provide a high-quality education while honoring our obligations to the taxpayers to not seek a referendum for at least several more years,” said Heyde. “That’s unacceptable to us, it’s unacceptable to our families, and it’s unacceptable in a community like ours that values public education.”
The agreement requiring Park Ridge to provide annual payments to District 64 was struck in 2003 as part of the creation of the Uptown TIF. It is intended to compensate the District for the cost of new students moving into the TIF area and provide for the District to share in the successful redevelopment of the TIF district.
Despite having paid the District every year until now, the City now claims the agreement it has honored for 11 years is no longer valid. It also claims there is missing documentation on new students living in the TIF area, even though District 64 has agreed to clarify and rectify any concerns.
"The City can't just pick and choose which bills to pay,” said Heyde. “They're paying the street pavers, the City payroll, the electricity bill, and their bond holders. Like any other bill, this one, too, requires payment, and it's long overdue."
He dismissed the City’s claim it may have to raise property taxes to make the TIF payment to District 64 and other local taxing bodies. As a home-rule municipality, he noted, the City has many options for finding the necessary revenue, whether other taxes and fees, budget cuts or covering the expense from its fund balance.