The Case for Voting NO’ on the Winfield Road Referendum TAX

This an archived article from February of 2010

This fall our village is putting to a public vote a referendum for $3.3 Million in order to fix the most decrepit roads in our town. After that, we need an additional $705 Thousand Dollars per year just to maintain the remaining roads. The initial tax will show up on your property tax bill as an extra $243 charge if your house is worth $300,000. If your house is worth more, your tax bill will be proportionally more. The tax will continue until the bond is paid off in 20 years. (Daily Herald, 12-18-09)

Note: The $243.00 does not include the additional cost of  the $705 thousand dollars for the next 20 years. In reality you are looking at approximately a 200% tax increase on the Winfield side of your tax bill.

An Epic Failure of Leadership

If you have been a resident for a few years, and if you watch the newspapers, you are probably aware  Winfield has had many opportunities to develop and grow our commercial tax base, which alleviates the financial pressure put on residents in the form of property taxes. Commercial real estate creates higher land values, puts no additional pressure on our schools, and they pay higher taxes per square foot than residential real estate does. Commercial developments also have the distinct advantage, if done right, of creating sales taxes. This town’s politicians for years have actively denied growth opportunities that would create net tax revenues for our town. (Daily Herald 3-25-09) If we had taken even a few of them, we would not find ourselves in such dire straights.

Lost Annual Transaction Tax

It is impossible to truly know how much sales tax revenue Winfield has forgone. I checked with the Illinois Department of Revenue and they tell me specific numbers are confidential. I have general numbers, and they are in the millions of dollars.

Currently, our heaviest traveled corridor is Roosevelt Road. The land along Roosevelt is zoned residential. Roosevelt Road has a traffic count of 30,000 cars each day. Of all the opportunities our village has to generate revenue in order to provide services like road maintenance, there is no better opportunity than Roosevelt Road.

“Winfield has lost every opportunity to raise tax revenue without raising taxes on our people…”

An Epic Failure of Government

During the last election cycle we were assured that Winfield Village President Deborah Birutis was a financial wizard that had spent 5 years on the finance committee and all was well with the budget. Glenn VadeBonCoeur and Jack Bajor also served with her on the finance committee and still do. Jack Bajor and Joel Kunesh are long time Winfield Trustees. One has to wonder, given their financial prowess, how did they NOT see this coming? In that same election cycle we were assured the budget was balanced and there was nothing to worry about. We should all be disappointed that we have arrived at this juncture in our town’s history; out of money and worse, out of ideas that do not revolve around raising taxes on the residents of this great town. The next step for these politicians is apparently to outsource our police department. The way I see it, if you boil the village’s responsibility to the residents down to its core, the local government is responsible for delivering clean water, disposing of sewage and garbage and providing police protection. If Village President Birutis doesn’t think Winfield should provide police protection anymore, then what, really, are we paying a local government for? If disbanding the police department is really an option, then disbanding the Winfield’s Village government should be too.

Why I ask you to join me in voting NO for the Winfield Road Referendum.

Let’s be honest with ourselves, the roads need to be fixed and Winfield is in a very bad spot because of monumentally bad management. But unless we take this opportunity to set the town on a path to fiscal responsibility, you can rest assured your politicians will come back to you in a few years from now to ask for more money for something else that is lurking (or should I say lacking) in our budget. However, we must vote NO for the Winfield Road Referendum UNTIL such time as they adopt reforms such as changing the zoning on Roosevelt Road to create the possibility for future revenues and outline a plan for developing a sustainable revenue stream. If our elected officials can put together a cogent plan with vision that clearly demonstrates a path to sustainable revenue, then we should change our vote to YES. I am not looking at a complete denial of the fact the roads need to be addressed, just a pause in doing what needs to be done. A pause just long enough for our current elected officials to do the right thing, to remember they are the stewards of the entire town and they manage the resources for the benefit of all the residents. I ask you to vote NO until a clearly defined plan has been devised to never have to come back to the residents again for more tax dollars.

Questions to Ask Your Elected Officials

1. President Birutis, Trustee VadeBonCoeur, with your 5 years on the finance committee, how long did you know that Winfield was out of money?
2. Did you know we were going to have to go to referendum for the roads during the last election cycle?
3. All your campaign literature said that you had “Balanced the Budget”. Tell me, is the budget really balanced when you are robbing from the road maintenance fund to cover operating expenses?
4. If getting a “Yes” vote for this referendum required changing the zoning of land in Winfield’s control on Roosevelt Road to commercial zoning would you do it?
5. Would you support leasing the Metra Commuter lots to a private company in order to raise $1 Million dollars?
6. Why did you vote against video gambling in Winfield that would have raised $45,000 per year?
7. Why did you not support the proton treatment center and its estimated $450,000 of tax revenue in the TIF district?
8. If we had the opportunity for a major commercial development to go in on Roosevelt Rd would you support it and the millions of dollars it would make for the Village?

“…the village needs to realize that there is a correlation between having an anti-development mindset and paying increased taxes …”

Political Districting Mailer

I would like to thank everyone that made the mailer regarding Winfield United and “Political Districting” possible. I just received mine in the mail today. The timing is perfect because it is 2 days in advance of the village road referendum meeting that is being put on by the politicians this weekend. With a little bit of luck, it will spark some good conversations among the attendees.

For all of you who are interested in talking about “Political Districting” in Winfield there is a debate club scheduled for Wednesday, May 26th at 7:00 pm. at John’s Buffet. I would love to see anyone that is interested there both pro and con. With a little bit of luck, either Winfield United Director Jed Skillman or Winfield United President Steve J Romanelli will be there to defend Winfield United and to take a position on districting.

I plan to use the month of June to advance the groundwork necessary to get Winfield districted. That is going to take a lot of signatures and I can use all the help I can get. Please contact me at TimAllen57@gmail.com or call 630.344.9354 if you are interested in helping with the effort.

Thank you,

Tim Allen

Winfield’s Road Referendum Won’t Benefit Residents

The residents of Winfield are currently agitated by the specter of having to pony up $3.3 million and another $14 million over 20 years for deferred road maintenance. So far, there have been three town hall meetings, one hosted by the village and two hosted by me for the purposes of educating the people about the referendum.

There is another issue that runs hand in hand with the road referendum and that is the Winfield politicians’ disinterest in finding sustainable revenues through retail sales taxes and commercial real estate taxes to help take some of the burden off the citizens of this town. Six out of seven of our politicians are either members of the Winfield United Political Action Committee or are hand-picked by President Deborah Birutis, who was elected as the candidate choice of Winfield United.

When you consider that Winfield’s best opportunity for creating sustainable revenues is on the Roosevelt Road corridor, it calls into question the motivation of the members of Winfield United. Based on records from the state, I have compiled a list of Winfield United political donors and where they live. Not surprisingly, they all live in a one or two block radius of Roosevelt Road.

The choice to not develop Roosevelt Road into a commercial district that can be harnessed to alleviate some of the financial burdens associated with running a village represents a wealth transfer payment. The wealth transfer is from all of the other 9,000 people who do not live along Roosevelt Road to the few people that do. It is a miscarriage of justice that Village President Birutis is using her political station not to the benefit of the whole village but to the benefit of a small cabal of landowners who have paid $32,000 in political donations for a small town village election to make sure their backyard view never has to change.

NIMBY stands for “not in my backyard”; this self-serving attitude is a sad commentary on the state of Winfield politics when our elected officials run the town for themselves and their cronies at the expense of the rest of the residents. The $32,000 represents a small amount of money to pay to buy an outcome to an election that ensures the rest of the town gets taxed for $18 million over 20 years.

I am writing to you today to let you know that as you cover the story of the Winfield Road Referendum which will be on the ballot this November, there is a back story that explains the motivations of this referendum. I would also like you to know that I plan to have on that same ballot, an opportunity to vote to district the Village of Winfield so that each section of Winfield is represented and the needs of the whole town are considered when planning this towns future.

CDH & Winfield’s Road Referendum

The State of Illinois seems to be scrutinizing not for profit hospitals. While this is very interesting it’s not a silver bullet for solving Winfield’s revenue issues.

See if you are with me on this. Let’s suppose that CDH’s facilities are worth 500 Million Dollars. The property taxes on that parcel of land will be worth 10 Million. The part the village receives would be 3% of that, which is $300,000. It’s better than a sharp stick in the eye but it isn’t the $705 Thousand per year we need for road maintenance and it isn’t the $3.3 Million we need for reconstructive work on the roads that are wrecked beyond compare.

If CDH’s tax exempt status were to change, it wouldn’t be without a fight from CDH and their lawyers. So you are looking at 6 to 10 years before Winfield sees a dime. In fact, if you can see exactly what CDH would be willing to budget for the lawyer expenses by looking at the above calculations. They would be able to spend $10 Million fighting per year and if they eventually lost the case they would still have broken even.

Bottom line is, it is irresponsible to put all Winfield’s revenue generating eggs in one basket. To be responsible, we need a mix of residential, commercial and sales taxes to properly fund village operations. Praying that CDH or their questionable tax status is going to solve Winfield’s revenue problems is a foolish delay in doing the heavy lifting that needs to be done to get this village fiscally solvent again.

Just the Facts?

The late, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan once famously asserted, “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts.” The senator was wrong. Of course, for those of us who still believe that objectivity is objective, a fact is still a fact, though the heavens may fall.

The key word here is “entitled.” Today in Winfield, not only does the political action committee Winfield United believe the community is entitled to pay for their self-serving lifestyle. Winfield United feels they are entitled to their own facts to support their claim, to their own entitlement to the residents money to support their narrow positions.

Not only that, they believe they are entitled to their own facts to describe the character and conduct of their political opponents. In the last election, Winfield United used The Winfield Register to collectively smear candidates who opposed their hand-picked candidates in the absence of a single verified fact to support their outrageous claims.

“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence. –John Adams (“Argument in Defense of the Soldiers in the Boston Massacre Trials,” December 1770).

Though Adams may have been correct technically — the facts cannot be altered in the eyes of God — he was wrong to the extent that the facts cannot be altered in the eyes of the public.

Winfield United repeatedly told the community their endorsed candidate for village president, Deborah Birutis, was a “financial genius” and because of her “financial insight” over the previous four years, the village was “financially sound.” But here we are barely one year after the “financial facts” were presented by Winfield United’s “financial genius” Deborah Birutis and the residents are now faced with a $3.3 million dollar road referendum, coupled with an additional $705 thousand dollar, 20 year tax to maintain the roads which will increase taxes upwards 200%. A reduction in police protection, a possible outright dismantling of the entire police department, higher water cost, increased waste collection fees, red light cameras, and a budget on life support due to Ms. Birutis’ blatant distortions and  financial mismanagement.

It will be interesting to see, seven months from now, how stubborn the facts will be. How effectively the advocates of the non-fact “communicate” to the residents — and how effective the rest of us are — will determine whether residents are hit with a massive tax bill. And remember, Winfield elections tend to be won or lost on the margin. If 18% of the voters are motivated by incorrect “facts” to vote, that may well be enough for the massive tax hikes to go through.

Of course, it is not a novelty in Winfield since Winfield United’s formation, there is often a struggle over convincing the public of the truth. As has been said, “A lie is halfway ’round the world before truth has got its boots on.”

So, we have a jolly seven-month public match over economic and political theory, Winfield United’s agenda  and the honest facts. Deborah Birutis and Winfield United have been quite upset for being called out as the responsible parties for Winfield’s financial troubles and for being identified as a  self-concerned, myopically-designed, deeply controlling organization desperately trying to save their sorry self-serving agenda. But if this massive tax increase goes through, Winfield United will once again enjoy the benefits of the taxpaying residents to maintain their lifestyle.

So, come out, come out where ever you are, my little WU’ers. We want to debate the facts, not duck your mud balls. What are you afraid of? Admittedly, the truth may hurt you — but only metaphorically. And, as the phrase goes, the truth will set us (even WU) free.

Would Chuck?

I had a conversation with Winfield Village Trustee Chuck Martschinke last night. We shared a beer at John’s Buffet and talked about Winfield. I was very interested to talk to Chuck to see how he fit into the village board. I enjoyed the conversation very much. I think Chuck is a straight shooter and while he may have been hand picked by Deborah Birutis, I believe he does his own thinking. When Village President Deborah Birutis torpedoed the Union Pacific Railroad underpass the first time it was up for a vote, Chuck Martschinke resigned from his involvement with the village. Former Winfield Village President RudyCzech, who hasd a habit of blind cc’ing people on emails, cc’d me on Chuck’s resignation letter. I thought that his commitment to something he believed in was admirable and I think he is an admirable guy.

That being said, I think he recognizes what I am trying to accomplish by shooting down the road referendum but he made abundantly clear he disagrees. I see the crumbling infrastructure as a symptom and I see the disease as being a lack of sustainable revenues. My purpose in working to kill the road referendum is to force attention to the lack of revenues so we cure the disease, then we can work on addressing the symptom. Its like having a boat with a hole in it. Do you bail the water out as it is rushing in? Or, do you fix the hole, and then bail the water out? To fix this hole in our budget we have to address the issue of Roosevelt Road in our comprehensive plan. From what I understand, the comprehensive plan for Winfield is up for review this summer and will be in front of the planning commission. I will be at those meetings and I think any concerned citizen should make an appearance too. Unfortunately it will probably be December before the village board votes to approve the comprehensive plan, so it is probably already too late for the November election and the vote on the road referendum.

Would Chuck support changing the comprehensive plan to allow commercial development on Roosevelt Rd? I think if anyone would give it honest consideration, Chuck would.

Daily Herald Articles on Winfield

Two articles appeared in the Daily Herald today, the first is an article on the upcoming Road Referendum and second is a rebuttal by Stan Zegel to a recently published article by Tim Allen concerning Central DuPage Hospital’s status in Winfield. We thought you would find them interesting reading including the comment section.

Referendum opponent wants to debate Winfield officials

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=374419

CDH should contribute for roads

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=374355

CDH and the Seven Stages of Grief

http://winfield411.com/blog/?p=971

Winfield’s $3.3 Million Dollar Bailout

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSsPanB6Ga8

As I am sure you all know by now, I have been very critical of Winfield’s current crop of politicians, especially where the $3.3 Million Dollar Road Referendum is concerned. In my opinion, any village president that was also the chair of the finance committee should have seen and budgeted for what became a $3.3 million dollar fiasco. Using the Freedom of Information Act, I received documentation stating the village board knew about the need for the referendum at the end of March 2008.

Politically, it would have made the existing village board (at that time) of Rudy Czech, Deborah Birutis, Jack Bajor, Joel Kunesh, and Glen VadeBonCoeur look completely inept in an election year had they told the public that they had deferred maintenance causing this issue. So they did the politically expedient thing and pushed the problem off two more years. The roads are now two years older and in worse condition and nobody has accepted responsibility for this issue.

There was an official town hall meeting on February 27th, that was poorly attended and poorly put together. The village did not take out advertisements in either of the town’s two papers (The Winfield Post, or Winfield STUFF). They didn’t spend a dime on running the Xerox machine to make handouts explaining the issues to the people. Curt Barrett laser printed a few graphs that were too small to see from the first row of the gallery at that meeting. They couldn’t even be bothered to offer coffee, water or a scrap of a cookie to their guests.

It strikes me as someone that works in sales, that it was possibly the worst sales presentation I have ever attended. Aside from not advertising, not having handouts, not preparing graphs and charts which could be read from the back row, Village President Birutis said nothing, except for a few sentences to back up Trustee VadeBonCouer’s comments. While the meeting was attended by all the trustees, essentially no politician had anything to say except Glen VadeBonCouer.

Winfield’s infrastructure is deteriorating to an alarming degree. (See Winfield’s Infrastructure Woes http://winfield411.com/blog/?p=686 ) In November, you are going to have the opportunity to vote on a referendum to raise $3.3 million for road repair and replacement. This referendum will also include another tax to raise $705 thousand per year for additional maintenance. These tax increases alone represent a +200% increase in the portion of your real estate taxes that go to Winfield and will last for the next 20 years. In addition, your taxes are being increased on water consumption, sewer usage, Metra parking, business permits, liquor licenses, and real estate. The politicians have also discussed vehicle permit stickers and the potential of disbanding our police force as well as adding red light cameras as a revenue generator.

So in an effort to do the town hall right, I am holding my own town hall. As my civic duty to my town, I have taken out advertising in both of our local papers, and I have sent out a massive email blast this week announcing the town hall meeting. As well as notifying the press. I respectfully request your presence.

Winfield Village President Deborah Birutis and Village Manager Curt Barrett have been invited to present again. The meeting is Tuesday 7:00 pm, April 20th at John’s Buffet in the meeting room. I have another meeting set up for Wednesday April 21 at the Winfield Park District at 7:00 pm in the meeting room. I have many people that have RSVP’d because space is limited.

I have FOIA’d all of the PDF’s from the original town hall meeting and reprinted them on paper large enough to be seen from the back row. I will have handouts for the people to take home. I plan to have coffee, water, and even a cookie or two.

I plan to cover the topics of how we got to this point in our town’s history and what we can do about it. Unlike our politicians, I have not only a plan B, but a C, D and E. I plan to show that our town has a 20 year history of essentially squashing growth, business and anything related to sustainable revenues, especially when the area in question is Roosevelt Road.

I would appreciate if you would consider attending, I believe that this meeting, unlike the last, will actually be productive.

Thank you,

Tim Allen

For Reservation: Email Tim @ TimAllen57@Gmail.com or Call 630.344.9354 to reserve your seat.

No Way Out

I want to thank the people at Winfield411.com for printing just about everything I have submitted to the press in the past several weeks. This is the first time that I have written anything that has been just for Winfield411.

I had a face to face meeting with Village President Deborah Birutis today (April 12) regarding the state of our village, how we got to this point in our village’s history and her plan (or lack there-of) on how we are going to get out of this budgetary (pot) hole that we find ourselves in. In our conversation we both had a moment that is worth writing about here and at the end of it, I have a question of you, the readers.

I believe that in everything that I have written I have tried to make abundantly clear that Winfield needs a plan for sustainable revenues that doesn’t require taxing the citizens every time the village needs money.

Ms. Birutis said to me today, “You obviously don’t love this town because if you did, you would be helping me to pass this referendum. Winfield needs good roads for the citizens to drive on.”

To which I replied, “Deb, you obviously don’t love this town because if you did, you would working to create sustainable revenues that didn’t involve taxing our citizens every time the village needs money. At the top of your list would be commercial development on Roosevelt Road.”

From the expression on her face, my reply was like a bucket of cold water…

However, I am worried that you, the people reading this blog are not understanding me and I need to know that you are following what I recognize is a very nuanced line of logic.

There is NO way out of eventually passing the road referendum. I want you to know that I was at the budget meetings, I downloaded the budget PDF from the village website. I have spoken to Trustee Jay Olson who I respect deeply and there is nothing left to cut that is going to stop us from needing to eventually pass this road referendum. Winfield will eventually be driving on gravel roads if we don’t pass this referendum at some point.

My argument is, if we pass this referendum without first using the issue to force some very important reforms in our village, we will have lost the “pain” that would be needed to leverage that change. In a nutshell, if we pass this referendum we will not see sustainable revenues because the reason for them will be gone until the next time we need money for something.

So I am asking you, the reader, to comment in the reader comment section below and let me know if you agree with me or disagree with me, that we are in this thing up to our eyeballs and ultimately, there is No Way Out.

Village Board Wants 200% Tax Hike