In this news segment about the possibility that the City of Chicago will privatize services such as the lakefront festivals and recycling to close a budget gap, Civic Federation President Laurence Msall says the plan is worth considering but may not be enough to solve the City’s fiscal problems.
This article discusses the City of Chicago’s possible bid to privatize its lakefront festivals, recycling, and other services to bridge a budget gap. The Civic Federation says the City has already benefited from privatizing janitorial and airport services.
This article explores the challenges Mayor Daley faces in filling the City of Chicago’s $655 million budget gap. One of the options being considered involves using proceeds from the City’s recent privatization deals. The Civic Federation says using those funds to fill a budget hole is unwise and that the City should restructure and reprioritize its services instead.
This news segment details how the City of Chicago had only $2.7 million in reserves at the end of FY2009. The Civic Federation says the City should have cash reserves of at least $200 million given the size of its operating budget.
The redesign of the Civic Federation website in July has provided the public, government officials, and the media better access to the Federation’s analyses of government services in Illinois. The regularly-updated Civic Federation blog especially has provided a constant source of information on the issues that the Federation covers, including local budgets and pensions, taxes, privatization and asset leases, and commentary on events in the news. Blog posts about local government budgets…
All governments - whether states, cities or school districts - should place a portion of their general operating revenues in a general fund reserve or “rainy day” fund. These rainy day funds are savings accounts that governments can use to address revenue shortfalls or unanticipated expenditures and to help stabilize tax rates. The discussion here centers around reserves for general funds only, not revenues from long-term asset lease proceeds such as the City of Chicago lease of parking meters…
The Civic Federation supports the FY2010 Forest Preserve District of Cook County budget of $198.2 million because the District will reduce its property tax levy by $1.1 million and use a portion of its budget reserve funds, rather than increase taxes, to balance its budget. However, the Civic Federation warns that the Forest Preserve District faces fiscal pressures due to rising personnel costs and should transfer law enforcement duties to the Cook County Sheriff and swimming pools to local…
In two previous blog posts [here and here] the Civic Federation discussed the City of Chicago’s use of asset lease proceeds from its 99 year leases of the Chicago Skyway and the City’s parking meters. In sum, the City has set aside $900.0 million in long-term reserve accounts using proceeds from both the Skyway and parking meter leases. The City set aside an additional $1,226.4 million of asset lease proceeds from the Skyway and parking meter leases to fund operating expenses between FY2005…
In FY2010 the City of Chicago proposes to close a majority of its FY2010 $520 million budget deficit with proceeds it received from the long-term leases of its parking meters and the Chicago Skyway. This begs the question: how has the City been using the rest of the proceeds from its long-term asset leases? The long-term lease of the Chicago Skyway yielded the city a lump sum payment of $1.83 billion. The long-term lease of the City’s parking meters yielded $1.15 billion. Combined the long-…
The Civic Federation opposes the FY2010 City of Chicago budget of $6.14 billion because it is unsustainable and relies too heavily on one-time reserve funds to close a $520.0 million budget deficit. The proposed drastic draw down of long-term reserves allows for increased spending in FY2010 but does not properly plan for the future. The City must consider FY2011 and FY2012 when crafting its FY2010 budget as the City’s revenues are not likely to rebound enough in the next 12 months to replace…
