College of DuPage votes to keep operating property tax levy flat

College of DuPage trustees voted Thursday to keep their operating property tax levy flat for taxpayers next year.

"The same levy that was filed last year will be filed again this year for the operating levy," said Tom Glaser, the college's senior vice president of administration and its treasurer.

Their debt service levy is also set to go slightly down, Glaser said.

Glaser said taxpayers in the college's district can expect the dollar amount of property taxes they pay to the college to slightly lower next year.

"This is the first time since this administration has been here where we've kept the property tax levy flat," Glaser said.

The operating levy is set at $83,646,596. Combined, the operating and debt service levy totals $109,148,351. Last year's total levy called for $109,567,597.

Between 2.5 and 4 percent of the average homeowner's property taxes currently go to the college, Glaser said.

College administrators recommended no increase in the school's operating levy, but with "much reservation," according to board documents.

Based on a Consumer Price Index rate of 1.5 percent, the tax levy for operations could have increased by $1.3 million. In board documents, staff gave the board reasons as to why they should take modest increases every year in the property tax levy.

Some of these reasons included that Gov.-elect Bruce Rauner's transition team has indicated that organizations should prepare for a 20 to 30 percent decrease in funding, and that given the recent Supreme Court decision on pensions, it is more likely that the college will have to take responsibility for funding their employees' pensions, officials said in board documents.

Despite these reasons, Glaser said they decided to recommend keeping the operating property tax levy flat because there are "economic and political realities."

Although he did not give details on the political realities, he referenced the "dynamics" at the board meeting Thursday. The economic realities they are facing, he added, are the decline in equalized assessed value and home prices being depressed.

But Glaser said staying flat is not a trend they intend to keep in the future.

"It's not something that we're going to continue to recommend."