Articles filed under On Guard

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  Big weekend for seat belt enforcement, but at what cost?May 23, 2012 12:00 AM
  Suburban police receive hundreds of thousands of dollars every year to increase enforcement of seat belt use around Memorial Day weekend. But our analysis of state transportation grant records shows the program costs more than municipalities will ever get back. "The biggest concern I have is it strips away officer discretion," said Aurora police Cmdr. Joe Groom.
  

   
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  Suburban parks bill taxpayers for Chicago hotel staysMay 9, 2012 12:00 AM
  Twenty-nine suburban park districts spent more than $200,000 combined to pay for hotels, meals, registration and other costs for a weekend conference in January in Chicago, an analysis of invoices showed. Arlington Heights parks spent the most -- $18,664 for 32 people -- while Oakbrook Terrace spent the most per person, at $921.
  

   
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  Which suburbs' police officers make the most? Apr 25, 2012 12:00 AM
  At $89,056.28, full-time Hoffman Estates police officers average the highest base salaries among 77 suburban departments surveyed. Critics say such salaries not only cut into funds for other municipal services, but increase pension liabilities and prevent other towns from holding the line on police salaries.
  

   
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  SHS receives criticism, praise for drug investigation Apr 23, 2012 12:00 AM
  Stevenson High School officials were criticized by some parents and praised by others for how they handled a much-publicized investigation into illegal drug activity on campus this winter, a Daily Herald review of emails on the subject shows. “While I wholeheartedly support the intent, the lack of information available to both parents and students is appalling,” one parents wrote.
  

   
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  Suburban residents leave $300 million in tax credits unclaimed Apr 18, 2012 12:00 AM
  Low-earning workers in Chicago and six suburban counties left an estimated $300 million in federal tax breaks on the table last year, and the Internal Revenue Service expects similar results this year. Although the filing deadline for 2011 has passed, the good news is workers can still claim up to three years of these missed tax breaks.
  

   
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  Island Lake trustees broke open meetings law, state saysApr 17, 2012 12:00 AM
  Island Lake trustees violated the Open Meetings Act in December by privately discussing financial business that should have been debated publicly, the Illinois attorney general's office has ruled. "There was no intentional or deliberate conduct here," village attorney Julie Tappendorf said in an email. "Discussions sometimes go off topic."
  

   
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  How short-term gains trumped Illinois pension funding Apr 13, 2012 12:00 AM
  Seven years ago, with the Illinois pension systems facing a $38.6 billion deficit, lawmakers chose to skip two years of pension funding in order to free up some cash short-term. That history lesson shows how difficult it could be for state leaders to reach a solution to the pension problem -- with a current deficit of $83 billion -- because many of the fixes could be controversial, painful for retirees and take years to make an impact.
  

   
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  Schools' pay hikes trigger state penaltiesApr 12, 2012 12:00 AM
  At a time when suburban schools are pushing back hard against taking over the states share of teacher retirement costs, many are paying thousands of dollars sometimes hundreds of thousands in penalties to Illinois pension systems for giving big raises to administrators and teachers. Suburban schools charged the highest penalties are Schaumburg Township Elementary District 54, West Aurora District 129, Barrington Area Unit District 220, Hawthorn Elementary District 73, Elgin Area School District U-46 and Naperville District 203, a Daily Herald investigation shows.
  

   
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  Hoffman Estates fire pension board delays buying iPads Apr 3, 2012 12:00 AM
  A suburban firefighters pension board voted themselves new iPads on taxpayers' dime, the Secretary of State won't accept Visa cards at driver's license facilities, and Wauconda Township finds a way to keep a citizen's petition off the annual town meeting agenda. Catch up on some odds and ends that your tips dredged up in this latest Suburban Tax Watchdog column.
  

   
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  Nine Cook County judges to be hired despite lighter caseloadsApr 3, 2012 12:00 AM
  Cook County will hire nine associate judges at a cost of $2.1 million in the first year, though the current 415 judges already have caseloads lighter than the state average. Associate judge posts are based on a county's population, and Cook County saw a steep drop in the past decade. Also, a Daily Herald investigation last week showed Illinois circuit judges are the highest paid in the nation.
  

   
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  More Illinois judges, required raises mean we pay 29% more in 8 years Mar 28, 2012 12:00 AM
  Illinois taxpayers will spend $39 million more for judicial salaries this year than they did just eight years ago. Aided by the richest salary of any trial judges in the country, Illinois also has more judges than it did eight years ago and judges are guaranteed pay raises by the state's constitution. Critics complain that these costs continue to rise despite declining caseloads for judges.
  

   
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  Suburban gun shop burglaries raise security issueMar 26, 2012 12:00 AM
  How did burglars break into a Des Plaines gun shop, swipe about 200 firearms in about a minute and get away before police could respond? The theft and others like it raise questions about the adequacy of gun shop security. “To truly protect guns, you need kind of an armored vault where you put them away at night,” security expert Michael Magill said. “The longer it takes for the burglars to get to (the guns), the sooner it is to get the cops there.”
  

   

• Township lobbying staff receiving public pensions Mar 14, 2012 12:00 AM
  Though it's funded almost entirely by townships out of their tax collections, the lobbying association of the state's townships is not subject to public scrutiny of its finances. Yet, the four-member staff of Township Officials of Illinois receives public pensions — a fact that riles some suburban state and township leaders, and even some on the organization's own board of directors.
  

   
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  West Chicago parks' finances called into questionMar 7, 2012 12:00 AM
  At West Chicago Park District, the Daily Herald found relatives of commissioners and full-time staff members working part-time jobs at the district, a commissioner's relative getting business from the district, commissioners spending hundreds of dollars on weekend conferences out of state or in Chicago and the district's executive director living rent-free at a house owned by taxpayers.
  

   

• Want a say about township government? Now's the time Feb 29, 2012 12:00 AM
  Daily Herald investigations into how townships spend tax dollars led some townships to change how they do business. Others stayed with the status quo. Upcoming township annual meetings give residents the chance for a direct say in how their township operates. But a deadline to get a public petition on the agenda is Thursday.
  

   
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  Suburbs getting more property taxes Feb 22, 2012 12:00 AM
  At a time when property values have gone down considerably, many suburbs have sharply increased how much they're receiving in property taxes. More than two dozen towns throughout the suburbs have raised property taxes by more than 20 percent since 2006, according to an analysis of five years worth of property tax records.
  

   
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  State examining grant spent at Zion ballparkFeb 12, 2012 12:00 AM
  Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity officials plan to examine whether the city of Zion properly spent $1.3 million in state grants connected to a baseball stadium that has yet to be built since 2010. Zion officials promoted the stadium as a job generator.
  

   
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  Why Legislators rarely know cost of laws they passFeb 8, 2012 12:00 AM
  Only nine of the 650 bills passed into law last year in Illinois had financial information attached to show the cost or savings for taxpayers. That means more than 98 percent of the new laws were passed without any basic information about the toll they'd take on the state's finances. That's according to a report by the Illinois Policy Institute, a watchdog group on government spending practices.
  

   
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  Where are DuPage's $28 million emergency radios?Feb 1, 2012 12:00 AM
  Six years and nearly $17 million later, DuPage County's public safety departments still don't have radio equipment that will allow them to communicate with one another during emergencies. It's one of several Homeland Security communication projects in the suburbs that have been plagued by delays and controversy.
  

   
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  Inspections show we don't always get gas we pay for at stationsJan 18, 2012 12:00 AM
  Eighty gas stations located in a wide swath of the suburbs had at least one fuel line that failed state inspections over the past three years, giving more or less gas than what was purchased. Last year at a Mundelein station, inspectors determined one line wasn't giving as much gasoline as had been purchased, while two lines were giving more gas.