Stroger allies now agreeing to four-year rollback of sales tax

Cook County commissioners - including some who had appeared poised to back the president in his veto of a one-year rollback of the 1-percentage-point sales tax increase - are now apparently on board with a rollback, albeit at a slower pace.

Commissioners previously passed a rollback of the entire 1 percentage point hike on May 5 by a vote of 12-3, with Commissioners Deborah Sims and Earlean Collins absent. The rollback in that ordinance was to happen in one fell swoop, taking effect Jan. 1.

But Cook County Board President Todd Stroger vetoed it, and a vote on overriding his veto is scheduled for Tuesday. To keep his veto intact, he needs a total of 4 commissioners out of the 17-member board to vote not to override.

But now, Sims - who voted for the tax increase in 2007 - is sponsoring an amendment that would roll back the tax increase, but at one-quarter percentage point a year for four years. According to agenda items sent out Thursday, she is joined in that ordinance by Commissioners Jerry Butler, William Beavers and Robert Steele - the three who voted against the all-at-once rollback.

That would appear to make the four-year rollback a done deal, but all four of those commissioners could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Cook County's sales tax had stood at .75 percent for years, but was raised to 1.75 percent in 2007 by Stroger and a bare majority of nine commissioners, giving Chicago the highest sales tax rate, at 10.25 percent, of any big city in the nation, if you include the sales taxes applied by other governments. The rollback would put the county rate back to .75 percent.