How township road tax investigation was pulled together

Since the inception of the Suburban Tax Watchdog column more than a decade ago, we have done multiple analyses of township operations.

In that time, we have written about the townships that grant pensions to elected officials, townships where taxpayers are covering health insurance costs for elected officials, township salary costs, how much money townships are holding in reserve, various legal battles and township road districts.

In fact, the second-ever Suburban Tax Watchdog column looked at how much money taxpayers were spending on the salaries of the elected township highway commissioners in 50 townships in six counties and compared those costs to how many miles of roads the townships were responsible for maintaining.

That investigation helped spur legislation that makes it easier for voters and/or townships themselves to eliminate some elected positions.

And that's what Elk Grove Township eventually did in 2020 when the highway commissioner's post was eliminated. Township officials believed eliminating the office and contracting the maintenance for the township's four miles of roads would ultimately save taxpayers some money.

It did. Prior to eliminating the post, Elk Grove Township taxpayers were charged about $280,000 on average each year. Last year, the township collected just $200,000 in property taxes designated for toad work, or about $49,000 a mile.

I wanted to see how that compared to other townships with elected commissioners, but first I needed to find out how many miles of road each township was responsible for maintaining.

I emailed the Illinois Department of Transportation, multiple county transportation divisions and reached out to some township highway commissioners to see if there was a master list somewhere. Eventually, one township highway commissioner reported the figures were available on a monthly state motor fuel tax distribution report.

The report lists the number of "centerline miles" each township is responsible for maintaining. A centerline mile is essentially the distance of a road from point A to point B, it doesn't take into account how many lanes the road is. Most township roads are rural or residential two-lane thoroughfares.

After pulling the mileage for each township, I searched through each township's annual audit for the amount of taxes collected that year for road work. Many townships keep a copy of their audits, or annual financial reports, available on their websites. But the Illinois comptroller's website also maintains a copy for each taxing body in the state at illinoiscomptroller.gov.

After compiling the data, it showed 48 townships collected an average of about $46,000 in property taxes for every mile of road they maintained. Collectively, all 50 townships were responsible for maintaining almost 1,800 centerline miles of roads.

The data also showed some townships collected more than $100,000 per mile, while others collected less than $6,000 per mile.

Highway commissioners in townships with higher rates noted their roads were more heavily traveled and sometimes included curbs, gutters and sidewalks that many rural township roads don't have to deal with.

Critics argue those costs could be reduced through consolidation or coordinating work with other local governments.