Palatine retires Rand Road Corridor TIF District

Palatine council members voted this week to dissolve the village’s Rand Road Corridor Tax Increment Financing District.

Village officials at Monday’s meeting pointed to the TIF district’s successes not only in growing the village’s property tax base, but also in spurring sales tax revenues.

In the 23 years since it was established, the equalized assessed valuation of the properties in the district grew from $50.7 million to $96.4 million, officials said.

In addition, they said, the TIF area now is generating $2.5 million in new sales tax revenue from businesses that were not there when it started.

Sales tax generators have included Walmart, car dealerships, including Arlington Toyota, and restaurants such as Panera Bread and Popeye’s.

Village Manager Reid Ottesen said that in 2002, the year before the TIF was created, the land where Arlington Toyota and Falcon Park now stand was occupied by the original location of Tore and Luke’s and several homes.

At the time, he said, Concord Homes planned to build at least 275 homes on the land.

“When that was being discussed, we had school districts saying, ‘There’s no way we could put all these kids into our schools,’” Ottesen said.

The park district, he recalled, also was talking about the lack of recreational facilities.

With the TIF district’s creation, the village was able to assume the contract from Concord, work with Tore and Luke’s to relocate and ultimately to acquire all the property and convey a portion of it to the park district for Falcon Park.

“We were then able to get Arlington Toyota to come in, which was a major sales tax generator,” he said.

Ottesen said Palatine also was able to invest TIF funds into various infrastructure projects, including $2 million for sanitary sewers and $1.25 million for roads and sidewalks. Working with the Illinois Department of Transportation, the village also helped pay for a traffic signal from the Walmart area onto Dundee Road.

During the TIF’s life, the village has rebated $11.4 million of surplus revenue from the fund and given it back to the taxing bodies from whom the money was withheld.

Palatine Mayor Jim Schwantz spoke Monday about the cooperation between the village and the affected taxing bodies.

“This is a true partnership,” he said. “It’s not just the village of Palatine doing this. This is all the taxing bodies on your tax bill that are involved in this. You can also close a TIF district early, and we’ve chosen not to do that to keep these options at our fingertips to be able to continue to redevelop these properties.”

With the retirement of the TIF, more than $5 million in property taxes will be redirected from the fund to each taxing body’s levy. More than half will go to Districts 15 and 211, Ottesen said.

The village of Palatine will see $480,000 allocated back to its general levy.

“We’ve completed what we set out to do with the TIF district,” Ottesen told the council Monday. “It will expire at the end of this year, and all the taxing bodies will be getting the benefit of that growth.”

szalusky@dailyherald.com