New court fees will help Kane County balance budget

Gov. Bruce Rauner signed two new state laws signed this week that will make it a little more costly to file a lawsuit in Kane County - but a little easier for the county board to balance the budget.

The largest windfall comes from SB1630, which allows Kane County to impose a fee of up to $30 on each party involved in a civil case and anyone convicted of certain felonies, misdemeanors and traffic offenses.

The fees will be earmarked for courthouse expansion, which is estimated to cost about $87 million. The law is effective immediately, but the county board still has to vote on the fee amount.

Before the fee, the county was searching for way to pay for courthouse improvements; the goal is to consolidate all of the county's judicial and public safety functions at one campus.

The fee will cover only part of the $87 million cost of to expand the courthouse, said Brian Pollock, chairman of the county's legislative committee, which lobbied for the fee, and it will take a long time to collect enough to start construction.

"I wouldn't anticipate the shovels going into the ground tomorrow," Pollock said.

A second bill the governor signed allows the county raise a fee already imposed on both convicted criminals and anyone involved in a lawsuit.

The legislation, SB0804, allows Kane County to raise the fee as much as necessary to cover the cost of having court security officers. Right now, the fee is limited to $25; to cover the full cost of court security, the county also must kick in about $1 million more from the general fund and other accounts.

Pollock said the county will do a study to determine how much the fee must be raised to cover the entire cost of court security.

People involved in traffic and local ordinance cases that don't require a court appearance won't be charged the court security fee.