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Impending Real Estate Delinquent Tax Sale Brings Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. to Cook County Board Meeting

3/23/2017

Cook County Board of Commissioners Board Meeting - March 22, 2017

Significant Issue Discussed:

Real Estate Delinquent Tax Sale - Commissioners Gainer, Boykin, and Garcia along with Treasurer Maria Pappas brought the issue to Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr., who spoke at the CC Board meeting. He asked all commissioners to inform their constituents about Real Estate Tax Delinquency buyers:

50,000 Cook County citizens are in arrears on property taxes, of which 7,000 have never received the seven notices Treasurer Pappas has mailed them concerning their property’s impending tax sale.
The date for the sale has been moved up by the IL legislature from July to April 3.
Comm. Gainer says that tax delinquency buyers provide no service to Cook County and make between $25 million to $50 million each year, preying mostly on elderly home owners who must pay up to 18% interest on “loans” from these contract buyers, when loans from legitimate banks cost 4%.
Gainer claims most of this activity occurs in neighborhoods like Chatham, Gresham, and other parts of the city, where homeowners are able to scrape together money to pay off these “loans”. These tax buyers ignore much poorer parts of Cook County where they would end up owning the properties and the tax bills.
Both Republican and Democratic commissioners were upset with the practice and claim the reason it passed the legislature were strong lobbyists who profit from the practice.

Other items of interest discussed:

Cook County Health and Hospitals System (CCHHS)

The CC board is worried about CCHHS making its budget.
County Care enrollment is down for Affordable Care Act (ACA) adults, who tend to be more transient and not as involved in community services as families and women. More of these adult ACA enrollees have difficulty with mental illness and permanent addresses.
The proposed Trump healthcare overhaul requiring renewal of Medicaid every six months would most likely double the fall-off of enrollees. Dr. Jay Shannon projected there would be a smaller number of Medicaid plans operating in IL after this year.
In response to questions about poorly-rated dialysis treatment at County hospital, Dr. Shannon said they were investing in better equipment and a different model which relies on technicians rather than RNs for staffing. Stroger has recently hired 35 new nurses. Overtime costs are quite high in the Dialysis area due to “no-shows” and sick calls particularly for the night shift.

6B Tax Incentive

There was long discussion about revamping the “6B Tax Incentive” recommended by Cook County’s Dept of Economic Development. Michael Jasso, head of Econ. Development, has been working for 15 months on revamping the 6B designation to make revocation a possibility, and pushing responsibility down to the individual municipalities. (Agenda Item 17-0293)
The 6B Tax Incentive allows Cook County to compete with collar counties for jobs by equalizing tax rates. Without the 6B Incentive most employers would choose to locate outside of Cook County.
In the end the ordinance was passed with only Com. Schneider voting against.

Observer - Amy Little

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CC Board Condemns Hateful Acts and Discrimination Based on Immigration Status

3/9/2017

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Cook County Board of Commissioners Board and Committee Meetings - March 8, 2017

Significant Actions Taken:

The Board unanimously passed a Resolution to Condemn Hateful Acts of Violence and Rhetoric Directed at Jews and Muslims. Initially sponsored by Commissioners Boykin (D, 1st) and the four Republican Commissioners, all Commissioners joined as co-sponsors. To indicate the seriousness of the resolution, the approval was given by a “rising vote” with all Commissioners standing to express their support.
The Board also approved the Ordinance Amendment which modified different portions of the County Code to eliminate references to “citizens” because the benefits, opportunities, and services provided by the County are not conditioned on citizenship or immigration status. (Agenda Item 17-1165)
The Healthy Workforce and Health Care Access Amendment made similar changes in language and specifically added that discrimination based on immigration status is prohibited unless required by Federal or State law. As explained by Commissioner Gainer, the purpose of both these actions is to encourage people to seek health care and report crimes without fear, no matter what their immigration status is. (Agenda Item 17-1732)

Other Actions Taken:

Approved a resolution requiring the Cook County Recorder and Clerk to submit progress reports on the transfer of all duties and responsibilities of the Recorder to the Clerk’s office by December 7, 2020. Reports will be due in May and November in 2017 and 2018, and quarterly (January, March, July, and October) in 2019 and 2020. Commissioners Boykin, Sims and Steele voted against the resolution, without discussion. (Agenda Item 17-2106)
Approved a substitute ordinance that requires reports from departments in connection with an agenda item to be made available (electronically, paper, or by posting on the Legistar system) by 5 pm on the day the agenda is posted, except for items to be referred to a Committee. The original version of this measure would have required the reports to be made available 72 hours prior to the meeting and stated that a failure to meet that deadline would result in the item being deferred to the next meeting unless there was a vote by at least 2/3’s to allow consideration then. (Agenda Item 17-0058)
Referred to Technology a proposed contract for a Unified Communications (Voice over IP) for $24 million over 5 years to replace the County’s aging telephone infrastructure (Agenda Item 17-1942).

Other Discussion of Interest: Cook County Health & Hospitals System (CCHHS) Issues
During the Finance Committee’s consideration of a monthly report from CCHHS:

Comm. Gainer asked whether the nearby hospitals (U of I and Rush) were in “competition” with CCHHS. The CCHHS CEO Dr. Shannon said that the populations served were different. About 1/3 of CCHHS’ patients are uninsured vs. 4% to 6% at the other hospitals. Also, while the majority of CCHHS’ patients are insured, the majority are under Medicaid, and a large amount of these are under the expanded Medicaid coverage that is the result of the Affordable Care Act.. Only a small percentage (less than 10%) of the patients purchase insurance on the exchange. Comm. Gainer noted, and Dr. Shannon agreed, that this means that the biggest concern for the financial health of CCHHS is whether there will be significant changes to expanded Medicaid coverage, as currently proposed in the bill introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives this week.
Comm. Boykin asked for an update on CCHHS’ involvement with the gun violence consortium. Dr. Shannon said that CCHHS is looking at the effect on the family of victims of gun violence and the researchers are finding increased stress and depression. Another effect of the increased violence in Chicago is on the trauma staff of CCHHS: the staff is saying that during this past winter they were contending with a level of violence that is normally only experienced in the summer. Usually, the staff has some time during the winter months to recover from the stress of dealing with violence.

Observer: Priscilla Mims Length of Board Meeting: 1 hour

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Impending Real Estate Delinquent Tax Sale Brings Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. to Cook County Board Meeting

CC Board Condemns Hateful Acts and Discrimination Based on Immigration Status

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