Chicago’s latest property tax bills have turned a long‑simmering policy fight into a kitchen‑table emergency. At stake is roughly half a billion dollars a year, and a bitter argument over whether homeowners, businesses, or powerful development tools should carry more of the load for schools and city services. I see a city trying to close its budget gaps while residents on the South and West Sides, already stretched thin, are being asked to pay for decisions they did not make.
The political clash is no longer abstract, it is arriving in envelopes that show double‑digit jumps and line items few people understand. As Chicago leaders debate new tax hikes, the question is not just how to raise another $500 million, but who ultimately writes the check when the bill comes due.
The hidden $500 million in diverted tax dollars
Before anyone talks about raising taxes, I think it is impossible to ignore the money that never reaches the general budget in the first place. Chicago’s network of tax increment financing districts quietly diverts nearly $500M in yearly tax revenues away from other local governments, including Chicago Public Schools, and funnels that growth into special project funds instead of the shared pot that pays for classrooms, parks, and basic services. Those districts cover some of the city’s most valuable real estate, including parts of its most popular tourist destinations, which means the areas with the strongest tax base are often the ones most insulated from the broader budget pain.
That diversion matters because it shifts the burden onto everyone who is not inside a lucrative TIF. When nearly half a billion dollars in growth is locked away, other taxing bodies, especially Chicago Public Schools, lean harder on the remaining base to stay solvent, a dynamic that has fueled controversy as CPS has hurtled toward bankruptcy in past years. The result is a structural imbalance: homeowners in neighborhoods far from downtown megaprojects end up paying higher effective rates so that tax increment financing can keep subsidizing targeted development, a tradeoff that rarely appears on the bill but is baked into the system described in Chicago TIFs take nearly $500M in yearly tax revenues.
Johnson’s “Protecting Chicago” plan and the new tax push
Into that landscape, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson has put forward his “Protecting Chicago” budget, which leans on nearly $500M in tax hikes to close gaps and fund his priorities. Johnson argues that the package, which he has branded as Protecting Chicago, is about stabilizing city finances and investing in services, but the headline number is unmistakable: a new $500 load is being prepared for taxpayers who are already absorbing steep increases from other layers of government. In my view, the plan reflects a belief that the city has more room to raise revenue than to cut spending or unwind long‑standing incentives like TIFs…