May 26 2010
County Treasurer Pays On Time and In Full
I went to the Urbana School Board meeting last night regarding the future of Washington Early Childhood. Of course, no school board meeting in the state happens these days without some discussion of payments from the State of Illinois. Superintendent Preston Williams informed the group that the State of Illinois was $4.8 million behind in payments to the district.
A little relief is in sight for the school district, and every other taxing body in the County. The first distribution of property tax payments should hit their bank accounts tomorrow. For Urbana schools that is a payment of $4.6 million which represents about 17% of what they’ll end up receiving from property tax revenues.
It bears noting that while the state plays games with tax dollars and withholds tax revenues due to local governments, the County is paying on time and in full. Once a month, the Treasurer makes a distribution of all that has been collected to that point.
The Township Assessors, Supervisor of Assessments Office, Board of Review, County Clerk, and County Treasurer work as a team to get tax bills out by May 1st each year. Because of the great work of this team, we’re able to mitigate the disaster that we face from a state that fails to meet their obligations.
WHOA!!! There’s actually a local government that works? Schools getting their share of local property tax revenue on time; coupled with their share of the sales tax that we, the citizens of Champaign County, voted in; means that quite possibly Urbana won’t need to close an elementary school. This shows me that at least here, everyone is on the same page and has the desire to make everything work well.