Well it took some doing, but I have completed my policy on TIFs.
This is critically important to the sustainability of the city moving forward. We cannot survive continuing to go further and further into debt year after year while our schools are failing and the TIF funds are growing bigger and bigger. We need to assess what it would take to shut-down the TIFs, eliminate all of the overhead, take what is needed for debt service, and give the rest of the money back to the operations and schools budgets where it belongs.
It’s worth pointing out that currently no one else running for alderman in the Second Ward is advancing such a position. Alderman Fioretti and all the other candidates are taking the position that TIFs are necessary for development, which I so easily prove false.
I’m waiting for the media to wake-up to this issue and begin asking the tough questions. Hopefully someone will start soon… before it’s too late.