The Chicago Tribune reports:
Chicago homeowners should brace themselves for sticker shock when they open their mailbox at the end of the month: property tax bills on average 13 percent higher than last year.
The big increase is mostly being driven by the record tax increase Mayor Rahm Emanuel engineered last fall to fix city pension funds for police officers and firefighters.
Cook County Clerk David Orr released tax rate figures Monday, revealing the practical effects of City Hall's painful decision. The owner of a single-family home with the current average sale price of about $225,000 can expect to see a property tax bill of $3,633, an increase of about $413.
But homeowner's individual bills can vary widely from home to home, depending on a property's market value and how well sales prices in their neighborhoods have recovered since the Great Recession, because property taxes rise in tandem with home values.
There's more:
In Chicago, tax bills reflect a $363 million property tax increase enacted last year by the City Council and Chicago Public Schools Board of Education at Emanuel's request.
The biggest chunk — $318 million — will go to the pension funds for police officers and firefighters. It's the largest of four yearly increases approved by the council in an effort to restore financial soundness to those retirement systems.
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