Class Warfare

Lightfoot, Allies Block Hearing on Proposal to Hike Taxes on Sales of Million-Dollar Homes to Fight Homelessness
Heather Cherone | November 14, 2022 2:25 pm





 

Paid Members of the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless blast half of the City Council for failing to show up for a hearing on a proposal to tax the sale of properties worth more than million to fight homelessness on Monday, Nov. 14. (Heather Cherone/WTTW News)


Mayor Lori Lightfoot and her allies on the Chicago City Council blocked a Monday hearing on a proposal to ask voters during the February election to hike taxes on the sales of properties worth $1 million or more in an effort to fight homelessness in Chicago.

Dozens of Chicagoans who waited hours to get their turn to address the Chicago City Council for three minutes were prevented from speaking. Only 25 City Council members attended the meeting — one short of the majority needed to hold the public hearing.

At least nine other alderpeople — all allies of the mayor — were at City Hall at the time of the crucial vote but declined to participate in the hearing, even as their colleagues exhorted them to particpate.

Supporters of the proposal say the change will help the nearly 66,000 Chicagoans who are unhoused by generating approximately $160 million annually — enough to address the root causes of homelessness and reduce crime and poverty throughout Chicago, they say.

After Ald. Brendan Reilly (42nd Ward), presiding in the place of an absent Mayor Lori Lightfoot, pulled the plug on the meeting, April Harris, of the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless, said she was furious that half of the City Council would “rather do what the mayor tells them to do than do their job.”

Ald. Maria Hadden (49th Ward), one of the champions of the ordinance known as Bring Chicago Home, acknowledged that the supporters of the plan “hit a roadblock” but vowed to keep pushing.

Ald. Carlos Ramirez Rosa (35th Ward) said Chicagoans deserve more from their elected representatives.

“I’m angry,” Ramirez Rosa said. “It is not right. Chicago deserves more.”

The proposal would not change the Real Estate Transfer Tax paid by the buyers of properties worth less than $1 million, keeping the city’s share of the tax at $3.75 for every $500 of the sale price. But when properties sell for $1 million or more, the new owner would pay $13.25 for every $500 of the sale price. That works out to an increase of 253%, according to the proposal.