Community Landfill

There has been little discussion lately about the liability facing the City of Morris as a result of its involvment with Community Landfill, Inc.

The Illinois Pollution Control Board has ruled that the city of Morris partnered with Community Landfill, Inc. to operate the city dump and that the city failed to provide the required "adequate financial assurances" for proper closure of the landfill.

The adverse IPCB ruling results from the actions of former mayor Bob Feeney and current mayor Dick Kopczick. The city co-signed performance bonds for Community Landfill, Inc. and submitted the bonds to the State of Illinois in order to maintain licensing for the landfill.

Why? Because Community Landfill, Inc. could not obtain proper bonding on its own.

Community Landfill, Inc. was operated by convicted felons, a fact known to both mayors when the bonds were signed.

Moreover, the bonds were issued by a bonding company which had been removed from the list of approved bonding companies in 2000. Another fact that was known to the city and its engineers and attorneys.

Predictably, the bond is worthless and Community Landfill, Inc. is unable to pay the costs. The IEPA is now looking to the taxpayers of Morris to do the environmental cleanup at the landfill.

The Illinois Pollution Control Board has already determined that the City is liable. Only the amount of the penalty to be imposed is yet to be determined.

Read the IPCB opinion finding against Morris here.

More SenreQ Tax Liens

The Internal Revenue Service has recorded two more Federal Tax Liens against SenreQ.

The most recent one is for $188,569 for Federal Withholding Taxes and unemployment taxes owed on wages and salaries paid to SenreQ employees.

City attorney says TIF payments illegal

For 19 years, the City of Braidwood gave money from its TIF fund to the Braidwood Park District. Park District representative Wayne Saltzman described the arrangement as a "gentlemen's agreement" in which the park district would get $15,000 a year in return for supporting the TIF. "It was a verbal agreement in 1988. Nothing was ever put in writing," Saltzman added.

"The park loses $125,000 a year to the TIF," Saltzman said.

This year, the practice was halted when city attorney Paul Keller told the council that giving money to the park district from the city's TIF account is not appropriate. Keller cited a TIF Association opinion that concluded that such payments generally violate the TIF Act, because they are not "in furtherance of the redevelopment plan and project."

The City of Morris also engages in this questionable practice by making annual payments from TIF funds to the school districts to encourage support for the TIF.

The payments by the City of Morris are not described in the Morris TIF redevelopment plan and are not payments for a project "in furtherance" of the plan. They appear to violate the TIF law for the same reasons as the Braidwood payments.



Read the complete Free Press article.


For an excellent summary of TIF and its proper uses and procedures, see "Economic Toolbox for Municipal Officials," authored by Stewart Diamond and Paul Keller of Ancel Glink. The TIF information starts on page 21.