Orland OKs tax rebates
By Mike Nolan mnolan@southtownstar.com August 6, 2012 9:02PM
Updated: August 7, 2012 6:09PM
Orland Park residents will soon get information about how they can claim their share of $2.5 million in property tax revenue from the village.
Trustees on Monday night approved resurrecting a program in which the village returns a portion of its share of homeowners’ tax bills. Orland Park officials are estimating that roughly 19,000 homeowners will apply, which would mean a $131 rebate per taxpayer.
The village will likely publicize the rebate in its newsletter, on its website and Facebook page, village manager Paul Grimes said. Residents would have to submit copies of their tax bills and driver’s licenses, among other documentation.
The deadline to apply will be announced in the coming weeks but will likely be sometime in December, with checks going out in March, Grimes said.
The village began the rebate program in March 2003 to offset a new home-rule sales tax, but the program was suspended in 2009 because the recession delivered a substantial hit on village revenue. From 2003 through 2009, the village rebated a total of $25.6 million, according to Annmarie Mampe, the village’s finance director.
When the last rebate checks went out in 2009, the amount each resident received varied, depending on the equalized assessed value of their home. But that year the village gave $4.5 million to homeowners.
Village officials didn’t believe it would be worth the extra time and cost to disburse the current rebate money based on home value, mainly because there isn’t that great of a spread, dollar-wise, between the lower and upper home values, Mayor Dan McLaughlin said.
In the 2009 rebate, checks equaled about 83 percent of the amount that homeowners paid in property tax to the village, while the $131 figure would represent about 20 percent.
Mampe said the average resident pays about $600 in property tax to Orland Park, and that the village’s share of a homeowner’s overall tax bill is about 7 percent.
Several weeks ago, McLaughlin had asked Mampe and her staff to ferret out any savings in the village budget that could be earmarked for the rebate. Much of the money is coming from savings realized on various capital improvement projects, including the 143rd Street and LaGrange Road reconstruction project, which came in nearly $400,000 under budget.
McLaughlin, speaking to reporters after Monday night’s meeting, said trustees will decide each year “if we are in a (financial) position to do a rebate.”
