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New Trier homeowners won’t be socked this tax round
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Updated: July 29, 2012 4:42PM
Homeowners may be surprised when another property tax bill shows up in their mailbox this coming week with a due date of Aug. 1.
But for most homeowners in New Trier Township, the size of the tax increase won’t be that disturbing.
The Cook County Clerk’s office Tuesday released the 2011 tax rates that will be used to compute each tax bill. While the new rates are sharply higher, the higher rates will be applied to lower values as a result of a 10 percent drop in the state multiplier.
Many homeowners in the New Trier Township communities of Wilmette, Kenilworth, Winnetka, Northfield and Glencoe will see their annual tax bills rise in the range of 2 to 3 percent. The newest installment may actually be less than the first payment that was due March 1, because the earlier tax bill was figured at 55 percent of last year’s total.
Tax increases were held down by a 1.5 percent cap on the tax claims of school districts, park districts and municipalities without home rule authority. Calibrated to the rise in the Consumer Price Index during 2010, the figure was one of the lowest since tax caps were applied to area governments in the mid 1990s. Next year’s cap will be considerably higher at 3 percent.
Generally speaking, homeowners in Winnetka, Wilmette and Kenilworth will see increases between 2 and 3 percent, while homeowners in Northfield and Glencoe will see smaller increases.
A plethora of tax relief measures in recent years has turned the tax formula into an individual equation that can vary greatly from homeowner to homeowner. New Trier Township homeowners were last reassessed in 2010 and are due for another update in 2013.
Though Illinois law requires that tax bills be paid in two installments with March 1 and Aug. 1 due dates, the county hasn’t met the second-payment deadline in decades, often citing the high volume of property tax appeals. County officials made a concerted push this year to expedite the appeals process and get the tax bills out on time.
