Leave it to Gov. BRUCE RAUNER to baffle people right to the end.

His approach to governing was one thing, but now he’s admitted publicly that he tried to duck out of the job before the election.

Democrats who soon will retake full control of Illinois government are expected to push for a sweeping overhaul of the state income tax, but if history is any guide prospects for success range from don’t-get-your-hopes-up to fat chance.

Replacing the current single tax rate structure in Illinois with a menu of graduated rates that charge more to the wealthy would require a Constitutional amendment that to pass requires an extraordinary majority of voters. Similar proposals in other states have fared poorly at the ballot box.

DePaul University freshman David Krupa scored an impressive victory in Chicago politics on Saturday: Boss Madigan — the most powerful Democrat in Illinois — backed out of a challenge to Krupa’s candidacy for alderman in the Southwest Side’s 13^thWard.

“I am truly humbled to be the first candidate on the ballot to challenge the 13^th Ward since 1991,” Krupa, 19, told me at the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners offices on Saturday. “This is a huge defeat for (Michael) Madigan’s organization, and the beginning of the end of boss politics.”

Reader, you’re in charge of the universe—or at least the local slice of it—for just a moment:

Imagine that the mayor, local economic boosters and a handful of the most ambitious real estate developers in town came to you and said they have projects on the drawing boards that would extend Chicago’s downtown business district, make the city a more powerful attraction for global employers, transform swaths of the underutilized real estate that currently blights the landscape, and invent vibrant new neighborhoods in which Chicagoans could live, play and work.

After an Algonquin Township trustee raised questions this month about whether the highway department has been following its own clothing and boots allowance policy, officials voted to pull more than $1,400 in bills for road worker boots that Highway Commissioner Andrew Gasser submitted for payment.

“I feel this is not being thoroughly done,” Trustee Melissa Victor said at the board’s Wednesday meeting, pointing to several occasions where road district employees bought boots that cost more than the $150 highway department policy allows for reimbursement. “They’re going way over and above with their shoes.”

Fox River Grove residents with homes valued at $200,000 could pay about $40 less in property taxes to the village next year, officials said.

On Dec. 6, the village adopted an $18,882 increase (2.1 percent) to the amount of property taxes collected for the village portion of the property tax bill; however, that levy request will be offset by a $91,558 reduction tied to the payment of the village’s only outstanding general obligation bond.