Superintendents in Nokomis Community School District 22 are gearing up to push for a county-wide sales-tax hike.

If a school facilities sales tax referendum was passed in DeKalb County, the 0.25 percent sales-tax rate could rise to 1.25 percent, a 400 percent increase.

While school districts can place sales-tax referendums on the ballot every election, once sales-tax hikes are enacted, voters can never initiate a referendum to repeal them.

Fourteen Illinois counties face higher sales taxes if referendums pass at the ballot box this fall. The tax is called the Illinois County School Facility Occupation Tax, or County School Facility Tax (CSFT) for short. The law authorizing the tax, which passed in 2007, allows school boards representing 51 percent of a county’s student population...

No matter how you feel about government spending, most of us agree that the people have a right to know how their tax money is being spent. This means that before a local government raises taxes on their citizens, it should be transparent about how current tax dollars are being spent. Unfortunately, most of Illinois’...

Counties across Illinois reject school facility sales tax hikes.