Champaign County has spent over $60,000 on a promotional campaign for a local sales tax hike using taxpayer funds. It might surpass $100,000 by Election Day.

A proposed 1 percent sales tax for school facilities improvements would bring the city of Springfield’s combined sales tax rate to 9.75 percent – among the highest in the nation.

Local voters struck down a 1 percent sales tax hike for the third time in seven years.

Madison County voters have twice turned down a proposed sales-tax hike to fund school facilities projects, but the proposal will appear again on March primary ballots. If approved, shoppers in Collinsville and Granite City would see some of the highest sales tax rates in the country.

A multibillion-dollar business based in Missouri — Stifel, Nicolaus & Co. — is making a pretty penny helping to hike local sales taxes across Illinois.