Shiloh sued tax collector for millions from its TIFs. Here’s how it was settled
For years, Shiloh argued in circuit and appellate courts that the county tax collector shorted the village a year’s worth of revenue from two of its tax increment financing districts.
TIF districts are a tool municipalities use to fund redevelopment. They freeze property values within the district when it’s created, and the revenue generated by any rise in property values from redevelopment goes into a special fund to pay for things like infrastructure improvements and economic incentives.
A TIF district is limited to 23 years. The village and county disagreed over when payments from the two TIF districts Shiloh created in 1998 should end. The county stopped sending Shiloh the TIF revenue in calendar year 2021. But Shiloh thought it should have continued into tax year 2021 — money the village levied in 2021 and the county collected from taxpayers in 2022.
On Monday, Shiloh’s fight came to an end as the St. Clair County Board agreed by consent judgment to give the village close to what it lost in 2022, plus inflation, by making adjustments during the tax collection in the upcoming 2025 tax year.
The “target” amount? $2,844,567, according to the agreement between the county, Shiloh and other affected taxing bodies that include school, township and fire protection districts in the area of the former TIF districts.
The 1998 TIF districts include some of the village’s biggest developments, like the Green Mount Crossing shopping center, which was built in 2001 featuring big-box stores like Dierbergs, Target and Michaels, as well as Memorial Hospital East, which was built in 2016.
St. Clair County initially filed a motion to dismiss the village’s lawsuit, and a circuit court judge ruled in the county’s favor in 2022. But an Illinois appellate court reversed the circuit court’s decision in 2023.
The county wanted to appeal, but the Illinois Supreme Court didn’t take up the case, St. Clair County attorney Garrett Hoerner told County Board members at a judiciary committee meeting Monday night before they voted on the consent judgment.
St. Clair County Board members Steve Gomric, of District 8, and Jerry Dinges, of District 15, were absent from Monday’s meeting.
County Board member Kevin Dawson, of District 24, abstained from the vote because he represented the Shiloh Valley Township and road district in the consent judgment as their lawyer.
When asked how the agreement to set aside about $2.8 million in property taxes from the area of the former TIF districts would affect the township’s budget, Dawson said that it required an adjustment but that township officials had been apprised along the way.
Superintendents for O’Fallon Township High School District 203 and O’Fallon School District 90 said Tuesday that they were still assessing the possible effect on their budgets. Belleville Township High School District 201 is also among the districts that are part of the consent judgment, but Superintendent Marshaun Warren said the agreement will not affect its budget.
