CHICAGO — A divided state appeals panel upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit in which Chicago activist groups accused the city of discriminatory practices in the way it administers tax increment financing districts and funding programs.
Cook County Circuit Court Judge Neil Cohen dismissed the complaint of the Grassroots Collaborative and Raise Your Hand for Illinois Public Education, finding they lacked standing to bring allegations under the city’s Tax Increment Allocation Redevelopment Act. Court documents show the plaintiffs alleged the city designated as TIF districts areas that weren’t blighted or near blighted or otherwise suffering from economic challenges. Instead, the groups contended, the city designated districts predominantly populated by white people near affluent and thriving neighborhoods.
The groups claimed the city's decisions had forced them to spend their time and resources fighting the city's TIF decisions, rather than putting those toward other advocacy goals.
Illinois Appellate Justice Terrence Lavin
| Illinoiscourts.gov
Grassroots is an 11-organization coalition with a stated mission of resisting “corporate interests working against its constituents.” Raise Your Hand says it focuses on eliminating inequities in public education. Lavin summarized their argument as maintaining the city’s TIF policy and the contested district in particular, “frustrated their missions by compelling them to engage in advocacy directed against the City’s actions. This advocacy required them to divert resources they would have otherwise invested in other advocacy efforts directed against other practices or policies that ran counter to their missions.”
Cohen agreed with the city’s position the plaintiffs failed to show how the groups' decision to spend their time and money challenging Chicago’s TIF decisions represented a palpable injury to a legally recognized interest that entitled them to sue.
Cohen dismissed the complaint with prejudice, and the groups appealed.
The Illinois First District Appellate Court ruled on that appeal in an order issued Nov. 10. Justice Terrence Lavin wrote the judgment; Justice Cynthia Cobbs concurred. Justice Aurelia Pucinski dissented. The order was issued under Supreme Court Rule 23, which restricts its use as precedent, except under very limited circumstances permitted by the Supreme Court rule.
Lavin said in addition to the broad allegations of discriminatory administration, the groups also said the city illegally designated the Cortland and Chicago River TIF District, which is between Logan Square, Bucktown, Lincoln Park and Wicker Park. They said the population within a half mile of the center of that district is 80% white, 12% Hispanic and 4% Black and cited evidence of economic development in the area in the years leading up to the April 2019 TIF creation.
While allowing for the understanding that fighting the city’s TIF policies could drain organizational resources, Lavin explained, the complaint didn’t show how the city’s actions directly interfered with their “ability to provide services or perform their daily operations.” A voluntary shift in targeting advocacy efforts is a management-level decision, he continued.
“Absent infinite resources, all organizations must engage in difficult decisions on how to prioritize their efforts and, accordingly, how to allocate their resources,” Lavin worte. “As the social, political, legal and economic landscapes change, these decisions must be revisited and reassessed.”
Lavin further said finding in favor of the groups “would effectively open the litigation floodgates” to any plaintiff that claimed an ideological disagreement with an action by City Hall.
In her dissent, Pucinski noted she agreed with Lavin and Cobbs about the plaintiffs’ lack of standing but said the correct remedy was sending the case back to Cook County court, so the groups could amend their complaint — although they did not formally request leave to do so.
“Although it is true that plaintiffs’ complaint did not contain any allegations that the city’s actions impaired their provision of services or performance of activities,” Pucinski wrote, “it is not apparent that plaintiffs would be unable to plead and prove such allegations if given the opportunity.”
The activist groups were represented in the action by the Chicago Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights.