Votes will be counted next week on the city's ballot question, heavily supported by the Chicago Teachers Union and other left-wing groups, that could empower Mayor Brandon Johnson and his allies in the Chicago City Council to jack up city property sales tax rates, after the Illinois Supreme Court rejected a last ditch appeal from Chicago business advocates to block the ballot measure.
The ruling from the state high court came two days after a coalition of business advocacy groups, led by the Business Owners and Managers Association of Chicago, filed a petition with the court. That petition had asked the state Supreme Court to overrule the decision of a Chicago appeals panel, which had ruled courts had no power before the election to rule whether the city had followed constitutional rules in placing the question before voters.
The state Supreme Court's decision to deny the business coalition's appeal did not include any explanation for the denial, nor any dissents. The order noted that three of the court's seven justices - P. Scott Neville, Joy V. Cunningham and Mary K. O'Brien - did not take part in the decision.
Cunningham is on the ballot in the March 19 Democratic primary, opposing Illinois Appellate Court Justice Jesse Reyes in a contest to secure a 10-year term on the high court from the state's First Judicial District, which includes only Cook County.
The ruling means the Chicago Board of Elections will count ballots cast for and against the so-called "Bring Chicago Home" referendum.
If successful, the referendum would empower the Chicago City Council to restructure the city's real estate transfer tax, which is levied on properties when they are sold.
The new RETT would sharply increase the taxes on all properties sold for more than $1 million. At the same time, supporters say the city would decrease the RETT assessed on properties sold for less than $1 million.
The referendum is strongly backed by Johnson and his far-left political allies, including the Chicago Teachers Union and others. They have claimed the referendum would result in at least $100 million in new tax revenue for the city, which Johnson and his allies have claimed would be put toward funding programs to alleviate homelessness in Chicago.
The referendum, however, does not include any language requiring the city to spend the money on homelessness prevention efforts or for any other specific purpose. Rather, it would be left to the mayor and City Council to determine how to spend the new millions of dollars in new tax revenue.
Opponents have noted the Chicago Teachers Union is already maneuvering to claim much of the money to fund a long list of new demands planned to be placed before the administration of Mayor Johnson, a former CTU member and political organizer whose mayoral campaign was most strongly supported by the CTU.
In recent days, for instance, the Illinois Policy Institute revealed documents indicating the Chicago Teachers Union intends to use proceeds from the referendum to help fund housing assistance payments for Chicago Public Schools teachers.
The Chicago Teachers Union has contributed $700,000 to the Bring Chicago Home campaign committee, according to campaign finance records.
Opponents have also asserted the measure would hammer the city's economy, hitting the owners of storefronts and small apartment buildings, among others, resulting in higher taxes for them and higher rents and home prices for residents of the city.
The Illinois Policy Institute has also noted the referendum will likely only generate a fraction of the revenue that referendum supporters have claimed will be raised. They pointed to the city of Los Angeles, where a similar tax hike referendum only brought in about 15% of the revenue city officials had promised.
After the City Council voted to place the referendum on the ballot, BOMA and its coalition partners filed suit in January in Cook County Circuit Court, arguing Johnson and the Council had violated the Illinois state constitution in the way the BCH referendum question was drafted.
Particularly, they argued the ballot measure impermissibly asked voters two questions in one referendum: Whether taxes should be increased on some properties, and decreased on others.
The challengers said that violates the state constitution's guarantee of "free and equal elections" by giving voters no choice to either oppose both options, or vote only for one option.
In February, Cook County Judge Kathleen Burke sided with the challengers, declaring the referendum to be invalid.
However, on appeal, a three-justice panel of the Illinois First District Appellate Court reversed that ruling. In the appellate decision, Appellate Justice Raymond Mitchell and his colleagues ruled that courts can't hear challenges to referendums placed on the ballot by lawmaking bodies, like the Chicago City Council, because otherwise courts would be interfering in the "legislative process."
They said the business group's lawsuit was "premature," and they would need to wait until BCH became law before they could challenge the ballot measure in court.
BOMA and its allies asked the Illinois Supreme Court to intervene, arguing the appellate court's reasoning will open the door to unconstitutional abuse of the referendum process from the Chicago City Council and other municipal governments, including cities, villages and counties, statewide.
"... The Appellate Court's decision, if permitted to stand, eliminates any pre-election challenge to the constitutionality of a referendum question placed on the ballot by municipal alderpersons, regardless of how blatantly unconstitutional the question may be," the business coalition wrote in its petition.
"The possibilities for ballot abuse by municipal councils across the state are endless."
Further, the business coalition noted the Illinois Supreme Court itself had allowed pre-election challenges to other referendum questions, notably including a decision from the state high court that had pulled the plug on a ballot measure in the village of Dolton, which was placed on the ballot by that village's board of trustees, which could have allowed the troubled suburb to oust scandal-plagued Village President Tiffany Henyard.
BOMA and its coalition partners are represented on the appeal by attorneys Michael J. Kasper, of Chicago, and Michael T. Del Galdo and Cynthia S. Grandfield, of the Del Galdo Law Group, of Berwyn.
Lawyers for the city of Chicago never responded to the petition for leave to appeal before the Supreme Court's denial.