Legislative Conference Highlights Spring Session

Legal/Legislative Scene

Legislative Conference
Highlights Spring Session

By Peter M. Murphy
IAPD General Counsel

Mark your calendar now! The IAPD Legislative Conference, scheduled for May 13,1992, is an important opportunity for park commissioners and professionals to meet on a face to face basis with their legislators in Springfield during the legislative session.

Legislators are accessible at this time of year and are impressed by the commitment on the part of local officials who take the time to come to Springfield.

This year your Associations and the park and recreation movement in Illinois need your participation at the Legislative Conference.

A strong legislative effort on the part of some members of the General Assembly will be made to push property tax caps to Cook County and the rest of the state. Your communication to the members of the General Assembly on this issue is critical. Tax caps will not work in the collar counties, and they certainly will not work for the rest of the state.

In addition, the Association is seeking legislative approval for a reestablishment of park district non-referendum bonding ability. This legislation will be introduced in both the Illinois House and Senate this spring, and it is important that you have the opportunity to let your legislators know here in Springfield, while you are attending the conference, how necessary this ability is to the continued economic viability of Illinois park districts.

The Legislative Conference will feature Minority Leader, Lee A. Daniels (R-46), who is serving his ninth term in the General Assembly. Daniels was a primary proponent of exempting park district non-referendum bonds from the tax cap. He will be discussing the prospects

for passage of non-referendum bond exemption legislation in addition to the other major issues which will be impacting local government and the State of Illinois.

The conference will also feature other state leaders who will assist conference participants in getting a true sense of the legislature's future directions.

Brent Manning, Director of the Illinois Department of Conservation, will be updating conference participants on new initiatives proposed by the IDOC, and we have invited Doug Whitley, Director of the Illinois Department of Revenue, to discuss the Department's future initiatives which will impact the manner in which local governments collect property taxes.

Activity on the Springfield legislative scene has been relatively quiet with regard to new bill introductions. This is a by-product of the activity legislators are spending locally on the March 17 primary elections. As a result, there have been relatively few bill introductions. However, when the session reconvenes on March 31 it is expected that the floodgates for new bill introductions will open.

The bill introductions reported in this article relate primarily to property tax limitation measures, and the various approaches being offered by members of the General Assembly.

Illinois Parks and Recreation

March/April 1992

The Association has been working closely with other organizations representing local government on a state mandates working group. This group is charged with supplying information, through the Department of Commerce and Community Affairs, to the Governor's office in order to provide fiscal information on those state mandates which increase the cost of doing business locally.

The Illinois State Mandates Act which became effective January 1, 1981 was created in response to a nationwide effort to slow requirements that increase local government costs without providing a means to pay for mem. Proposition 13 in California was the first major example of these mandates.

The Act defines a mandate as any "state initiated statutory or executive action that requires a local government to establish, expand or modify its activities in such a way as to require additional expenditures from local revenues." A state mandate does not include federal mandates such as the Americans with Disabilities Act or mandates imposed by court order.

There are five types of state mandates: • local government organization and structure mandates; • due process mandates; • service mandates; • personnel mandates, and; • tax exemption mandates. These latter mandates are of the greatest concern to Illinois park and forest preserve districts.

State reimbursement of 100 percent of the increased cost to local governments due to the imposition of personnel and tax exemption mandates is required under the Act. Reimbursement of 50-100 percent is required for cost of service mandates and no reimbursement is required due to the imposition of local government organization and structure or due process mandates. In addition, the Act states that if reimbursement is not provided, local governments may refuse to comply with the mandate. This option has not been the past practice of local governments.

Since its adoption the State Mandates Act has been amended in each of the subsequent legislative sessions in order to relieve the state of reimbursement liability for the various new laws that increased costs to local government. In fact, in only one instance has reimbursement been provided under the Act.

Legislative sensitivity to legislation mandating costs to local government has increased, however, and the establishment of a mandates working group by the Governor's office is a reflection of this sensitivity.

Working in cooperation with associations representing local government, DCCA will be providing cost estimates of mandates to the Illinois General Assembly. Member park and forest preserve districts will be surveyed regarding the applicability of state mandates as they arise during this legislative session.

The following are examples of state mandates impacting park and forest preserve districts: liability insurance, collective bargaining, handicapped accessibility, vehicle emission controls, yard waste disposal, underground storage tank removal, asbestos removal, energy costs, health code regulations, Freedom of Information Act and the Prevailing Wage Law. Please contact our offices with other specific examples of state mandates affecting your operation.

The Interior and Insular Affairs Committee chaired by Rep. George Miller (D-CA) on February 26 convened an oversight hearing to consider the administration's proposed new "Manual for Identifying and Delineating Jurisdictional Wetlands." The updated version would ease development restrictions on property currently designated as wetlands. It is estimated that up to half of all areas currently meeting the wetlands definition will lose protection if the new manual is implemented as is.

Of major concern to the panel was what affect this change may have on existing parks and other protected lands. While development is unlikely to occur on most wetlands located in parks, wilderness areas or wildlife refuges, changes to nearby private property could alter long-term management.

The House Budge Committee chaired by Rep. LeonPanetta(D-CA) on February 28 adopted the fiscal year 1993 budget resolution which serves as a guide for Congress to follow in enacting appropriations legislation for the fiscal year.

Congress is expected to consider soon whether or not to allow money to be transferred from defense to domestic appropriations. As a result, the budget committee has created two plans contingent upon the outcome of the debate.

The House Interior Appropriations Subcommittee on February 26-27 received testimony from about 130 organizations, including NRPA. NRPA urged $200 million for state assistance and at least $50 million for urban park rehabilitation. NRPA also urged inclusion of funds for recreation investment in any "jobs" funds. The subcommittee hearing schedule continues into May. Formal subcommittee action is expected in June. At $200 million, estimated state apportionments for Illinois would be $7,324,000.

Illinois Parks and Recreation

March/April 1992

Enacts the Tax Freedom Act. Provides that no taxing district, including home rule units, may adopt a property tax levy in excess of their levy in 1987, excluding a levy for bonded indebtedness incurred prior to the effective date of the Act. Also restricts user fees and taxes other than property taxes to the 1988 level. These limitations may be exceeded by referendum approval of 60 percent of the voters in a taxing district. Repeals the Truth in Taxation Act. Repeals the Property Tax Extension Limitation Act. Amends the Revenue Act of l939 to change the due dates for tax bills and to provide that beginning in 1993 property taxes be paid in 2 installments based on 50 percent of the prior year's tax bill and the second installment being the balance of the amount of taxes actually due. Terminates equalization of assessments by the Department of Revenue. Establishes the assessed valuation of property in 1987 as the permanent assessed valuation unless the assessed value increases in a subsequent year due to improvements or unless the assessed value decreases in a subsequent assessment year or unless the property was unimproved in 1987 in which case the property is reassessed when it is improved with a structure. Amends the Election Code to remove the limit of the number of referenda appearing on a ballot.

Amends the Property Tax Extension Limitation Act to make it applicable to counties with 2,000,000 or more inhabitants. Also exempts from the State Mandates Act.

Amends the Revenue Act of 1939 to provide for a senior citizens tax freeze homestead exemption that provides to persons aged 65 and over, who have an income of $20,000 plus an annual adjustment for inflation, a reduction in the equalized assessed value of the homestead property equal to the amount of increase in the equalized assessed value of the property since 1991 or the year in which the taxpayer becomes 65 years of age.

Amends the Property Tax Extension Limitation Act to make the Act applicable to all taxing districts in Illinois except taxing districts with an equalized assessed value below their 1982 equalized assessed value, including taxing districts that are home rule units. Preempts home rule units.

Creates the Elected Officials Seniority and Hiring Preference Act. Provides that an elected official of the State or local government who has left his last previous full-time employment to serve in elective office shall be entitled to accrue seniority in his last full-time employment during his service in elective office and shall be entitled to be hired in preference to all other job applicants by his last previous full-time employer for any job he is qualified.

Amends the Illinois Income Tax Act, the School Code and the State Finance Act. Increases individual and corporate income taxes beginning January 1,1993 to 4 percent and 6.4 percent respectively, and reduces those rates to 3.75 percent and 6 percent respectively, beginning July 1, 1993. Creates the School District Tax Replacement Fund in the State Treasury. Provides for transfer into the School District Tax Replacement Fund of the portion of the additional income tax revenues that will equal the decrease in school district property tax revenues resulting from a 25 percent reduction made in the maximum authorized educational purposes tax rate of school districts.

Permits an employer to insure the lives of employees for the benefit of the employer or the benefit of the employees. Requires the consent of the employees and limits coverage for nonmanagement and retired employees to amounts related to unfunded liabilities to certain welfare benefit plans.

Amends the Criminal Code of 1961 relating to unlawful use of weapons. Provides that the enhanced penalties for possessing silencers or machine guns or for carrying while hooded, robed, or masked, a firearm, stun gun, fazer, or ballistic knife on school property or in a public park.

Amends the Chicago Park District Act. Deletes requirement that district commissioners state the times of regular meetings in the schedule published at the beginning of each year. Provides that the park district (rather than the commission) may, after the beginning (rather than after the first half) of the fiscal year, authorize transfers among appropriations. Provides that the commission shall adopt an ordinance establishing procedures by which the transfers shall be made.

David Deets has replaced the late Myron Olson as state representative of the 70th District.

Both Chambers will convene in regular session at Noon, Tuesday, March 31, but the House will be in perfunctory sessions periodically throughout this month of March.

Gov. Edgar will give the State Budget Message at noon on April 7. It is expected that he will reveal an increasingly bleak revenue picture for State Government in Fiscal Year 1993, which begins July 1, 1992.

Illinois Parks and Recreation

March/April 1992