Members of the Homewood-Flossmoor High School District 233 board set the district’s 2015 tax levy at $37,862,000, an increase of just .8 percent.
Residents will pay the tax in 2016, but the amount of the property tax is based on 2015 numbers for the equalized assessed valuation (EAV) of property and the value of any new property.
Although the $37.8 million is an approximate number, the district will use that for budgeting purposes. It will receive the true levy number from the Cook County Assessor’s Office. Staff there will determine the final levy when those two important numbers — EAV and new property — are plugged into a formula established by the Illinois Legislature.
Under the Property Tax Extension Limitation Law, commonly know as tax caps, lawmakers in 1991 passed legislation that said taxes can only be increased to match the Consumer Price Index (CPI) or 5 percent, whichever is less. CPI is at .8 percent, so that is the amount of increase to the tax levy H-F Business Manager Ken Parchem is expecting.
The 2014 levy was $36,348,582.
H-F gets approximately 65 percent of its revenue from property taxes, he said. The state pays just 16 percent of the cost of educating H-F students. The district receives about 6 percent of its revenue from state and federal grants, and another 12 percent in local revenues including interest income, fees and cafeteria sales, Parchem added.