By Townhall Chicago News Staff
Illinois voters split on 85 local tax and bond referendums on the ballot this fall, with explicit tax increases more likely to fail than measures framed as bonds, according to policy analyst Ted Dabrowski.
Dabrowski, who has written on the referendum results and has said on air that he ran in the Republican primary for Illinois governor, said ballot language shaped the outcome. “When voters knew the referendum was a tax hike, they were much more likely to vote against it,” he said. “I want to see tax hike in the language of the ballot initiative.”
Four county sales-tax increases failed, Dabrowski said, while bond measures with less explicit tax language often passed. He cited a $295 million bond for Township High School District 214 that he said could cost about $600 million with interest, and a $355 million bond for District 300, covering Carpentersville and Algonquin, that he said was rejected and would have cost about $700 million with interest.
Dabrowski said a 2024 state law, House Bill 4582, extended bond terms to 30 years and exempted some bonds from the state’s property tax cap, and that ballots no longer have to state the average cost to taxpayers. Those provisions have not been independently verified against the statute’s text.
Co-host Jeannie Ives, a former state legislator, said the results show inconsistent voter preferences. “Illinois voters like high taxes and more spending, but they’re a little bipolar,” she said.
Roughly half of the 85 referendums passed, according to Dabrowski; the exact tally and district-by-district results have not been confirmed against official election returns.
