Finance Committee Budget Hearings – Feb. 9, 2011

Assessor, Recorder of Deeds, Board of Review, and Department of Administrative Hearings

Assessor (Joseph Berrios)

Met 16% cut requested by President ($22 million vs. $25 million in 2010; 337.6 FTEs vs. 397 in 2010). Assessor Berrios said that he fired 13 people who had worked for his predecessor and hired new people. For this budget reduction, he told Commissioner Beavers that he did have to eliminate 59 positions that were filled. A number of these positions are held by union people, so there is "bumping" going on now and he won't know exactly who will be walking out the door until this procedure is completed.

Separately, Mr. Berrios stated that he was going to lobby the state legislature to change the newly enacted law which requires seniors to re-apply every year for the senior exemption for property taxes. He feels that he has the necessary tools to catch any fraud. This law has the effect of his office incurring additional costs in sending out the exemption applications and then processing them when returned.

Recorder of Deeds (Eugene Moore)

Also complied with the 16% budget cut ($11.96 million vs. $11.43 million in 2010; 206 vs. 221 FTEs). Recorder Moore was able to cut FTE positions without having to lay off anyone because he had 15 unfilled slots. By drawing down on the Recorder's Special Purpose Fund, he was able to transfer 20 people to that Fund. In response to Commissioner Schneider's question, however, unless revenues improve, it will likely be difficult to maintain all these positions in future years since the balance in the Special Purpose Fund has been depleted this year. Commissioner Daley suggested that the County should be getting more than $1 from the $10 Rental Housing fee that the Comptroller charges under State Law that has $9 going to the State.

Commissioner Gorman stated that there were political activities being run out of Mr. Moore's office and that she would meet with him privately to discuss so he could put a stop to them.

Board of Review – (Larry Rogers, Dan Patlak, and Michael Cabonargi)

The President's recommendation is to cut an additional $280,119 from the budget requested by the Board. The difference relates to overtime that was paid last year with approval from the then President's office, but which was over and above what was in last year's budget. The Board of Review hopes that the Cook County Board will offer amendments to put this additional amount back into the budget, but first the additional money would have to be found.

Michael Cabonargi was introduced as the new Board of Review Commissioner for the 2^nd District, having been appointed by the Chief Judge to take the position vacated by Joseph Berrios upon being elected Assessor. Mr. Cabonargi has been an attorney with the Security and Exchange Commission.

Department of Administrative Hearings

This department was created 2 years ago pursuant to an authorizing state statute which permitted the County to establish an administrative hearing procedure for alleged violations of the County code, such as alleged failure to pay required home rule taxes (cigarette, sales, liquor taxes, etc.), building and zoning code violations, animal control violations, etc. These administrative hearings provide for a quicker and less expensive way to resolve alleged violations as opposed to going to the circuit court and help relieve some of the burden on the courts. The hearing officers for these proceedings are volunteer lawyers who are appointed by the Director of this Department.

The Department met the 16% budget reduction without having to reduce its current 7 FTE slots. Last year the Department handled 5,000 cases and it expects to expand that 5 fold to 30,000 this year. That could mean $12 to $15 million more revenues to the County. At yesterday's budget review meeting, however, State's Attorney Anita Alvarez said that she would withdraw all support for Administrative Hearings if she was forced to cut her budget by 10%. The Director said that the administrative cases would be stalled without the support of the State's Attorney. The Department would like to hold hearings in each of the suburban court houses, but has been unable to get the approval of the Chief Judge for space at Markham.

The Commissioners clearly see the value in expanding the work of this Department in future years.

--submitted by Priscilla Mims