Interesting Read

Seems there's money lying around all over the place to avert layoffs, pay for repairs and give the Police and Fire Departments contracts after all:

• Over the past month, Mayor Daley's tax increment financing (TIF) system has attracted some much-needed scrutiny. First came the news that the city is forking over $3.8 million to insurance giant Willis Group Holdings to refurbish their swank new Sears Tower headquarters (despite the fact that the company's annual revenue exceeds $2 billion). Then we learned from the Sun-Times that condo owners in Chicago's University Village had benefited from TIF subsidies, only to flip their "affordable housing" for a profit (essentially pocketing those taxpayer dollars). Cook County Clerk David Orr recently summed it up well: "We’re looking at massive abuse. ...TIFs can be a good tool, but this has become a giant slush fund in the city of Chicago.”

  While we could write on and on about the "massive abuse" of TIF, we're going to shift the focus slightly today -- to the hoarding of unspent TIF dollars.

The linked article describes $1.4 BILLION in cold hard cash just sitting around in accounts doing next to nothing. Correct us if we're wrong, but government isn't supposed to make money. If there's money left over, taxpayers are due a refund.