* The folks at School District 300 who oppose an extension of the Sears Economic Development Area are making some big promises…

If the EDA is allowed to expire in 2013, the District will realize a minimum of $14 million per year in increased revenue - our share of payment of property taxes on the EDA properties.

Not if Sears leaves, you won’t.

* But this is fascinating. The Village of Hoffman Estates controls the Economic Development Area money. It acquired the failing Sears Centre Arena two years ago via a Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure process. The Sears EDA extension legislation includes language that allows Hoffman Estates to buy up public buildings with the cash it gets from the fund. So, the antis have an interesting theory…

We believe that Hoffman Estates is desperate to extend the EDA so that they can use it to pay for the Sears Center and pay to operate it over the next 15 years and here is why:

Hoffman was recently forced to purchase the flailing Sears Center Arena for somewhere in the area of $70 million dollars because it has become a white elephant and its owners were ready to abandon the property and walk away;

Hoffman has promised THEIR tax payers that they would do whatever they could to not put the burden of the failing Sears Center on them;

Suddenly Hoffman files legislation to re-write the EDA statute to let them use the EDA to pay for the Sears Center for them and to pay to operate it for the next 15 years – AT OUR EXPENSE! They have NO problem putting the burden of their white elephant on us;

* Buried in a bill introduced this week by House GOP Leader Tom Cross is a provision that allows Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle to take control of public worker pension funds…

The legislation would give Emanuel control of the pensions funds for police officers, firefighters, municipal employees, city laborers, park district workers and Chicago Public Schools teachers. Preckwinkle would hold sway over the pensions for county and forest preserve employees. […]

The police pension board has four mayoral appointees and four trustees chosen by the union’s 17,000 members, including about 10,000 officers and almost 7,000 retirees. The legislation, House Bill 3827, would dissolve the board within 90 days of passage and set up a new panel with four mayoral appointees and only three representatives of pension fund members.

The unions are not happy…

Also voicing opposition to the measure Thursday was Anders Lindall, a spokesman for the Chicago-based Council 31 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represents 5,000 county employees and about 3,500 City Hall workers. Lindall said the blame for the pension crisis belongs to politicians who avoided contributing government’s share to the funds.

“To consolidate power in the hands of politicians is a recipe for disaster,” Lindall said. “It would take the funds in the opposite direction of the transparency and accountability that Mayor Emanuel says he wants in city government.”

* From the AP…

Illinois ranks first nationwide when it comes to nonprofit groups reporting late payments from the government, according to a survey last year by the nonpartisan Urban Institute. More than 80 percent of Illinois groups say their money doesn’t come on time.

Not to be nitpicky, but those sentences should probably be past tense since the study was conducted before the tax hike.

* Roundup…

* Hearing scheduled for teachers union’s complaints about longer school day pilot

* Sears Threatening to Move Business Out of Illinois Along with 6,000 Jobs: At a rally attended by about 2,000 people at H.D. Jacobs High School, one speaker after another declared, “23 years is enough.”

* About 3,000 in District 300 protest Sears tax break