Members Present Mr. James, Mr. Skutt, Mr. Enz, Mr. Mulcahy, Mr. Snipes, Ms. Polk, Ms. Bernard, Mr. Arseneau, Ms. Dionne, and Mr. LaGesse Members Absent Mr. McConnell In Attendance Board Members Mr. Bossert Department Heads John Shoopman, Bruce Clark, Julie Boudreau, and Lori Gadbois Media None 1. Call to Order The meeting was called to order by the Chairman, Mr. James, at 9:00 a.m. Quorum present. 2. Public Comment None. 3. Approval of minutes October 25, 2011 A motion to approve the minutes was made by Mr. Skutt and seconded by Ms. Dionne. Motion carried. 4. County Clerk: Bruce Clark A motion to accept the Monthly Reports as presented was made by Mr. Enz and seconded by Ms. Dionne. Motion carried. 5. GIS: Roger Diercks GIS Day Report Mr. Diercks was not able to attend the meeting but did include a report on the GIS Day in today s packet. 6. Assessor: John Mac Shoopman A motion to accept the Monthly Reports as presented was made by Mr. Mulcahy and seconded by Ms. Dionne. Motion carried. Page 1
Mr. Shoopman stated that they have a total of 768 appeals in front of the Board of Review for 2011. The board is on their fourth day of appeals today; they are hearing 66 appeals today. He noticed that this year there seems to be a higher percentage of appeals that are multiple properties. Bourbonnais had a total of 443 appeals with 171 being single appellant having a subdivision with cookie cutter developer lots so those appeals with be hearings where they are reviewing like properties and the total volume will be considerably less in terms of the number of hearings required by the Board of Review. They look to be completed around February 3 which is a month ahead of last year. Ms. Bernard asked what the two properties were in Aroma Township with no change in value. Mr. Shoopman stated that those will all go up for final appeal for anyone who was unsatisfied with their preliminary decision. Ms. Bernard asked if they have appeals broken down into townships. Mr. Shoopman stated that they do. Ms. Bernard asked what the average decrease was percentage wise in property value in Aroma Township. Mr. Shoopman stated that he believes that was one of the higher ones between 1% and 7 % and they averaged 4% across the county. He believes Aroma was the highest or second highest at 6% or 7% decrease. Ms. Bernard stated that Mr. Shoopman had talked to her about the rate of dispersion. The larger the rate of dispersion the more it indicates that higher end properties are assessing at a lower rate relative to the lower end properties in the same area being assessed. They have had that discrepancy in Aroma where the little guy has been paying a higher rate relative to the people who live on the river in the mini-mansions. What is that rate of dispersion now for Aroma? Is it finally being fairer? What kind of corrective action has been taken? Mr. Shoopman stated that there will be some discussion on that in their assessor s meeting which is tomorrow at 1:00. The only way to really go through that is identify those properties and reassess them. Mr. Snipes stated that he thinks the point is well taken but he thinks it is going to be the peoples fight with their local assessors. Mr. Bossert stated that Aroma had only 13 complaints as compare to 72 a couple years ago. The property owners did not take the initiative to appeal if they felt that they were over assessed. Ms. Bernard stated that she has a feeling most of the average lay people are not even aware of the dispersal rate. She was not even aware of it until Mr. Shoopman shared it with Page 2
her. She doesn t think that it would be a bad idea for the Supervisor of Assessments to tell the assessors that people are becoming aware of these dispersal rates and their job as an assessor is to make sure that the vertical assessments are being done in an equitable manner. Mr. Enz stated that he thinks that is an excellent point that Ms. Bernard brought up. It seems to him that it would be prudent to bring it up at his assessor s meeting tomorrow and see if something can t be done about it. Has he seen a significant increase in big operation appeals? He noticed that as a township supervisor he got numerous appeals this year on different properties in the township. He wondered if there was an increase in that overall. Mr. Shoopman stated that he did not isolate those from the total but he does have the data on that. He didn t see anything that looked different or unusual. Mr. Enz stated that a lot of these in his area were ones that were pulled from the TIF and now they are back onto the tax rolls and it seems like they are reluctant to be good citizens. Mr. Arseneau stated, in defense of Mr. Shoopman, that each assessor is an elected official and he can only consult with them and let them know what we are talking about. The county board members should be letting their constituents know what they could be doing with the assessments. Ms Bernard stated that she has let her constituents know about it. Also, she thinks Mr. Shoopman is an excellent assessor. This is in no way meant to impugn him or to say anything negative about him. He is the first assessor in all these years that told her about this. She is simply asking him to mention this to the assessors tomorrow. Mr. Snipes stated that we can tell them but unless the people take the initiative it is a mute issue. Mr. Shoopman stated that the property owner has the ability to make an appeal at the local level. If they are dissatisfied with the local board s effort then they do have an option to go on to the circuit courts or to the Tax Appeal Board which is a state agency for that purpose. 7. Recorder: Lori Gadbois A motion to accept the Monthly Reports was made by Mr. Arseneau and seconded by Mr. LaGesse. Motion carried. Ms. Gadbois stated that she handed out two documents to the committee today. She reminded the committee about property fraud alert. It is a free service that is available to anybody that has recorded documents in her office. She encouraged them to take a few minutes and sign up for it and tell people about it. She has been out there communicating to the public about it. The other document she prepared in conjunction with the VAC. Primarily, it is geared towards helping those who are coming home from the war and also Page 3
coming out of the service for whatever reason. It explains the benefits of why they should record their DD-214 in her office and why they will need that document for the rest of their lives. They are getting the word out everywhere that they can. Ms. Gadbois stated that for the fiscal recorded year which is December to November they recorded 16,297 documents which is down considerably from the past years. Things are not picking up as fast as they had hoped that they would. For the month of December they are already competitively the same as last year so she looks at that as a good thing because it is not down. Ms. Gadbois stated they have been working on cleaning up their past records that were incorrectly indexed to make it easier for information to be found for their users coming in and also in cyber world. In their backlog project of indexing they completed over 37,000 documents that was film that she had pulled and had it imaged to their system. They are working on cleaning up their township section range documents that are recorded. There were some inaccuracies as to how that was put in. The utilities that have been coming in, such as the railroad, Comcast, AT&T, have brought to light that some things from the past were indexed incorrectly so they are cleaning that up, as well. They have also repaired and rebound two books from 1926 that were falling apart; as well as, the miscellaneous books that covers the years 1986 to 1991 have been repaired and are waiting to be rebound. Mr. Bossert stated that their income was up quite a bit in November. Was it from anything in particular? Ms. Gadbois stated that it was the big sale from the Bradley Commons. Mr. Enz stated that the Lis Pendens (Notice of Foreclosures) were down in November. Is there a reason for that? Ms. Gadbois stated that she would like to believe that with the efforts of the Attorney General s office and other entities that people who are getting into that situation are tapping into resources to help them get out of their unfortunate situation and are working with their banks. Mr. Enz stated that is prudent on the banks part because when those houses go empty they get little to nothing for them. He thinks that it would be smart on their part to make some deals. Ms. Gadbois stated that it is not only the ability to save the house but to also recapture their dignity which is a good thing. Mr. James asked about the suit against Wells Fargo. Ms. Gadbois stated that it is still ongoing. They have not received an update from the Attorney s General s office in the last three weeks. One of the Attorney General s in Massachusetts has filed an individual lawsuit against them. Our Attorney General is still Page 4
working with the conglomerate, not individually going after them. No deal has been made for Illinois. Mr. Bossert stated that getting the DD-214 s filed is a good service. He can testify to the importance of it because when he needed to get his in-laws into the Veterans Cemetery in Elwood he needed it. The one that was issued right after World War II was a little hard to find in the family records. They did track it down but having it on file at the County Recorder s office is a nice service. Mr. Snipes stated that he thinks it is a good service and thanked Ms. Gadbois for providing that service. Ms. Bernard stated that she thinks the Attorney General in California and maybe New York are pulling out of the suit because they think that the settlement is too lenient. They are actually looking at seeing criminal prosecution against some of the banks. Where is Illinois going with this? Ms. Gadbois stated that the last report she received was that Attorney General Madigan is working in conjunction with 50 attorney generals in some kind of suit. Ms. Bernard stated that she agrees with what California is doing. The way that these big banks have ruined and crashed our economy they need to suffer some criminal penalties as well. 8. Animal Control: Julie Boudreau A motion to accept the Monthly Reports as presented was made by Mr. Arseneau and seconded by Mr. Mulcahy. Motion carried. Ms. Bernard stated that she noticed that the number of total animals handled is down. What does Ms. Boudreau attribute that to? Ms. Boudreau stated that hopefully people are realizing that they do not need to take an animal on so that is an animal that doesn t come in later when they do realize that. They are still seeing a fair share of strays and owner surrenders. People in hard times realizing that they cannot care for their pets. They really try to encourage people who are relinquishing their pets to reach out to private humane organizations that can hold their pet longer and have more resources to avenue that pet into a new home. Ms. Bernard asked if she was seeing an increase in spay and neuter. Ms. Boudreau stated that the people who do not want to spay and neuter are not going to. They try and try to encourage people and she would love to come back to the board in the future and tighten up the requirements that the state has in the running at large. It says that on a second offense they have to be spayed or neutered within 30 days. They are Page 5
often seeing on the second and third offense that that is not happening. When they come into them the third time and they have failed to spay or neuter she will not release them without them being spayed or neutered. They have to go directly to an Animal Hospital. She doesn t know the exact number of the spays and neuters. Ms. Bernard asked how many she has done through the Population Control Fund. Ms. Boudreau stated that she did not bring that information with her. Looking at that list, she was disheartened to see that out of the number of applications that she has approved many of them were never used. She will email those numbers to Ms. Bernard. Ms. Boudreau stated the season always brings them at the end of the cat season with an abundance of cats. As they come into winter, they want to move them. Dr. Vaughn from VCA Aroma Park called earlier this month and said that their hospital would like to offer free service to a cat as a holiday gesture. She thought about it and wondered if other vets would like to come together and do something so she made phone calls and every animal hospital in the county offered to help spay and neuter all of the cats in their shelter for free, including Dr. McKay who is their administrator from Beecher. He came in and did all the males. They did over 30 cats and then slashed the adoption prices to $20. They have been extremely busy these last couple weeks moving these animals out. She also lowered the dog adoption rate until the 24 th. A few of the hospitals offered to honor just the voucher price on the spay and neuter. It really helped and she really appreciated it. It was the first time in her 12 years that all the vets came together to benefit the animals. Mr. Bossert asked how they are doing on the horse population. Ms. Boudreau stated that they still have two in custody. HAHS (Hoofed Animal Humane Society) agreed to take them when they could make room for them. Two more were abandoned real close to the state line. It made her wonder if they did come from the Indiana side but there is no way to know that. People have to realize that taking on this kind of animal is such a huge expense. She does have another resource in the Will County area. If somebody calls and says that they cannot take care of their horse and asks where they can go, this organization will go out themselves and talk directly to the owner and evaluate if the horse fits into their program. They work with children and with a Christian college out of Indiana. The children work at this barn and they earn scholarships for the college. They get the privilege of owning one of the horses and taking it home and being in 4H. It is a nice resource to have. HAHS and other places strictly deal with neglect and will only take them from us. Mr. Bossert asked if the slaughter laws changed. Ms. Boudreau stated that from what she understands the President signed a slaughter bill but she thinks it is going to left up to the states now. She doesn t know if Illinois is going to allow that back in. She hopes that they have some stronger regulations if it is brought back. 9. Old Business None Page 6
10. New Business None 11. Adjournment A motion was made by Mr. LaGesse and seconded by Mr. Mulcahy to adjourn the meeting at 9:45 a.m. Motion carried. Stan James, Chairman Joanne Langlois, Executive Coordinator Page 7