Census Fakers

Note to Ops: If you've been getting primo tee times at the Antioch Golf Club that may not be a sign that you got clout. It might be because the Lake County population has been plummeting. At least according to the Lake County Gazette (Lake County's most trusted fake news source):

Lake County lost more than 5,000 residents between July 2015 and July 2016, following a statewide trend that has seen 91 percent of counties experience outmigration. The Chicago Tribune recently described the political and economic effects outmigration can have on areas, including the loss of federal and state funding for various programs because it is based on population.
Lake County residents follow flood leaving state

A nearly one percent drop in population over a 12 month timespan is precipitous -- even by the standards of the Lake County Gazette. So your LakeCountyEye looked up the Chicago Tribune article that was cited:

Lake County's population fell between 2015 and 2016, but only barely, new estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau show. There were 703,047 people living in Lake County as of July 1, 2016, down from 703,413 a year earlier, according to the estimates released Thursday. The loss of 366 residents reflected a decrease of less than one tenth of 1 percent.
While Chicago region loses people, Lake County population remains fairly flat

Some back-of-the-napkin math reveals that 366 is, in fact, not more than 5,000:

366  ≱   5000

When asked to explain the discrepancy, one authorized fake news spokesman said: "If you're just looking at a Lake County population census map, then absolutely the numbers don't add up. But 366 beats 5000 on the Lake County electoral college map."

That's all your LakeCountyEye has. Nothing else to see here, please vote with your feet.

Dump and Dumper

If U.S. President Donald J Trump's poll numbers are in the outhouse that may be because he's been taking a lot of crap, lately, from the lamestream media fake news.

At first flush, Trump was the butt of this Saturday Night Live joke ...

Trump: I sit on every chair like it's a toilet.

"I sit on every chair like it's a toilet."#SNLLiveCoastToCoast pic.twitter.com/dhVldhnBCF

— Saturday Night Live (@nbcsnl) May 14, 2017

Crack reporter, Anderson Cooper was next to pile on.  He let rip with ...

If Trump took a dump on his desk, you'd defend it.

Anderson Cooper tells Jeffrey Lord: "If (Trump) took a dump on his desk, you'd defend it" https://t.co/eoDxfEWswC pic.twitter.com/pulkG3RaHt

— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) May 20, 2017

Perhaps unable to hold it in, it was then Congressman Peter Roskam who, in the end, unloaded on Trump ...

Cong. Roskam Tells Trump: Dump Your Tweeting

Peter Roskam is a number-two also-ran for the Republican US Congressional leadership. One spokesman said: "Anyone who says Mr Roskam is in the tank for Donald Trump is talking out of their ass."

The $25MM Schilla in the Strom

Note to Ops: If you aim to burn some rubber thru a Tollway Oasis, watch out for pedestrians. That's because the Illinois Tollway Authority has gobs of walking-around money to hand out. And by gobs, your LakeCountyEye means $25,000,000 of them.

According to the Daily Herald ...

Illinois tollway directors unanimously voted to study extending Route 53 north Thursday, approving a $25 million consulting contract amid furious lobbying for and against the project.
Tollway OKs $25 million, 4- to 5-year study of Route 53 extension

Lake County officials welcomed the decision. One told your LakeCountyEye: "We got a golf course in Lake Villa Township to sell them."

That's all you're LakeCountyEye has. Don't forget to tip your tollbooth operator.

The $750K Gorilla in Lake Villa

Note to Ops: If you aim to burn some rubber down Route 120, watch out for pedestrians. That's because there seems to be gobs of walking-around money in Lake Villa Township.

The Daily Herald says ...

About half of Lake Villa Township's $1.4 million reserves would be spent in a plan to buy a failing golf course located mostly outside the township. Lake Villa Township Supervisor Dan Venturi said his plan to buy the nearly 100-acre Antioch Golf Club for around $750,000 would preserve the value of homes adjacent to the 18-hole, par-70 golf course. Most of the homeowners live in Lake Villa Township.
Why Lake Villa Township wants to buy a failing golf course

In situations like this, local government would normally pressure the Lake County Forest Preserve to obtain the worrisome parcel of land. But it appears that Lake Villa Township plans to cut out the middle-man, and will opt to directly buy the Antioch Golf Club, before the developers can. Perhaps they just couldn't wait?

One impacted homeowner told your LakeCountyEye that "when your voters live on Clout Street, the Township better get off the dime". That's because there are outside buyers eyeing the failing golf course, all with plans of their own.

Ten of them, by your LakeCountyEye's count:

10 Blueprint-Ready Projects Being Discussed for the Antioch Golf Club

Last Exit Ramp Off the Route 53 Extension CN Railway Spur to Caboose Park Trumpcare Pauper's Cemetery The Waukegan Casino The Midlothian Manor Homeless Facility The Grayslake Trucking Terminal The Lakemoor Woodman's Grocery The Cary Gravel Pit The Vernon Hills Menards What Part of Crony Capitalism Don't You Understand?

Look for your LakeCountyEye to putt for the dough near you.

Chinese Diplomat on Future Relations with the US

Adlai Stevenson Center on Democracy

Hong Lei, Consul General of the People's Republic of China in Chicago, will discuss The Sino - United States Relationship in the New Era at a forum at the Adlai Stevenson Center on Democracy.

• Sunday
  May 21, 2017
  2:00 pm
• The Stevenson Center on Democracy
  25200 N St Mary's Rd
  Mettawa (Libertyville), IL 60048
  847-816-7433
• $15
  (Students Free)

Q the Eye/05.15.17

Dear LakeCountyEye,

Property taxes are due next month. Help!

If my home is my shelter and if I am taxed on the value of my home then why isn't my home a tax shelter?

Dear $64,000 Question,

Simply save a penny every day. If you are like your LakeCountyEye then at the end of the year you will have the $3 needed to cover your property tax bill.

Haha, this illustrates an important point. Your property taxes are a zero sum game. Whenever your neighbor gets his assessment lowered, his property tax goes down and yours automatically goes up. Even if your assessment has not changed, your tax goes up because you have to cover the shortfall produced by your neighbor.

Luckily the assessment process in Illinois is a self regulating feedback loop that you can ride to your advantage.

Here's how: A sure sign that you are being over-assessed is when your neighbors cannot afford to pay their property taxes. When this happens it is only a matter of time before one of those neighbors is foreclosed on, and he loses his house to a tax sale.

That is your cue to spring into action. Since that home is likely to be sold significantly under market value, you can use the outcome of that sale to get your assessment lowered. These sales are not hard to find if you remember that Zillow is your friend. For example, this home in a nice Lake County neighborhood recently sold for $80,000 ...

Real Estate & Homes For Sale

... a steal by your LakeCountyEye's reckoning.

If you live in that neighborhood, print out the webpage, and remind your Township Assessor that assessments are based on comparative values, then demand to know why your assessment isn't $80K also. And watch your assessment shrink faster than the reserve funds at Lake Villa Township!

Take it from your LakeCountyEye: Don't look a gift house in the mouth.

If you are an elected official, or a previously elected official, or just a private citizen under indictment, send your political questions to Q the Eye c/o ... LakeCountyEye@gMail.com

Dead to Health Care Rights

People are dying to get out of Lake County. They've been departing to Randy Hultgren's district office in Campton Hills, where a mass die-in has been reported.

Hultgren, Lake County's boreal congressman, voted to repeal Obamacare last week. According to the Northwest Herald:

The Campton Hills district office of U.S. Rep. Randy Hultgren, R-Plano, again was the center of protest Tuesday, but organizers called it a die-in, lying on the grass with cardboard tombstones and plastic skeletons to show their disdain for the American Health Care Act. Hultgren was among the seven Illinois House Republicans who voted May 4 to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.
U.S. Rep. Randy Hultgren's office the scene of a die-in to protest American Health Care Act

In related news, people in Lake County are living longer:

People live longer in Lake County than in many of its counterparts across Illinois, and life expectancy in the county has increased since 1980 — but not as fast as the rate of improvement in other Chicago-area counties such as Cook and Kane, according to the results of a new national study.
Life expectancy increasing in Lake County, but health outcomes unequal

One spokesman spoke on conditions of anomalously: "If they repeal Obamacare, then people won't be living longer in Lake County. It will just seem that way."

Next Week: Where all the bodies are buried.

I Never Promised You a Rose Garden

Caption Contest!

No sooner had the GOP repealed Obamacare on Thursday, they all made a beeline for the White House and took a happy dance in the Rose Garden with President Trump. Operatives are challenged to find vestigial Lake County Congressman Peter Roskam in the photo, and then post this caption:

Rep. Peter Roskam casts the deciding vote to repeal Obamacare. So great!

Haha, trick question. Everyone knows Peter Roskam never poses in public for anything.

In fact, even though Roskam cast his vote in Washington around 2:00pm, he was seen back home at a Wheaton golf club -- before dinnertime:

According to the Daily Herald ...

Roskam was greeted by about three dozen protesters when he arrived early Thursday evening to a GOP fundraiser at Arrowhead Golf Club in Wheaton. Demonstrators carried Planned Parenthood posters and wore black veils because, they said, they were in mourning after the vote.
Hultgren, Roskam join majority in Obamacare repeal in U.S. House

The fundraiser became the locus of an impromptu townhall meeting. Wealthy donors were assured that under Trumpcare golfer's elbow would not be considered a pre-existing condition.

Your LakeCountyEye will keep you apprised when further developments warrant.

Haunted Highway

If wishes were horses then beggars would ride. Provided, of course they were riding on the Route 53 Extension.

Haha, it's back. A new poll commissioned by a pro-highway construction special interest group reportedly breathes some life into the zombie Route 53 Extension. The Daily Herald has been keeping a close watch on the $3 billion tollway project:

Despite Lake County Chairman Aaron Lawlor's dropping support for the project in May, tollway leaders reaffirmed their commitment, indicating they'd hire consultants by last summer, but nothing's happened. That begs the question: Is the tollway all-in or getting cold feet? Proposals from consulting firms are still under review, a spokesman said. If officials needed ammunition to pull the trigger, they got it with the release of a report last week from the Illinois Economic Policy Institute
Is the tollway getting cold feet on Route 53 extension?

That begs the question, indeed.

Be that as it may, one obvious question remains to be asked: Will the Tollway Authority pull the trigger or get cold feet? A well-heeled spokesman said: "Let's build it in McHenry County, instead. That way no one will be surprised when they shoot themselves in the foot."

My Foot!

Your LakeCountyEye will keep you apprised when further developments warrant.