CHICAGO — The Bring Chicago Home referendum remains in limbo as the city and Chicago Board of Election Commissioners appeal a judge’s order to throw out all votes cast on the question.
Activists and homelessness prevention groups have for years led a campaign to raise the city’s real estate transfer tax on all properties over $1 million, with the additional revenue dedicated to providing affordable housing and services for people who are unhoused.
Dubbed Bring Chicago Home, the policy change was a key campaign promise of Mayor Brandon Johnson. After some compromise with advocates, the mayor’s allies pushed an ordinance through City Council in the fall to put a referendum on the March 19 ballot asking voters to approve a graduated transfer tax rate instead of the current flat one.
The measure would raise the one-time fee paid on property sales over $1 million while lowering it on cheaper homes and buildings.
But with only three weeks until the primary, the referendum’s future is uncertain.
On Friday, a Cook County judge sided with a coalition of real estate and business groups who sued to block the ordinance, ruling that any votes cast on the question should not be counted.
The judge also denied a motion to dismiss the lawsuit.
The referendum remains on the primary ballot as the city and elections board file separate appeals. All votes cast on the referendum question during early voting are being “sequestered” pending any future court order, board spokesperson Max Bever said in a statement this week.
So, what happens now? Here’s more on the issue.
What Would ‘Bring Chicago Home’ Do?
Property buyers in Chicago currently pay a one-time city flat tax of 0.75 percent on all sales, regardless of final price.
The current iteration of Bring Chicago Home would shift that flat tax structure to a graduated one, which proponents argue would decrease the dollar amount paid by about 93 percent of property buyers in the city.
Under that plan, which was formally introduced to City Council in September, people buying properties under $1 million would see reduced property transfer taxes. Real estate sales over $1 million would see higher rates only on the portion of the sale above $1 million.
The rate proposal includes:
- Property sales under $1 million would be taxed at .6 percent, down from .75 percent.
- Property sales of $1 million-$1.5 million would be taxed at 2 percent.
- Property sales above $1.5 million would be taxed at 3 percent.
City Council passed Bring Chicago Home in November, sending the question to voters in the March 19 primary for final approval, as required by law. If passed by a simple majority, alderpeople would then craft an ordinance to actually raise the tax structure and determine the exact programs to be funded.
Bring Chicago Home Lawsuit And Appeals
Bring Chicago Home has been controversial from the start.
Former Mayor Lori Lightfoot initially supported a transfer tax hike but then opposed efforts to move legislation forward. It stalled in 2022 when half of City Council bailed on a meeting to put a referendum on the citywide ballot.
The proposal then gained steam again when Johnson and a slate of progressive alderpeople took office or were reelected last year.
Since Bring Chicago Home began working its way through City Council, it’s garnered fierce pushback from business and building groups who argue the change would hurt small landlords as well as commercial property owners Downtown.
In January, several of those groups sued the elections board to have the question removed from the ballot, calling it “vague” and “ambiguous” in explaining how it will reduce homelessness. They also argued the referendum improperly grouped three separate questions into one.
Cook County Circuit Judge Kathleen Burke sided with those groups last week. In a ruling made public on Monday, she ordered the Chicago Board of Elections “to not count and suppress any votes cast on the referendum question at the March 19, 2024 primary election, and not to publish any tallies or results of any votes cast on the referendum question.”
In response, the city’s law department on Monday filed an appeal challenging Burke’s order to invalidate the ballot question. The court previously denied a request for the city to be a defendant in the lawsuit, so city officials also have filed a motion to overturn that decision.
The elections board on Tuesday announced they would also launch an appeal, but specifically focused on the part of Burke’s ruling that denied a motion to dismiss the lawsuit. Board officials have repeatedly stressed they do not believe they should have been named in the complaint at all.
“Ultimately, the Board did not create the question. We are the messenger, so we cannot be a proper defendant to argue the merits or validity of the referendum language itself,” Bever said in an email Tuesday afternoon. “The Board’s appeal is on a separate track than the City of Chicago’s appeal (which gets into the merits of the question and their denial to intervene).”
It’s not immediately clear how long the appeals could take. The elections board is requesting an expedited review by the Illinois Appellate Court.
What Does This Mean For Voters?
The Bring Chicago Home question is still on the ballot for Chicago voters. All early voting and voting by mail will continue as normal, Bever said. Votes cast on the ballot referendum will be sequestered and could later be counted if the appeals court overturns Burke’s ruling.
In a statement issued Tuesday, Building Owners and Managers Association of Chicago executive director Farzin Parang blasted the ongoing appeals and Bring Chicago Home. The organization is one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit challenging the ballot referendum.
“The appeal doesn’t change the fact that this referendum is a backdoor property tax increase on the entire city that was deliberately hidden from the public in a bundled, misleading question,” he said. “Homelessness is a serious issue facing our city and we deserve more from our elected leaders — rather than playing politics, they should have brought all the stakeholders together to develop a real, sustainable plan to address this crisis.”
But Bring Chicago Home backers said the court order and lawsuit have not hampered their work to get out the vote.
Deputy campaign director Asha Ransby-Sporn on Tuesday called the legal challenges an “attempt to subvert the democratic process” that aims to block voters from having the final say.
“The legal challenge has not slowed down any of our campaigning, and it has not distracted us from the most important thing at stake, which is figuring out how to address an inequitable housing landscape in the city of Chicago,” Ransby-Sporn said. “We’re going to continue to encourage people to vote ‘yes.'”
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