FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: James Buiter, 708-259-4367, j.buiter395@comcast.net
July 5, 2020
Will County Hiring Chicago Tax Firm to Distribute CARES Funds, But Why?
Will County has four departments dedicated to economics: Treasurer, Auditor, Budget Director and Finance Director. So why are we paying a Chicago-based firm with higher payroll costs additional revenues that should be going to one of our local businesses hurting from this crisis?
As I understand this, the consultant was voted on and passed via bi-partisan support of the Ad Hoc CARES Committee of the Will County Board. The problem I have here is that Will County is paying an outside firm, a Chicago tax-based firm, to distribute funds awarded to Will County. Other counties, like DuPage, are having their auditor distribute these contracts. Why? Because the auditor and the treasurer are supposed to know where the tax deficiencies are within each of the local townships and in our local businesses throughout the county. So why is our auditor not doing his job? Why is our auditor punting his responsibilities while receiving a Will County taxpayer-funded paycheck? And why does he think he needs a raise when he is not doing his job?
I understand why Republicans on the committee voted for the consultant: because they don’t trust the auditor to be able to handle this job. The voters also need to know this and question his competency. This is not the only issue I have with the current auditor. Right now Will County does not know how much of a deficit the county has lost in revenues. There is a gap between $5 million-$25 million and our accountant can’t be any more specific than that! That is a huge range, and it’s unacceptable. The voters—the taxpayers of Will County—must make a change this November so that we can track our revenues and losses more adequately than we do now. We can no longer afford business as usual, the way Will County has been “working.”
I’ll keep harping on this until I get an answer.
James Buiter, Candidate for Will County Auditor
