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The lights dimmed as two “renters” stepped forward from stage right. From the other side, the “landlord” appeared, demanding this month’s rent.

The two actors began to cry out, “We can’t afford the rent!” Suddenly, a hero emerged, wearing a red cape made out of Monopoly money and the acronym “TIF” emblazoned on her shirt.

In this skit, “Tax Increment Financing” was the superwoman that would save senior citizens.
As the Chicago City Council debated the city’s 2010 budget a few blocks away Thursday morning, about 250 senior citizens gathered for the Jane Addams Senior Caucus’s annual meeting. They would learn about TIFs and call attention to a proposed ordinance that would allocate 20 percent of the city’s total TIF funds for building and rehabilitating affordable housing in distressed neighborhoods.

With $1.3 billion in TIF funds already collected, the ordinance sponsored by Ald. Walter Burnett, Jr. (27th) and Ald. Manny Flores (1st) would set aside nearly $260 million for affordable housing.

“The money would go to the right people, people who need it most: families earning less than $30,000 a year and seniors on fixed income,” said superwoman “TIF,” otherwise known as senior caucus member Marcia Morrell.
The Jane Addams group has teamed up with Sweet Home Chicago Coalition to organize meetings and marches to garner support for the ordinance. According to Liz Brake, an outgoing member of the senior caucus board, the aldermen plan to formally introduce the ordinance in February.

“In actuality, only 4 percent of TIF money [between 1995 and 2007] is being spent on affordable housing,” Brake said. “A lot of funds are left unused.”

The grassroots organization met at the Chicago Temple, 77 W. Washington, located just across the street from the Block 37 construction site. The long-delayed shopping complex and train station development received at least $72 million dollars in TIF funding from Chicago but is now facing foreclosure.

“Right underneath us is a train station without tracks,” Morrell said. “We could have used this money for affordable housing all across this city.”

While some critics of TIF districts want them eliminated all together, groups like Sweet Home Chicago Coalition are hoping to reform them to address Chicago’s shortage of affordable housing.

“This ordinance draws attention to the fact that TIF funds are off-budget and don’t get the same scrutiny that the general budget does,” said Professor Richard Dye of the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Institute of Government and Public Affairs. “Chicago has a severe budget crisis, so special interests are looking at different options [for funding].”

Ald. Tom Tunney (44th) was the only City Council member who attended the senior caucus meeting on Thursday. While he has worked to increase affordable housing, he said, he won’t sponsor the ordinance as it stands now.

“It needs more fine tuning in order to meet their ultimate goal,” Tunney said. “We need to keep affordable housing for workers and families. But [we] also need the positive economic development for jobs, which really was the initial purpose of TIFs.

“TIFS have become a fund for many, many issues because there’s no monies for cities, and there’s no money coming from the state.”

Regardless of where the money will come from, the fight to create more affordable housing in Chicago is personal for Liz Brake. Once a business executive and home owner, she came down with Lyme disease in summer 1990.

“I wasn’t diagnosed for two years and spent all of my retirement money going from doctor to doctor,” Brake said. “It did enough heart damage in that time to cost me my job and home.

“This happened to a lot of people who lost half or more of their retirement savings,” Brake added. “Being a senior made me realize life really is uncertain.