Burr Ridge Business Missing From Tax Rolls For 13 Years: Official

BURR RIDGE, IL – A business in Burr Ridge has not paid any property taxes for its building for the last 13 years, an official says.

That's because the Cook County Assessor's Office failed to put the building on the tax rolls when it was built, Lyons Township Assessor Patrick Hynes said.

The building houses Kensington School's administrative offices at 743 McClintock Drive.

Hynes said the building would bring in $100,000 in property taxes a year, or well over $1 million since it was built.

To be clear, local taxing bodies lose no money when properties are missing from the rolls. Rather, other taxpayers pick up the slack to cover local governments' tax levies.

Patch left a message with Scott Smith, the assessor's office's spokesman, a week ago. He said he would provide comment, but had not done so as of Thursday.

Over the last year, Patch has reported on a number of situations where Lyons Township houses were missing from the tax rolls. In some cases, the county assessor never updated its information to reflect the replacement of older, smaller houses with mansions.

In October 2020, Hynes' predecessor, Barbara Weyrick, informed the county assessor's office about the Kensington building.

"(P)lease move a mountain to get this building assessed accordingly," she said in an email to county officials. "The property needs to be back tax(ed) for as many years as we can go back."

She said the building sold for $1.5 million in 2008. (Hynes said the building is now worth at least $2 million.)

In response to Weyrick, Smith said, "I will follow up with the team to see what can be done here."

But the county never acted. That meant Kensington was able to avoid another $200,000 in property taxes, Hynes said.

Hynes said the county can seek back taxes for up to three years.

"There's no excuse for the county to have 18 budgeted positions for field inspectors and only have 11 of them filled, especially when you have egregious mistakes like this," Hynes said. "This has resulted in a million-dollar shift to the neighboring taxpayers who make up the missing payments."

He said with all the property taxes that taxpayers pay, they have a reasonable expectation to see a functioning assessment system.

"It's just so frustrating to see these egregious mistakes over and over," Hynes said.

Kensington executives could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Kensington pays property taxes on its land, which amounted to about $13,000 in 2021.

Here are Patch's other stories about problems with property assessments:

• 18 La Grange Homes Missing From Tax Rolls: Official
• WGN Reporter's Taxes In Hinsdale Unusually Low
• Lyons Township Homes Missing From Tax Rolls
• $3.9M Hinsdale House With Low Tax Bill