‘Little Empires’
Cronin, 53, sought oversight authority after two state representatives requested financial records from the Highland Hills Sanitary District in Lombard: They were told to file a freedom of information act request.
An 18-year veteran of the legislature, Cronin went to the state capital to get authority to obtain information and impose more control over what he calls “all these little empires.”
“These are nice little opportunities to take care of friends and relatives,” he said, “a nice thing to hand out to people.”
Cronin hired a private accounting firm to examine sanitary, fire protection, street lighting and mosquito abatement districts, as well as other independent boards and commissions involving 900 jobs and $300 million in annual revenue. They are a sliver of the 400 taxing units in the county of 928,000 people.
Among those examined was the Wheaton Sanitary District, which handles waste water for 62,000 people. Its chief executive was paid $146,000 in 2012, more than the state’s lieutenant governor, treasurer or comptroller.
His effort to rein in the taxing bodies comes as their outstanding debt levels rise. Park district debt in 2012, for instance, jumped 143 percent to $383 million in 10 years.
Cronin realized that pushing to roll back a broad array of taxing bodies would almost guarantee defeat because the opposition is rooted in the protection of “turf, people, relationships and bread on the table.”
“Our strategy is to be incremental,” Cronin said in his office in suburban Wheaton, holding out his thumb and index finger, with a tiny space between the two.
In Springfield he was forced to trim even those modest ambitions. He didn’t get expanded authority of fire protection districts. Similarly, Durkin said his bill abolishing mosquito control districts in Cook County is dead in committee.