Homeowners blast property tax increases, but only 20% vote when given a chance to reject them
2025 Consolidated and 2026 Primary Elections
Those Who Did Show Up Approved $335.5 Million in Bonds and $3.7 Million in New Taxes, Rejected Another $54 Million in Bonds and $3.5 Million in Tax Increases
Introduction
Only one in five eligible voters determined the outcome of property tax referendums in Cook County during the last two elections, meaning a distinct minority of voters decided whether property taxes would increase by hundreds of millions of dollars.
Suburban governments and school districts asked voters to approve 20 binding property tax referendums to upgrade schools, buy new emergency and rescue equipment, renovate libraries and rebuild aging roads. Voters approved 15 of them and rejected the other five during the April 2025 consolidated election for local government offices and the March 2026 primary for federal, state, county and township governments.
Turnout for those referendums averaged 20.1%, with the fate of four each determined by less than 10% of voters. That low-turnout trend, which is particularly acute in local and primary elections, was first identified in a March 2024 Treasurer’s Office report and again in follow-up report one year later.
Average turnout for property tax referendums only topped 50% twice during the past six years. Both times were during general elections that featured a presidential contest — which always have higher voter turnouts. During that same period, no consolidated or primary election drew more than one-third of eligible voters to the polls.
Cook County taxpayers, particularly those in the city and the south suburbs, have repeatedly shown their frustration in recent years with skyrocketing property taxes. , Yet, their frustration was not enough to motivate them to vote in property tax referendums — a key opportunity to control government spending and increases in their property taxes.
In four south suburban townships, strictly advisory referendums asking voters if they would like to receive property tax rebates were overwhelmingly approved — a symbolic expression of frustration with high tax rates in that region. The referendums all passed with at least 89% voter approval but saw an average turnout of only 21.5%.
Results
In Cook County’s last two elections, a minority of voters authorized:
- Issuing $335.5 million in bonds across ten taxing districts
- Enacting a new $425,000 tax in the Northbrook Rural Fire Protection District
- Increasing taxes by $602,000 in the Northfield Park District and $728,000 per year in the Leyden Fire Protection District
- Imposing $1.9 million in new taxes to pay for mental health services in Palatine Township, which will add about $11.73 in new taxes per $100,000 of a home’s market value
- Creating a new real estate transfer tax on 0.3% of a property’s purchase price in the village of Forest View
Voters rejected:
- Issuing $54 million in additional bonds across two taxing districts
- Increasing taxes by $375,000 in the Roselle Fire Protection District, $2.5 million in Prospect Heights School District 23, and $605,000 in the Park District of Oak Park
The highest turnout for a property tax referendum occurred in Oak Park, where 40.6% of eligible voters decided whether to issue $40 million in bonds to build an indoor aquatics facility sought by Park District officials. Ultimately, voters by a 3-1 margin, rejected the bonds, which would have cost homeowners about $37 — paid each year for the next 20 years — for every $100,000 in their homes’ values. Communities like Oak Park, which is majority-white and wealthier than most of Cook County, tend to see higher voter turnout.
The lowest turnout for a referendum occurred in the Northbrook Rural Fire Protection District, where just 4.9% of eligible voters decided the fate of a new tax for emergency crews and equipment. Ultimately, voters approved the levy, increasing the district’s taxes by about $425,000 a year and costing homeowners about $30 in new taxes for each $100,000 in their homes’ values.
In that Northbrook election, about 9.4% of the 904 voters who did go to the polls did not bother to vote on the referendum. Such drop offs in votes are common for referendums, which are at the end of the ballot and sometimes not even understood by voters, in part because Illinois does not require governments to write referendums in plain language.
The median drop-off rate for binding referendums in the last two elections was 4.1%, with a range of 1.1% in the Village of Western Springs to a whopping 69% in the Roselle Fire Protection District.
Income and Race
The Treasurer’s Office noted in 2025 that property tax referendum turnout tends to be higher in communities with higher median household incomes. That trend continued in the last two elections.
When considering a broader set of Cook County referendum data, from 2020 to 2026, the connection between median household income and voter turnout becomes clearer.
The Treasurer’s Office also noted in 2025 that majority Black, Latino and majority-minority communities tend to see lower voter turnout than majority white communities, possibly because the residents of those communities tend to have lower household incomes.
Still, majority Black communities tend to have higher turnouts than majority-Latino communities, even though the median household incomes in Black communities were lower.
Of the 15 binding property tax referendums in which data on race and ethnicity could be analyzed, 14 took place in majority white communities. The remaining referendum occurred in the majority Latino village of Forest View. As a result, there is not enough reliable data to analyze whether these trends shifted in the two most recent elections.
Nevertheless, the trends remain apparent when looking at election data from 2020 to 2026.
Although the race, ethnicity and income of a community tend to create variances in turnout, one trend holds true across all communities: for referendums that empower voters to control their own property tax increases, the few continue to decide for the many.
- Harjas Sandhu, Cook County Treasurer’s Office Research Team
July 2026
Click here to download a copy of this report.