Add This to Your Summer Reading List

The Long Range Plan and Supplements are must-reads for DG residents

With the Fourth of July coming up fast and the dog days of summer stretching out ahead, consider this your invitation to spend a few hours on the patio or poolside with the village’s Long Range Plan (LRP) and supplements.

They won’t be confused with the latest beach read or bestseller, but these reports are crammed with essential information about Downers Grove finances as well as the challenges and prospective solutions facing decision-makers. Fortunately, the information is presently clearly and cogently, making good use of graphs, charts and jargon-free language. Kudos to the village staff for that.

Tonight’s Village Council meeting will be the third in a month to focus on strategic goals, key recommendations, and the major trends and issues facing Downers Grove. These include the sustainability of the village’s various funds—general, health, capital and water—as well as its property tax levy and public safety pension obligations. The village’s facility maintenance plan, debt capacity, and the implementation of plans for Guiding DG projects and the Fairview Focus Area also will be under discussion.

The LRP process is aimed at establishing goals and priority action items which will guide the annual budgeting process and, ultimately, the Village’s daily operations and delivery of services. It should come as no surprise that finances are the major focus as the village faces increasing pension obligations as well as higher costs due to inflation and amenities such as the ones described in Guiding DG and Fairview Focus Area plans.

“At the risk of sounding like an old DuPage Republican, we have increased over time what our services levels are,” Mayor Bob Barnett told me. “A resident who moved here in 1975 versus one who moved here in 2025 are going to have very different expectations.”

While unfunded state mandates—for lead pipe replacement and pensions, for example—don’t help matters, Barnett sees the village’s demographic challenges as its biggest hurdle.

“We’re not building a lot of 1,100-square-foot Cape Cods anymore,” Barnett said. “People who move into this community have high expectations for things we haven’t traditionally provided. Newer residents want us to do more and better than in the past.”

And they may be willing to accept higher taxes to get it done, Barnett acknowledges. But there’s another Downers Grove demographic that also must be considered—older residents who are trying to age in place and whose income is fixed. “Those folks are more sensitive to the cost of maintaining and operating their homes than younger families,” Barnett said. And although the number of retirees hasn’t grown in recent decades, it also didn’t shrink as much as expected.

“We do have a broad profile economically,” he said. “They are all our residents, and we have to figure out a way to serve them.”

Keeping the village’s tax bite stable is one way the Village Council has done that. The Village of Downers Grove accounts for less than 10% of your property tax bill, but residents expect a lot for their money. Think snow removal, stormwater management, traffic calming and all the amenities that make the streets and neighborhoods of Downers Grove attractive.

Given the distaste many residents have for anything that will increase property taxes, some of the most interesting reading in the LRP reports concerns three key ways to raise additional revenue:

· Increasing the Home Rule Sales Tax from 1% to 1.25% or 1.5%

· Creating a TIF district to support the Fairview Avenue revitalization project

· Issuing as much as $20 million in bonds earmarked for infrastructure and capital projects.

Other possibilities floated by staff include vehicle stickers, an increase in the food and beverage tax and/or the local gas tax, and implementing a tax on streaming services.
Want to learn more? More information on these and other revenue proposals can be found in LRP Supplement Report #1 and LRP Supplement Report #2. There’s also a Resource Guide that provides background on the Village’s finances.