Mount Prospect, District 214 at impasse over TIF

Mount Prospect officials say they've reached an impasse in talks to settle a lawsuit Northwest Suburban High School District 214 filed over the village's new downtown TIF district.

In a statement issued last week, village officials said settlement discussions have not been productive and they're resolved to vigorously defend the Prospect and Main TIF District.

The suit, filed in June, asks a court to declare the downtown TIF as invalid.

A TIF district is an economic incentive in which new tax revenue created by development within its boundaries is diverted away from schools, libraries and other local governments, and instead goes into a special fund for use within the district. The arrangement can last for 23 years and be extended for another 12 years.

According to village, it has offered District 214 two compromise settlements involving significant payments prior to the natural end of the TIF.

Both were rejected, village officials stated.

"The Prospect and Main TIF District will achieve benefits for the entire community, including our excellent school districts, but this is ignored by District 214 and its lawyers and experts," Village Manager Michael Cassady said in the statement.

In an email, District 214 spokeswoman Jennifer Delgado said the information in the village's statement is not complete.

"The district sent the village an additional proposal in August, in which the village took over a month to respond," she wrote. "We sat down on Sept. 22 with the village and thought we came to a mutually-beneficial agreement. However, what the village sent over afterward was not what we had agreed to in that meeting."

The Prospect and Main TIF, which was adopted in January, is the second downtown TIF for Mount Prospect. It consists of 235 parcels within 180 acres in the area around South Main Street and East Prospect Avenue.