Some Chicago aldermen are requesting more transparency and better access to the city’s tax increment financing information. This is in an effort to provide more knowledge and trust in Illinois government for the city’s residents, said Alderman Manuel Flores (1st Ward).

Alderman Flores and Scott Waguespack (32nd Ward) proposed the Sunshine Ordinance in order to make TIFs, public investment funds from communities that are used to rebuild businesses, neighborhoods and other projects to improve an area’s development, more readily available to the public and government officials online.

The TIF Sunshine Ordinance would provide residents of Chicago with the ability to regularly check and see how TIF money is being spent, as well as all the information that has never been released on a particular project.

The ordinance states it is “intended to improve all transparency of TIF agreements, thereby facilitating significantly increased public accountability.”

Flores said he believes technology has provided the opportunity to make TIF information easy for everyone who wants to read it. The Sunshine Ordinance requests the documents be available online, in PDF format, as soon as possible.

“I think that, right now, we don’t make it easy for people to access information, and I think we can really make progress in using newer technology to make it easy for people to better access and disseminate information,” Flores said.

Keeping a close eye on policy is a challenge in Chicago, Flores said.

“[The Sunshine Ordinance] is a good way to develop a sense of legitimacy and encourage activism,” Flores said.

Along with Flores, Waguespack has received support and signatures from 20 other aldermen.

Reana Kovalcik, an aide to Waguespack, also sees difficulty in finding and deciphering TIF information and said she thinks this new ordinance would benefit everybody.

“[TIFs] are pretty hard to track down, even for government employees,” Kovalcik said. “There is usually an overwhelming amount of paperwork, and you usually have to file a Freedom of Information Act request to get the information. We want to make it easier.”

The Chicago Department of Community Development is in charge of TIF information and dissemination. The department releases an annual report on TIFs, but Kovalcik and Flores agree that once a year is not enough, especially when most TIFs are more than 20 years old.

“There is a lot of information that the annual report is not going to tell you,” Kovalcik said. “We just really want to be sure that the money taken out of a community is going back to that community, especially in the form of jobs.”

Molly Sullivan of the Chicago Department of Community Development disagrees that the annual reports are not effective in providing all the information. Sullivan said she has never heard of the Sunshine Ordinance.

“We have a lot of information that is readily available on the Internet, and we have a number of public hearings that all of the TIF info is available through,” Sullivan said. “We feel that we have already done a lot to provide information on TIFs, both on the Internet and at the public hearing level.”

Flores said the ordinance is currently in committee, and he hopes it will be in effect very soon so there can be more access to Chicago TIF information.

“I think [the Sunshine Ordinance] is more in line with President Obama’s initiative and goals on the federal level by making government more transparent through the use of technology,” Flores said.

Other cities such as Berwyn, Ill. use TIFs, and some even have ordinances similar to the Sunshine Ordinance. But until it goes through a legislative process, the ordinance is not in place, Kovalcik said.

“This ordinance doesn’t cover anything about changing the way TIFs work,” Kovalcik said. “These documents are public anyway, so why not get more eyes on them?”

Kovalcik said. “We just really want to be sure that the money taken out of a community is going back to that community, especially in the form of jobs.”

Molly Sullivan of the Chicago Department of Community Development disagrees that annual reports are not effective in providing all the information. Sullivan said she has never heard of the Sunshine Ordinance.

“We have a lot of information that is readily available on the Internet, and we have a number of public hearings that all of the TIF info is available through,” Sullivan said. “We feel that we have already done a lot to provide information on TIFs, both on the Internet and at the public hearing level.”

Flores said the ordinance is currently in committee, and he hopes it will be in effect soon so there can be more access to Chicago TIF information.

“I think [the Sunshine Ordinance] is more in line with President Obama’s initiative and goals on the federal level by making government more transparent through the use of technology,” Flores said.

Other cities such as Berwyn, Ill., use TIFs and even have similar ordinances. But until it goes through legislation, the ordinance is not in place, Kovalcik said.

“This ordinance doesn’t cover anything about changing the way TIFs work,” Kovalcik said. “These documents are public anyway, so why not get more eyes on them?”