Jim Jacoby of the American Design and Master-Craft Initiative and Jim Cohen of BeSparked interviewed me in July for this series of master designer podcasts. What, you may ask, do I have to do with design? Ah ha! You’ll just have to listen to this wide-ranging 47 minute interview where I talk about my background in the arts and the connections between design, space and civic engagement. If you do listen – please comment at the bottom of the podcast web page.
We upload all the TIF presentations to http://www.slideshare.net/tomtee. These presentations have been viewed over 44,000 times!
The champ is the two presentations on the 27th ward which were viewed a total 4,292 times.Thar works out to something like 10 views every day since they were uploaded.
So – if you are one of the people whose viewed these presentations and found them valuable – PLEASE support our work by (1) signing our email list at http://tinyurl.com/SignUp-CivicLab, (2) consider renting a desk with us (we’re in Chicago’s West Loop), and (3) making a deducible contribution via our fiscal agent, the Investigative News Network – http://tinyurl.com/SupportTheLab-INN. Contact Tom Tresser at tom@civiclab.us.
The TIF Illumination Project has reviewed all 151 annual reports of the city’s Tax Increment Financing districts. At the end of 2013 the city’s TIF accounts held $1.71 BILLION in property tax dollars! This is a modest increase from 2012. A full report on our 2013 research is here.
The TIF Illumination Project is completely volunteer driven but we can really use your contribution so that we can publish all our work in multiple formats. Donate via PayPal here.
Cook County Clerk David Orr leads the way in TIF data services! He released his summary of 2013 TIF data today. Chicago’s 151 TIF districts (3 were cancelled) extracted $422 million. 284 suburban TIFs extracted $261 million. We’ll be combing the data for insights over the next wee. Thank you, Clerk Orr!
Back by (somewhat) popular demand!
The TIF Illumination Project has Illuminated 147 TIFs across 25 wards. Over 2,000 people have been at these meetings and over 40 media stories have been written about our work. We’d like to know what YOU think should now be done with or to the TIF Program in Chicago. Remember, in 2012 TIFs extracted almost $500 million in property taxes from Chicago property tax payers.
PLEASE TAKE A FEW MINUTES TO COMPLETE THIS SURVEY. THANK YOU!
Create your free online surveys with SurveyMonkey , the world’s leading questionnaire tool.
http://issuu.com/cmrenner/docs/cnu-conference-final-20140325 – Free download of presentations and material from 2013 conference on new ways of doing urban development. We did a piece on the TIF Illumination Project. Also great stuff on how Rockford is using creativity and the arts for economic development and Naomi Davis presenting on her vision for grassroots community development.
Can you help The CivicLab advance through the Knight News Challenge? We’re seeking support to evolve our Civic Illumination work. 
Check out this great video shot by the folks at the Progressive Democrats of America. It’s 28 minutes long and lays out what the CivicLab is all about and how The TIF Illumination Project works AND reveals the details of the 12 TIFs of the 27th Ward. Whew!
We launched the TIF Illumination Project at the Chopin Theater one year ago! What a wild ride it’s been. Here is an account of the work we’ve done. Comments are welcome.
