Why have some county board representatives from Urbana and Champaign forgotten their constituents? City residents already pay most of the taxes for rural county highways, and most of the taxes for all of county government. Yet in May 2005 a majority of Champaign County Board members voted that their primary responsibility is for rural roads. They voted to cap county spending on roads just outside the cities-the "urban fringe" roads-in violation of signed agreements with Urbana and Champaign, thus increasing the burden on city taxpayers.

A century ago such a vote might have been expected. Illinois counties were dominated by rural interests. But the 1970 Illinois Constitution required "one-man, one-vote" so urban people would have fair representation on county boards. Today a majority of the county board is elected to represent urban areas.

Although county Board members including Tom Betz and Tony Fabri argued against the restriction and most Board members from Champaign and Urbana voted against it, enough urban representatives joined with rural board members to pass it.

Champaign Mayor Jerry Schweighart and I asked the county board in June to rescind their resolution. We held two meetings with county staff. In October I invited the Champaign City Council and the County Board to meet in a joint study session with the Urbana City Council.

As city council and county board members introduced themselves, it was clear that we represent the same people, we all have budget constraints and a logical transportation system requires mutual cooperation.

By signed agreement in 1994 the County Board promised to not "avoid funding projects because they are in the urban fringe" and the cities agreed to pay the county for sales tax on annexed properties for ten years after the annexation. The cities have lived up to their side of the agreement. Urbana has paid the county $577,700 in sales tax revenue from annexed businesses and Champaign has paid $1.5 million.

The cap on county spending for urban fringe roads means the county board will spend more and more of urban taxpayers' money on roads which not only have more money available per mile than city roads but which have far less traffic.

City taxpayers are heavily subsidizing rural county highways. (Most rural roads are township roads. County highways are identified by signs with blue shields.)

Today 66% of county motor fuel tax, highway tax and county bridge revenues are paid by residents of Urbana-Champaign-up from 58% ten years ago.

Highway taxes available to the county total over $5 million per year. The $1 million cap on urban fringe roads means that the people who pay 66% of the bill will get less than 20% of the benefit.

Heavy subsidies from city taxpayers for county highways boost the money available per mile for county roads far above that available for city streets. The county gets nearly $3 million in motor fuel tax to maintain 394 rural lane miles. Urbana gets $1 million to maintain 277 lane miles. In addition, the county gets $1.5 million in County Highway Tax and $737,000 in County Road and Bridge Tax, both of which are property taxes which can only be used for rural roads.

Available funds for County highways per lane mile total $12,916 compared with $3,971 for Urbana streets.

Ironically, the roads with the most money available have the least traffic. The average daily traffic on Urbana streets is ten times that on county highways.

City traffic is also growing six times faster than rural traffic. Average daily traffic has declined on a number of county highways while it is growing on all urban roads. Average daily traffic increased 60% on urban roads from 1991 to 2001 compared with 11% on county highways.

If the county refuses to rescind its May 19 resolution, Champaign and Urbana need to ask our legal staff to give us some options. Should we ask for a refund of the over $2 million in sales tax we have already paid? Should we refuse to pay the county any more sales tax? Should Urbana renegotiate the Lierman Avenue agreement (the county is paying up front and we are to re-pay them 2/3 of the cost over three years--a total of $900,000)?

County board members need to hear from their constituents. Urbana and Champaign citizens need to talk with their county board representatives about fairness in taxation as well as adequate representation.