Over the years, we've written a lot about the need for better tax increment financing (TIF) oversight and transparency in the City of Chicago.  Maybe it's time this effort extended to the state as a whole.

Today, SouthtownStar columnist Phil Kadner notes that a TIF lawyer stole between $1 million and $3 million from a district in south suburban Calumet Park. For years, he overcharged the municipality for legal work that wasn't even being done.  All the while, he neglected to send state-mandated annual financial reports for the district to Comptroller Dan Hynes, who repeatedly notified Calumet Park of the failure to comply, but never took further action.  When confronted, a spokesperson for the comptroller said the office's only responsibility is to "collect the reports."  Kadner's response: "So you need a law telling the comptroller to notify the attorney general when a municipality fails to file reports for nine years? How about using some common sense?"  Read the whole piece here.