Council Approves Law Against Illegal Immigration, Votes Down Property Tax Levy

At Thursday night’s city council meeting, the council voted to declare O’Fallon a .

This means the city publicly does not condone illegal immigration and intends to pass laws to deter illegal immigration in O’Fallon. Some council members said the federal government is not doing a good job of enforcing illegal immigration.

Ward 2 Councilman Jim Pepper introduced the topic to the city council in August. He said the city is trying to send a message.

“You don’t have the papers, you don’t belong here. Do it legally,” Pepper said. “We don’t need to have our legally authorized workers put out of a job by a low-paying substitute.”

Sister Carol Boschert and Sister Joan Schnorbus of the Sisters of the Most Precious Blood opposed the bill.

They said they believe the North American Free Trade Agreement is responsible for forcing people in other countries to immigrate to the U.S.

Boschert said the city should accept immigrants because many U.S. citizens are descendants of immigrants.

“We were allowed to cross the ocean and enter without any problems. And now we’re not letting other people to do that even though we’re making it impossible for them to live in their own countries,” she added. 

Schnorbus said laws such as this are barring undocumented workers from making an honest living.


Council Votes Down Property Tax Levy

After much debate, the council voted not to approve a tax levy that would have increased both the property tax rate and the debt service tax rate.

The goal of the levy was to account for a loss in revenue from property taxes. Since assessed property values have gone down 6.1 percent this year, property taxes have declined as well.

The money from the property tax was to go to the general fund, while the debt service tax revenue was to pay off portions of the city’s debt from past bond issues.

The levy would have set property tax rate so that most residents would be paying the same dollar amount in taxes as last year. However, the tax rate itself would still have increased.

Ward 3 Councilman John Haman said he thinks the city should make budget cuts instead of increasing residents’ taxes in a tough economy.

“We can’t be doing this to our people,” Haman said. “If we can’t make cuts here, we aren’t doing our jobs.”

Though some councilmen said the city should simply make due with the loss in property tax revenue, Director of Finance Vicki Boschert said the city cannot put off increasing the debt service tax rate for longer than a few years.

“We are going to have to increase that rate to a level that is necessary to make those payments,” Boschert said.

It was not clear how the city plans to make up for the loss in property tax money. Boschert said some of the money in the debt reserve will likely be used to pay off the city’s debts.

Correction: This story was modified at 2 p.m. on Saturday. The former version stated the City of O'Fallon now condones illegal immigration. Patch regrets the error.