A "Perfect Gift" — Bought With Your Own Tax Dollars — Donato Latrofa for Elk Grove Village

Every year, Elk Grove Village residents spend $10,000 in yard waste stickers. It’s money that goes right to the Village. See for yourself— it’s a line item on the Village’s revenue section of the budget.

And it’s unclear why this charge persists, year over year.

Revenue Line for Yardwaste Stickers among other “GREEN FUND” revenues in the FY26 Budget. And, what is “miscellaneous revenue?”

What is clear is that in Elk Grove Village the residents eat last.

We saw it when the Village Board quietly voted to give themselves pay raises last month.

We saw it when they handed $40,000 of your money to billionaire Cubs owner Tom Ricketts for a 90-min speaking appearance.

We saw it when the Mayor solicited donations to supposedly support re-election of his handpicked Trustee candidates.

And we are seeing it again at today’s board meeting, buried deep in the addendum to the Village Board's Agenda.

The $2.8 Million "Perfect Gift"

Tucked away as "Item 6.V" on the October 13th addendum is a proposal to increase the General Fund Budget by a staggering $2,830,000 to award a contract to "PerfectGift.com."

This is the exact same vendor the Village has used in years past for the gift card motion in late 2022 and late 2024.

2026 Gift Card notice in the 10-13 Addendum

Yes, you’re reading that correctly— once again, nearly $3 million of taxpayer money is being handed over to a corporate gift card vendor. And this time it is without a single word of public debate, or even attempt at clarifications or insights (unlike in 2022 and 2024).

And this is less than one year after the Village raised your taxes!

Now, before we go any further, let's level-set: my objection to the gift card motion isn’t the fact that residents are getting gift cards. I’m happy our neighbors are getting some relief during these times of ever-increasing costs.

What irks me is the cynicism behind it all. Why do these gift cards only seem to go out in the run-up to the municipal elections?

So we’re clear: instead of providing actual, structural tax relief, or eliminating penny-ante fees for things like yard waste stickers, or coming up with creative solutions for our residents, or listening to residents who are demanding “slow down on these data centers, we don’t want them by our homes!”, or bothering to provide any oversight on the issuance and efficacy of the gift cards, the Trustees think they can just give you back a little bit of your tax dollars on a gift card every 2 years before the election, and call it “good.”

And, apparently they think they can then crow about how much the Village Board “gives back” when they send you the gift cards…without you realizing it was your money all along.

It’s not right.

Rubber-Stamping Land Grabs

And, while we are talking about unscrutinized $200 gift cards giveaways and $3 yard waste stickers, I’d note the Trustees are also preparing to spend your money on more speculative real estate without any apparent debate.

Stashed in the same addendum as the gift card giveaway is Ordinance No. 3946, authorizing the Village to purchase a 27,500 square-foot truck lube and wash business at 1461 Busse Road.

Buying out another business… how much are we spending? Who knows…

The entry confirms"[t]here are no plans for redevelopment at present," yet the ordinance leaves the door open to "potentially levy a direct annual tax" to cover the purchase.

So are they buying land blindly, and leaving the door open to tax you to pay for it? Or do they have something in mind? Will they tell us why we’re putting yet another local business out of business?

And, how much is the Village paying for it?! The referenced exhibits aren’t attached (just like the most important documents about the pay raise were missing last month).

I guess we’ll have to tune in today to find out what the Village is doing buying yet another business…

It's Time to Put Residents First

Elk Grove Village deserves a government that prioritizes the people who live and pay taxes here. We deserve Trustees that provide targeted, sustainable tax relief, not election-year gimmicks. We deserve Trustees that tell use why they’re buying out businesses in our community. We deserve transparency.

To Exceed Exceptional, we need Trustees who make sure the residents eat first.