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Illinois local government salary data is public record.

Cities

On June 9, 2011, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's administration posted the salaries of every city employee to a public website in a bid to follow through on a campaign promise to bring transparency to government.^[1] At $2.5 billion as of 2011, payroll was one of the largest expenses for the city as it battled a $650 million budget deficit. The data showed that 2,400 city workers were paid $100,000 or more per year.^[1]

According to a payroll database compiled by the Illinois-based watchdog group Better Government Association, there were two employees earning more than $150,000 annually in Aurora in 2011.^[2] The BGA database does not allow searches to be broken down by department, only last name or salary value.

• City Treasurer Brian Caputo earned $159,411.20
• Chief of Police Gregory Thomas earned $154,731.2
• Mayor Tom Weisner earned $111,841.6
• Assistant Chief of Staff Charles Nelson earned $98,966.40

Counties

Lake County's highest earner is the county administrator, who earned $222,547.27 in 2011.^[3] The Cook County CEO earned $500,000 for the same year.^[4] The chief financial officer of DuPage County earned $162,782.^[5]

School districts

Teacher salaries

Below is a chart of the top 10 highest paid teachers in Illinois as of 2010.^[6] Over 14,000 teachers in Illinois made over $100,000 a year as of 2010.^[7]

There is also a chart comparing salaries for the highest paid high school teachers to those of university professors:^[8]

Law enforcement

Chicago Police Department 2011 salaries:^[9]

• Superintendent of Police earned $310,000
• Assistant Superintendent earned $188,316

The Illinois Senate passed a bill to repeal a provision in a 2007 pension law that would have allowed the former Oak Brook Chief of Police to collect a $750,000 annual pension, much higher than his final salary. The 2007 law included a one-time, six-month window that allowed former Oak Brook Police Chief Thomas Sheahan to transfer credits from a Municipal Employees’ Annuity and Benefit Fund of Chicago (MEABF) into the Sheriff's Law Enforcement Personnel program within the Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund (IMRF). Sheahan was to receive benefits based on one $77,000 pension, instead of two pensions that add up to $45,000 a year. Sheahan was the only person in the state to benefit from the provision.^[10]

Fire departments

The Chicago Fire Deputy District Chief earned $134,868 and the District Chief earned $148,356.^[11]

Salary articles

In 2011, Sunshine Review requested salary information from 19 local governments in the state.

Salary records project

In 2011, Sunshine Review chose 152 local governments as the focus of research on public employee salaries. The editors of Sunshine Review selected eight states with relevant political contexts (listed alphabetically):

Within these states, the editors of Sunshine Review focused on the most populous cities, counties and school districts, as well as the emergency services entities within these governments. The purpose of this selection method was to develop articles on governments affecting the most citizens.

The salary information garnered from these states were a combination of existing online resources and state Freedom of Information Act requests sent out to the governments.

A study published by the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Economy League of Greater Philadelphia said the city of Philadelphia faced challenges owing to the cost of public employee pensions.^[12] The report claimed the amount that Philadelphia paid to pension recipients limited the city’s ability to use its budget effectively.

The report said there were more individuals receiving pension benefits—33,907 claimants in 2006—than workers in the city—28,701.^[12] The authors recommended three steps towards addressing the problem of high costs in pensions: improved data collection, expanded transparency initiatives, and reductions to the city's overall budget.^[12]

Salary schedules can be published as ranges, not as specific compensation figures, and may leave out compensation received through health and retirement benefits, as well as benefits such as commuter allowances and cell phone reimbursements. This project aimed to close the gap and provide a more accurate picture of public employee salaries for the sake of public education and transparency.

External links

• “Employee State Salaries”, Pantagraph.com, 2010
• “Better Government Payroll Database”, Better Government Association, 2010 (dead link)
• “Salary Request”, State of Illinois Comptroller
• “Robbing Peter to Pay Paul: A Closer Look at Public Employee Pay”, Illinois Policy Institute, 2010
• “Illinois State Payroll Database”, STLtoday.com, 2009
• “Teacher Salary Database”, Family Taxpayers Foundation, 2010

Footnotes

	v • e Illinois local government employee salaries
By type	Cities Counties • School districts • Law enforcement • Fire departments
Local governments	Aurora • Chicago • Lake County • Cook County • DuPage County • Will County • Township High School District 211 • Chicago Public School District 299 • Township High School District 214 • School District U-46 • Illinois State Police • Chicago Police Department • Will County Sheriff • Cook County Sheriff • DuPage County Sheriff • Lake County Sheriff • Aurora Police Department • Aurora Fire Department • Chicago Fire Department

	v • e State of Illinois Springfield (capital)
Elections	What's on my ballot? | Elections in 2022 | How to vote | How to run for office | Ballot measures
Government	Who represents me? | U.S. President | U.S. Congress | Federal courts | State executives | State legislature | State and local courts | Counties | Cities | School districts | Public policy