Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle plans to tax cable TV, bowling and golf = Basically shake you down for every penny you WORKED for

Months after winning approval for a controversial penny-on-the-dollar sales tax increase, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle now wants to extend the county's 3 percent amusement tax to cable TV and recreational activities such as bowling, golf and many for-profit sports leagues.

The additional $20 million — most of it coming from cable taxes — would help close a projected $199 million hole in the operating budget, Preckwinkle said. The county would get much more from the sales tax hike and spend it on shoring up government worker pension funds, loan repayments and capital projects such as roads, bridges and major technology upgrades.

"We're taking the difficult but necessary steps to ensure the long-term financial sustainability of county government," Preckwinkle said during her 2016 budget address Wednesday. Later, she characterized the expansion of the amusement tax as a "modest" effort to close a loophole, given that the city already charges its 9 percent amusement tax in those same areas.

The proposal was a stark contrast from a year earlier, when she delivered a painless budget blueprint with no tax, fee or fine increases prior to the general election. That plan easily won approval from the County Board, which may not be the case this year.

Finance Committee Chairman John Daley, a Chicago Democrat and ally of Preckwinkle, conceded a budget with an amusement tax expansion "is a tough sell." Indeed, other commissioners were quick to question it, with John Fritchey, D-Chicago, saying "there's only so much of a burden you can put on taxpayers and businesses before we reach a tipping point."

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