August 13, 2015

To the Honorable Members of

The Illinois Senate,

99th General Assembly:

Today I veto Senate Bill 1344 from the 99th General Assembly, which lowers the threshold required for common interest community associations to incorporate as municipalities.

Under current law, a common interest community association may initiate the process to incorporate as a municipality upon approval by two-thirds of its members. Senate Bill 1344 would lower that threshold from two-thirds to “51%” of the members.

The decision to incorporate as a municipality, which implicates a range of tax and local governance policies, should not be taken lightly. Illinois has almost 7,000 units of local government, more than any state in country. As such, we should maintain the higher threshold for initiating the incorporation process.

Therefore, pursuant to Section 9(b) of Article IV of the Illinois Constitution of 1970, I hereby return Senate Bill 1344, “AN ACT concerning civil law”, with the foregoing objections, vetoed in its entirety.

Sincerely,

Bruce Rauner

GOVERNOR