Property Tax Abatement data from the City of Chicago includes all projects receiving a supporting City Council Ordinance since January 2011. It tracks economic development incentives offered by Cook County, administered by the Department of Planning and Development. The dataset records project details, applicant information, job creation metrics, and financial incentives.
Use Cases
- Analyze the relationship between INCENTIVE AMOUNT, TOTAL PROJECT COST, and JOBS CREATED: REQUIRED to assess cost-per-job of tax abatements.
- Model project approval likelihood based on features like PROPERTY TYPE, COMMUNITY AREA, and CONSTRUCTION TYPE.
- Track spatial distribution of incentives over time using APPROVAL DATE and geospatial columns like Wards and Census Tracts.
- Compare aspirational job targets (JOBS CREATED: ASPIRATIONAL) against required commitments (JOBS CREATED: REQUIRED) for program evaluation.
Strengths
- Data covers projects from January 2011 onward, providing over a decade of temporal coverage.
- Includes multiple concrete metrics per project, such as SQUARE FOOTAGE, JOBS RETAINED, and INCENTIVE AMOUNT.
- Integrates administrative, financial, and geospatial data (Community Areas, Wards, Zip Codes) in one record.
Limitations
- Sample size is unknown, preventing assessment of statistical significance for analysis.
- Data relies on self-reported or application-based figures (e.g., JOBS CREATED: ASPIRATIONAL) which may not reflect actual outcomes.
- Geographic coverage is limited to properties within Chicago and Cook County eligible for these specific programs.
Provenance
- Source
- data.cityofchicago.org, sourced from the City of Chicago's Department of Planning and Development.
- Collection Method
- Collected from administrative records of applications reviewed for compliance with program eligibility requirements.
- Time Range
- From January 2011 onward.
- Freshness
- Last updated March 20, 2026, indicating regular maintenance.
- Geography
- City of Chicago and Cook County, Illinois.