South Side business owners fight special taxing district – Chicago Sun-Times

The dispute involves an obscure taxing agency known as a “special service area” or SSA, sometimes referred to as a business improvement district. SSAs were conceived as an economic development tool to allow property owners within a limited geographic area to tax themselves to provide enhanced services. But SSAs also can serve as an under-the-radar source of power and funding for local aldermen from which their allies can bestow contracts and jobs.