Elburn to increase annual licensing fee for video gaming machines

The village of Elburn will increase the annual amount an establishment pays to license each video gaming terminal from $25 to $250. The fees are evenly split between the terminal operator and the licensed facility.

The exception will be veterans and nonprofit establishments, such as the American Legion Post 630, which will remain at $25.

At the Village Board meeting March 20, Village Administrator John Nevenhoven presented information from the Illinois Gaming Board showing the village has 39 video gaming terminals in seven locations in town.

Documents show the annual fees for those terminals is $975. With the increase in fees, the amount will come to $8,625, a difference for the village of $7,650 a year.

The amount will be in addition to the taxes the village collects from each establishment at 5% of the net terminal income obtained from their machines. Each establishment pays a 34% annual tax on its net terminal income, 29% of which goes to the state and 5% to the municipality.

Nevenhoven assured the board that the taxes shared with the village will continue.

For the 12-month period between February 2022 and January 2023, the total net income from the 39 terminals in the village was $1.5 million, and the 5% in taxes collected by the village was $75,568.

The net amount each facility made for the 12-month period reported ranged from just under $3,000 for the Elburn American Legion Post 630 to just over $726,000 for LCI Highland of Illinois, which is associated with Elsie’s Place Café. The village’s share of that net income was just under $150 from the American Legion post to just over $36,000 from LCI Highland of Illinois.