Job Varghese

“Our family came to this country for opportunity, but I find myself discouraging my son from working at our business here.

“Property taxes are killing us. Usually your mortgage is your biggest expense, but when your property tax is more than the mortgage, where are you standing?

“We’re paying $220,000 a year in property taxes. And over the last 10 years they’ve increased by $70,000. If I moved my hotel three miles away from here [to Indiana], that $70,000 would be my entire property tax.

“And there is just no development here. But you take the next exit on the highway to Calumet [Indiana] and it’s booming. There’s so much retail. They redid all the sidewalks, people are buying, people are spending.

“[Our] government is a total discouragement to that. At every turn they squeeze you.

“I regret starting my hotel here. I wish it was somewhere else.”

Job Varghese
hotel owner
Lansing, Illinois