Starting this Thursday, Illinois’ statewide 1% grocery tax goes away, but anyone expecting instant relief at the checkout might want to hold the applause. Cities and counties can now slap on their own 1% grocery charge, new protections for the Mahomet Aquifer kick in, and a Ken Burns deep dive into the American Revolution is getting local buzz. As Chicago Tonight highlighted in its Monday full show, the result for shoppers and local budgets is a messy patchwork that will play out through 2026.
The Illinois Department of Revenue says the state is eliminating the 1% sales and use tax on groceries, and that municipalities and counties are allowed to impose their own 1% grocery occupation tax by passing an ordinance. According to the Illinois Department of Revenue, ordinances had to be filed by October 1, 2025, for a January 1, 202,6 start date, while measures filed by April 1 will instead take effect July 1. The agency also notes it had received more than 600 grocery tax ordinances by the time of that bulletin, which means plenty of shoppers will still see a grocery fee on their receipts, depending on where they live.
That local variation is already substantial. NPR Illinois reports that more than half of Illinois municipalities have enacted a local grocery tax, while cities such as Chicago and Springfield did not move ahead by the filing deadline. In other words, whether that extra 1% survives on your grocery bill will hinge on which side of a city limit you shop in, not only on what lawmakers in Springfield decided.
Inside City Hall, Mayor Brandon Johnson pushed to preserve a local grocery occupation tax as part of his plan to close a projected budget gap, and the City Council introduced an ordinance to do just that. City Bureau reported that the mayor’s budget office estimated Chicago could lose roughly $60–$80 million in 2026 without the revenue. The full ordinance language is posted on Chicago Councilmatic.
Mahomet Aquifer Protections Take Effect
Beyond shopping carts and receipts, one of the year’s major environmental shifts is a ban on carbon sequestration projects that would overlie or pass through sole-source aquifers such as the Mahomet. WGLT notes that the Mahomet Aquifer supplies drinking water to hundreds of thousands of central Illinois residents, and that lawmakers advanced the ban after concerns about leaks at a Decatur sequestration site.
More Than Bills: What Else Changes
Alongside the grocery tax repeal and aquifer protections, hundreds of other measures are also taking effect, touching everything from hotels to libraries and firehouses. As summarized by Capitol News Illinois, the package includes limits on single-use toiletry bottles in hotels, new training and equipment requirements for firefighters, and expanded access to overdose-reversal drugs in public libraries.
Ken Burns Sees ‘Rhymes Of History’
On the cultural front, filmmaker Ken Burns is back in the spotlight with a new six-part series on the American Revolution, and Chicago audiences are getting an early taste. In an interview with WTTW, Burns emphasized that he wanted the series to highlight lesser-told perspectives and to explore what he calls the “rhymes of history.” WTTW reports that the project blends battlefield accounts with voices of Native peoples, enslaved and free Black people, women, and other participants whose stories the filmmakers say broaden the usual origin-story script.
For now, the homework for shoppers is simple, even if the tax map is not. Check whether your town passed a grocery ordinance or, if you are a retailer, whether the state has notified you about new local rules. The Illinois Department of Revenue bulletin and the MyTax Illinois tax-rate tools remain the official guides to which jurisdictions will collect a grocery tax and when those charges kick in. The department recommends that consumers and businesses confirm local rates before assuming the statewide repeal will automatically cut the total at the bottom of the receipt.
