The updated report concludes 126,034 — or 2.4 percent — of Cook County’s 5.2 million residents live in unincorporated areas.

But to County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, it’s an expensive and unsustainable way to serve the patchwork of far-flung, wildly varying communities that make up unincorporated Cook — and ...

But they have one thing in common: Unlike 97 percent of Cook County's 5.3 million residents, the 126,114 residents of the county's unincorporated areas do not pay taxes to a municipality.