Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Illinois

Bankruptcy is a drastic measure, costs money to go through and there are other consequences that could prove unfavorable. You don't actually say how many units there are. First your association members had to have used water, so it must owe a portion of the bill. If you are self-managed (ie have no management company handling association bills and the association was turned over to unit owners) you should still have had a budget and should have known there was a water bill, so the money that was budgeted for water should still be there and should have accumulated. If the bill covers a period where the developer owned units, it should have paid assessments on the unclosed units too. Sounds like this has been going on quite a while. Frankly I don't know if the City will help prorate the bill between your association and the developer, but most associations have some attorney if they have no management company, who can talk to the City and see if something can be worked out. And just because the developer LLC dissolved doesn't mean you can't sue it. An attorney would have to look at a the documentation showing how this all came to pass to decide how to proceed.