Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner has signed a stopgap budget agreement, passed by the Illinois General Assembly, that would fund the state for six months.
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The state’s public schools will get a total of $11 billion to stay open for a full school year.
IL lawmakers have started advancing pieces of a stopgap budget deal to keep the state running and fund schools in the fiscal year that begins Friday. But this is the first time in post-World War II history that a state has gone a full fiscal year without a complete budget.
Jim Edgar found himself in an unsettling position as IL governor in 1991 when the state went 18 days without a budget.
An 800-page amendment to the stopgap budget has been introduced in the Illinois House.
Rauner said he’s hopeful a more far-reaching compromise-or “grand bargain” as he likes to say – can be struck between November and January.
The full House is expected to vote on the bills later Thursday, followed by the Senate.
“This could be the worst bill I’ve seen here in Springfield”.
Also winning final approval was a budget implementation bill that forgives $454 million in interfund borrowing and allows the state to refund up to $2 billion of bonds to save about $20 million that would be used for higher education spending.
Illinois Speaker of the House Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, looks on as Illinois Senate President John Cullerton, D-Chicago, speaks to reporters after leaving Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner’s office at the Illinois State Capitol Wedn. It keeps the boat a float per says.
The plan adds $250 million in spending for school districts with low-income students. “This was one of the most important “yes” votes I have cast while representing the 38th Senate District”. Meanwhile, the state would agree to pick up roughly $200 million in teacher pension payments, a provision that would only be good for one year starting next June. Hoffman said that permitted the compromise to be developed.
Higher education institutions, social services providers, and government operations will get money for six months. “That’s a fact. Both sides”, Rauner said.
The governor and lawmakers have been facing increasing public pressure to end their gridlock.
“This [budget] was not balanced, and we have a constitutional obligation to do that”.
Rauner has maintained since he vetoed the 2016 budget that he will not support new tax revenue without major reforms to workers’ compensation, tort liability, collective bargaining and local property taxes, as well as other changes he said are necessary to reverse the state’s dire fiscal condition.
Echoing themes from his 2014 campaign, he also framed the upcoming election as a choice for voters between the continued financial problems he says were created by Democrats or a new, Republican approach to creating more economic growth.
The partial budget won’t solve that ideological divide. They also held onto the CPS pension bill because Rauner wants a separate measure to cut state employee retirement costs before he’ll sign it.
McHenry County’s three senators – Pam Althoff, R-McHenry, Karen McConnaughay, R-St.
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Legislation that surfaced late Wednesday in the House would commit an additional $205.4 million in state money to CPS pensions for fiscal 2017, $221 million in fiscal 2018 and unspecified amounts in subsequent years.
