* The tax amnesty program took in more than twice as much cash as expected…

Illinois’ cash-starved budget received a more than half-billion dollar influx of money through its recently completed tax amnesty program, a new report says.

According to the report, tax scofflaws took advantage of the penalty-free period to send in checks worth at least $546 million.

That’s more than double what supporters had originally forecast and more than a similar program raised in 2003. And that total only accounts for November. More money could roll in this month and into January. […]

“While the amounts collected in November 2010 are impressive, it must be stressed that the vast majority of these revenues are not new revenues but rather an acceleration of tax revenue that would have ultimately been collected,” the General Assembly’s Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability noted.

* Meanwhile, slots at O’Hare and Midway have been kinda/sorta dropped from the gaming bill…

Yet a clause that would have done exactly that was mysteriously dropped from the megaexpansion bill that cleared the Illinois Senate last week. The bill would add new casinos, authorize a Chicago casino and allow racetracks to install slot machines — but the previous airport clause vanished. […]

According to bill sponsor Sen. Terry Link, D-Waukegan, the clause wasn’t needed because, if the bill passes, the Illinois Gaming Board would allow “temporary” slots at O’Hare and Midway on its own.

All the removed clause was doing was “confusing people” by allowing them to think the proposed 2,000 slots at the airports would be in addition to the 4,000 allowed at the new Chicago casino, Mr. Link said.

But Mr. Link conceded that the Legislature has not defined “temporary” — meaning that any slots at the airports might be there for decades. And other sources I’ve spoken with say it’s far from clear that the Gaming Board could authorize anything like that on its own.

* And a Crain’s editorial calls an economic development program a tax hike…

Think Illinois lawmakers haven’t passed a tax hike lately? Think again.

A pair of bills jammed through the Illinois House in the veto session last week amount to an enormous tax increase for utility customers across the state. The legislation would require millions of Illinois residents and businesses to purchase gas and electricity at above-market prices from two “green energy” plants to be constructed with state backing.

Naturally, legislators tout the measures as “jobs bills.” The plants—one on the South Side of Chicago, the other in Downstate Taylorville—would create a couple thousand construction jobs and a few hundred permanent positions. State legislators who represent the districts where the plants would be built see a chance to grin for cameras at ribbon-cutting ceremonies and brag about bringing jobs to the area. […]

This is taxation. It is government taking money from one group and transferring it to a smaller group with the political clout to extract special treatment from the state. It’s government propping up businesses that can’t compete in the open market by requiring the people of Illinois to underwrite their extra costs.

Yeah. Kinda like the newsprint and ink tax exemptions for newspapers and magazines. Not to mention the public notice requirements which pad newspapers’ bottom lines.