Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch raised some eyebrows after he attended a meeting in suburban River Forest to talk about the proposed O’Hare Flyer project, which would run express commuter trains back and forth from Downtown Chicago to O’Hare Airport.
Welch told attendees he could prevent two state agency budgets from moving forward if he didn’t get what he wanted out of the project for towns in and around his district.
Some residents of suburban towns along the route have expressed concern about the project, particularly about noise, and one person asked Welch at the meeting how opponents could stop the project or at least make it more difficult to complete.
“I can make it a little difficult,” Welch replied. According to the Oak Park Wednesday Journal, Welch pointed to the Illinois Department of Transportation and the Illinois Commerce Commission and said he could “let ‘em know that your budgets can be held up at budget time if you do things to negatively impact the communities that I represent.”
It seems kinda doubtful that the other Democratic leaders would agree to hold up IDOT’s huge budget over this, particularly since state money will play almost no role in building the project. The ICC’s main role in this project would be to approve railroad crossings. And railroads have an extraordinary amount of powers under federal law. If they want to build this with federal government help, it’s tough to stop them.
In other words, it was a lot like the playbook Welch used this year when he told the Chicago Teachers Union that he would take the lead on Chicago school funding during the veto session, and then later said he wanted a solution for all schools and then seemed to quietly drop the whole topic.
Welch signaled as much when he said, “I want to hear the good. I want to hear the bad,” according to the Oak Park paper. “I’m hearing from people in other communities that are in opposition. But I’m also hearing from people that are in support of this.”
So perhaps the usual political bluster. But publicly threatening to hold up entire agency budgets over nonbudget disagreements is not a common occurrence for a House speaker. That’s saying the quiet part out loud, and it rarely works well.
Since I mentioned the CTU earlier in this column, let’s get back to them.
As I’ve told you before, the CTU has been claiming that the state has more money for schools than it’s letting on. And as part of that argument, the union is demanding at least a billion dollars from the state during November’s veto session. That’s what Welch was responding to when he agreed to lead the charge for state funding next month.
And the CTU did so again after the release of a quarterly revenue report issued by the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability.
The commission reported robust quarterly growth in corporate income taxes and some other revenue sources totaling about $1 billion. But the commission’s report also warned: “While the first quarter produced strong revenue gains, several factors are expected to place downward pressure on revenues during the remainder of FY 2027 and could offset a significant portion of the gains realized thus far.”
For example, the Income Tax Refund Fund will be “$649 million lower” than last fiscal year, with the largest reductions coming in October and November. And another $349 million will be lost to the “annual reconciliation of business-related income tax receipt” which are known as “true-ups.” Another $265 million could be at least temporarily lost because of lawsuits filed against several new online-related taxes that were put into the budget.
The commission is also not convinced that the unexpected growth in corporate income taxes and sales taxes will continue, so “additional time and data are needed before the Commission updates its FY 2027 revenue outlook.”
The bottom line is that it could be quite dangerous to the budget to add a billion dollars in new spending before legislators even know how much money will actually flow into state coffers by late spring.
Welch’s upcoming reelection as House speaker is still in doubt, so numerous media outlets have claimed his nod to the CTU was an effort to bolster his position. But the O’Hare express train has support from several powerful statehouse groups, especially trade unions, which is a big reason it’s doubtful that those agency budgets will be stalled next spring.
So Welch’s bluster might help him a bit back in his district, but likely not under the dome when he fights to retain the speaker’s gavel in January.
- Well-being check - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 8:37 am:
Is it just me or is the Miller Anti Welch Crusade going overboard?
- Downstate - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 8:40 am:
Is it a political bridge too far to consider The Boring Company for installing a high speed link between Ohare and downtown?
- Amalia - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 8:42 am:
I think well-being check needs a well-being check. facts are facts.
- low level - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 8:46 am:
==Is it just me or is the Miller Anti Welch Crusade going overboard?==
Its you. Ridiculous comment.
Getting back to the post, Welch’s heavy handed tactics arent helping him or his caucus. The speaker ought to know better.
- Three Dimensional Checkers - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 9:21 am:
===Is it just me or is the Miller Anti Welch Crusade going overboard?===
How much are you being paid for your comments. /s
When I read Welch’s quotes, my first thought was how little he must think of his audience’s intelligence.
- Alton Sinkhole - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 9:24 am:
Speaker Welch makes history as the first politician in Illinois to make brash, perhaps slightly exaggerated promises to the residents of his district.
- levivoted4judy - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 9:36 am:
Two key takeaways:”state money will play almost no role in building the project. The ICC’s main role in this project would be to approve railroad crossings. And railroads have an extraordinary amount of powers under federal law.”
For Welch’s sake, I hope this was bad staff due diligence because to me he embarrassed himself. He’s been grasping for a while to appear “Speakerish” and keep his title.
- RNUG - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 9:44 am:
== it could be quite dangerous to the budget to add a billion dollars in new spending ==
When did that ever stop the State Legislature from spending magic beans?
- Sam E. - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 9:51 am:
== Welch makes history as the first politician in Illinois to make brash, perhaps slightly exaggerated promises ==
Appreciate the snark, but this is part of a larger pattern with Welch: an impulsive and short-sighted tendency to solve the problem immediately in front of him, with no thought of the potential long term consequences. That leads him to tell folks what they want to hear and it sometimes puts his caucus in an uncomfortable spot. Rich lays out two recent and public examples of this, but there are plenty of behind the scenes examples as well.
- Candy Dogood - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 9:52 am:
My comment may have been filtered due to using a term that expresses my feelings about Chris Welch.
Hopefully we will be celebrating a new House Speaker come January.
- New Day - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 10:13 am:
“Is it a political bridge too far to consider The Boring Company for installing a high speed link between Ohare and downtown?”
2018 called and wants its project failure back.
- Pundent - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 10:15 am:
= this is part of a larger pattern with Welch: an impulsive and short-sighted tendency to solve the problem immediately in front of him, with no thought of the potential long term consequences.=
The problem immediately in front of Welch ain’t the Rail Flyer. And I think he knows that.
- NIU Grad - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 10:16 am:
This is why we can’t have nice things.
- 44 - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 11:10 am:
I still think of that tunnel Downstate, every time I am stuck in traffic coming out of Ohare. Such a glorious fantasy, too bad we can’t have cool things like that.
- Leslie K - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 11:11 am:
==Hopefully we will be celebrating a new House Speaker come January.==
I’ll second that
- JS Mill - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 12:27 pm:
=The problem immediately in front of Welch ain’t the Rail Flyer. And I think he knows that.=
Yep. The flyer and cps funding are what they call distraction issues.
- Incandenza - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 12:31 pm:
== Crusade ==
Politics ain’t beanbag.
- Just Another Anon - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 12:40 pm:
While procrustean standards are usually reserved for the small minded, it seems to me that public transportation infrastructure is the place to apply those universal standards. I grow weary of projects being told “We totally support that goal, but isn’t this a project for a poorer town or a ideally, two towns over?”. It was only in January that Speaker Welch wrote a letter supporting improvements and laying additional track for High Speed rail between St. Louis and Chicago calling for “full and fair consideration of IDOT’s application” for federal funds. I suppose he holds impacts on communities he represents to a higher standard than those impacting the people of Elwood and Braidwood. He certainly doesn’t seem interested in “full and fair” consideration of proposals before the IDOT and ICC if he is going to stonewall their budgets if they approve them.
- Lincoln Lad - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 12:48 pm:
Speaker Welch - your 15 minutes are up. We need better.
- Dotnonymous x - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 1:51 pm:
- Is it just me or is the Miller Anti Welch Crusade going overboard? -
Zat you, Chris?
- Rich Miller - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 1:53 pm:
===The problem immediately in front of Welch ain’t the Rail Flyer. And I think he knows that. ===
If he does, how does something like this solve it?
Nothing he’s done during the past several months makes any crisis comms sense
- Rich Miller - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 1:55 pm:
===Is it just me===
It’s definitely you. But that’s fine. Keep on whistling.
- Railfan - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 1:57 pm:
Downstate - the Boring Company already tried this, and failed because they were too ‘bored’ to do the work of working with governments. As you can see in the link below, the city funded a public engineering study that identified exactly the route the Chicago Flyer wants to use.
Some of the flyer team was a bidder on the deal they lost to Elon when Rahm let his billionaire fanboy persona take over common sense.
https://chi.streetsblog.org/2017/12/13/experts-and-advocates-weigh-in-on-the-latest-plans-for-the-ohare-express?utm_source=chatgpt.com
- jimbo - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 2:01 pm:
=I still think of that tunnel … every time I am stuck in traffic coming out of Ohare. Such a glorious fantasy, too bad we can’t have cool things like that.=
You haven’t done the Vegas tunnel I presume. There are people that can jog that trip faster.
- Rich Miller - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 2:04 pm:
===too bad we can’t have cool things like that===
Wouldn’t be so cool if a Musk Mobile caught fire and they couldn’t get first responders to it because the tunnels were so laughably narrow.
It was a desperate pipe dream that was laughed out of town.
- Sam E. - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 4:01 pm:
==The problem immediately in front of Welch ain’t the Rail Flyer. And I think he knows that. ==
True, but it was the very moment he was standing in front of a bunch of nimbys at a community meeting in River Forest, so he told them what they wanted to hear.
To the bigger problem you’re referring to, it will be interesting to see if he tell-people-what-they-wanna-hear his way to 60 votes.
- Stephanie Kollmann - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 4:42 pm:
Using the clout of the Speaker’s seat to direct money and influence to the folks back home may not be new but that doesn’t make it emulable
And I question the political judgment of a member of (much less leader in) the party people are begging to actually challenge POTUS’ corrupt crony government who talks this way.
Read the room
- Excitable Boy - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 5:41 pm:
- consider The Boring Company -
That company is the biggest practical joke Rahm ever fell for.
- Huh? - Tuesday, Oct 13, 26 @ 9:15 pm:
“Is it a political bridge too far to consider The Boring Company for installing a high speed link between Ohare and downtown?”
Rahm Emanuel got mush’s boring company to start a study to drill a pair of tunnels from Block 37 to O’Hare Field. The project was killed off when Lori Lightfoot became mayor.
I was involved in the project when I worked for IDOT. The boring company wanted to start digging as soon as possible. They didn’t understand the involvement of the FHWA, IDOT, CDOT, and the rest of the associated alphabet agencies involved. They got FHWA Headquarter staff to come to Chicago in an attempt to strong arm IDOT and Chicago letting the boring company do what ever they wanted.
They had no idea how they were going to ventilate the tunnels. They had no idea how they were going to dispose of the millions of cubic yards of spoil from the excavation. They had no understanding of the requirements for designing the roadbed to operate their 150 mile per hour “skates”. The “skate” was based on one of the tesla cars at that time.
I was glad when this project died a whimpering death.