* According to the Commission on Government Forecasting & Accountability, the state’s budget deficit is even worse than Gov. Pat Quinn says it is.
COGFA’s director testified to a Senate committee that the actual combined budget deficit is $12.4 billion, not the $11.6 billion claimed by Quinn. The reason? We started the current fiscal year with an $835 million deficit from last fiscal year, which COGFA believes wasn’t counted in previous estimates. Add that to the $11.6 billion deficit and you get $12.4 billion.
Wunnerful.
* Mayor Daley kinda, sorta apologized today for the Al Sanchez conviction. The Sun-Times has the statement…
“I want to say to the people of Chicago that I understand that this is a disappointment and that this conviction does not reflect well on our city or my administration,” Daley told reporters at an event at Daley College. “For that, i am sorry.
Daley declined to answer questions about whether he was aware of the corruption.
“It happened under my administration and that’s it,” he replied.
He also dodged a question about testimony in the trial that linked his brother William Daley and former top aide Timothy Degnan to the creation of HDO.
“This is a statement that speaks for itself,” he said, chiding any reporters who might describe him as “mad or upset” with the questions.
He then abruptly cut off the news conference.
“You can do with his not answering your questions whatever you will,” mayoral spokeswoman Jacquelyn Heard said after the mayor left the podium.
* Last night, Daley fumed about a gun education proposal…
Mayor Daley is seething over a West Side legislator’s suggestion that children be educated about gun safety and gun use.
State Rep. Annazette Collins (D-Chicago) said she believes that education is the key to gun safety, and said a hands-on approach is the key to taking away the mystery and allure of guns. […]
“It’s the silliest position I’ve ever heard taken,” Daley said.
Daley said putting guns in the hands of more children is the last thing the city of Chicago needs.
“It would be different if they have an interest and the family takes them so they’re going out hunting,” he said. “Don’t you think we should concentrate on math, science, reading, attendance, keeping children in school, after-school programs? I think the representative should put her priorities in order.”
* Gov. Quinn was on Chicago Tonight last night, but I think the station’s online embed player crashed my Mac, which has never happened before, so go view it at your own risk.
Progress Illinois has posted a couple of exerpts. In the first excerpt, Quinn calls on his critics to get into the game…
In this clip, he was asked about the tricky politics of the budget…
The man in charge of electing more Republicans to the United States Senate says the party “absolutely” will make winning the seat now held by Sen. Roland Burris a top tier priority next year — if it can get the right candidate to run.
In an interview during a quick stop over in Chicago Monday evening, Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, suggested he is willing to open up the committee’s wallet and send money to an increasingly blue state that national Republicans effectively abandoned more than a decade ago. […]
Asked directly if a decision by either Mr. Kirk or Mr. Roskam would guarantee Illinois tier-one national support, Mr. Cornyn replied, “Absolutely.” If that happens — and November, 2010 is a long time away — an Illinois Senate race could draw tens of millions of dollars of spending.
Look for both Mr. Kirk and Mr. Roskam to make up their minds by Memorial Day, and perhaps earlier.
The Illinois Democrat announced today that he’s appointing Kenneth Montoya to be his legislative director and Jose Rivera to serve as director of his Chicago office. […]
Montoya has worked for Democratic Sens. Paul Simon of Illinois and Paul Wellstone of Minnesota. Most recently, he served as the Government Affairs Representative for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
Rivera joins Burris’ staff after serving as director of program audit compliance for the Chicago Department of Human Services.
The Illinois Technology Partnership has snagged Rich Miller, publisher, editor, and chief scribe of the Capitol Fax newsletter and The Capitol Fax Blog and columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times to speak to the role of blogs and other social media tools in Illinois politics at the group’s conference – ”Illinois 2.0″ – in Springfield on March 25.
Aviva Gibbs, the organization’s Executive Director, will talk to legislators, staff, candidates, and media regarding reaching larger and targeted audiences, such as constituents, via blogs, Facebook, Twitter and other online gizzmos once the exclusive preserve of whizz-bang college students.
In a recent survey of legislators, the group found as many as 50 percent were already using social networking sites, while another 25 percent expressed interest in learning more. Gibbs will share some battle-tested best practices and digital “do’s and don’ts”.
“Blogs and social networking tools like Facebook and Twitter have become a much more relevant way for not just college students, but businesses, organizations and the government to connect, interact and share ideas,” said Gibbs.
Miller will comment on the influence of digital media on news coverage and the impact on political and public policy processes.
“While traditional media is cutting back considerably, digital platforms are becoming an influential way to get and write the news,” said Miller. “I break stories all the time on my blog and have hundreds of readers add comments and share posts in real-time. With social media becoming so popular, I’m seeing more politicians getting in on this than ever before.”
“ Illinois 2.0” will be held at the Statehouse Inn in Springfield from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. or immediately following session.
This should be an interesting and fun event. They’re even serving “complimentary refreshments and appetizers.” Mmmm.
But space is limited, and spots are filling up very fast (I’m not kidding, they only have a handful of open slots left), so you should RSVP as soon as possible to: aviva@iltechpartner.org.
People ask me all the time why Daley hasn’t been charged in connection with the hiring probe, which you’ll recall is an outgrowth of the earlier Hired Truck scandal.
I can only assume that if federal prosecutors had evidence the mayor knew how his underlings were flouting the Shakman decree’s prohibition on political hiring, then he would have been charged by now. Since he hasn’t been charged, I have to believe they don’t have the proof.
Brown has already reported that HDO founder Victor Reyes is now beyond federal reach because of the statute of limitations.
But, at least as far as Mayor Daley is concerned, a RICO beef might still be possible. Interestingly enough, both Chicago papers danced around the Daley issue today.
“No one has had the guts to come forward and take responsibility” for the hiring system, Breen said after his client was convicted. “I don’t understand why Al Sanchez has been singled out.”
Prosecutors would no doubt be delighted for Sanchez to open up to them about the corrupt system his attorney railed about in court. With Sanchez’s cooperation, the “fat cats” could be held to account.
We have every confidence that U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald will not end this investigation with Sanchez, a powerful player but not among the ultimate benefactors of the city’s corrupt hiring practices.
We expect Fitzgerald’s investigation to go wherever it leads, without fear or favor.
Both papers have screamed for Todd Stroger’s scalp over far less.
But if you ask me how it’s possible the mayor could not have known, I understand completely.
Even if he didn’t know the details of exactly how interview scores were cooked, the mayor must have known there was a system in place to take care of finding jobs or making promotions to keep his political backers happy. And as the man in charge, he should have been asking how it was possible to do that within the confines of the law.
Yep.
* Related…
* Sanchez found guilty in four of seven counts of mail fraud
* Al Sanchez convicted: Ex-Daley aide guilty in Chicago hiring fraud trial - Juror believes the verdict ’says everybody’s aware of what’s going on and let’s clean it up’
Sneed is told new State Police chief Jon Monken, 29, who now has more than 3,600 people under his command, may undergo State Police cadet training.
You look silly, especially since you didn’t really say that you’d do it…
The upshot: “That’s certainly something I’d be interested in,” said Monken –who claims he will definitely go through State Police weapons training.
And take your own advice, please…
Monken has no plans to make immediate waves: “Some of the best advice I got in the military was, ‘When you are a new leader coming in, the best thing that you can do is go in and observe.’ And that’s what I plan on doing.”
OK, so commense with the observing and shut your trap.
* As I’ve been telling subscribers for weeks, the Democrats will do their best to drag Republicans into any budget solution if the GOP wants a capital bill…
Legislators won’t leave the state Capitol this year until they approve a capital construction program, and it will be tied to the passage of a new state budget, Senate President John Cullerton said Monday.
“My number one priority has always been a capital bill, and it hasn’t changed. We have to do the budget and the capital bill together,” said Cullerton, a Chicago Democrat who took over as Senate president earlier this year.
“The two are linked, and by the way, the votes will be linked,” Cullerton told the editorial board of The State Journal-Register. “So for the Republicans who think that they’re going to let the Democrats … raise the taxes, and they’re going to just vote for the spending, I don’t think it’s going to work that way.”
Later Monday, Republican legislative leaders said they don’t want to link the two issues. Instead, they think lawmakers should pass a capital plan as soon as possible, enabling projects to begin this construction season.
Of course the Republicans don’t want any linkage, but they may have no choice.
At the same time Gov. Pat Quinn is calling on most Illinoisans to pay higher income taxes, his budget proposal calls for he and other top state officials to get cost-of-living raises.
The governor’s spending blueprint would raise Quinn’s salary to $182,400, up from $177,000, while boosting base pay for lawmakers by about 2.7 percent to $69,735 annually, up from $67,836.
Oops.
…Adding… The governor’s budget office just called to say that the COLAs are not in the actual budget proposal. Instead, they’re outlined in the comptroller’s narrative.
* And my weekly syndicated newspaper column talks about the budget fight ahead…
The biggest problem Gov. Pat Quinn faces in getting his tax hike and budget proposals passed is not that almost every special interest group opposes them.
The Illinois Federation of Teachers, for instance, sent out a statement before Quinn had even finished his budget address to say that any state legislator who votes for the governor’s proposed “pension cuts” would automatically lose the union’s endorsement.
State workers are spitting mad about paying more into the pension plan and being forced to take unpaid days off.
Business groups are beside themselves about the tax hikes.
Mayors hate the idea that they won’t get their usual 10 percent slice of Quinn’s proposed income tax increase.
These are very serious, almost insurmountable obstacles, of course. But they’re not the worst.
The biggest hurdle, by far, is the governor focused on a problem that he alone wants to deal with, but nobody else really cares about.
The governor, you already know, wants to raise the state’s personal income tax rate from 3 percent to 4.5 percent, but also triple the $2,000 personal exemption so almost 5 million people will get a tax cut or pay no extra taxes. Quinn claims this is about “tax fairness” as much as it is about raising new money to close the state’s $11.5 billion budget deficit.
But, seriously, when was the last time you heard anybody complain about the Illinois income tax?
At just 3 percent, Illinois has the lowest flat tax in the nation. Quinn has pushed this tax fairness idea for decades, but almost nobody else has. Tripling the personal exemption is just not something that any legislator has ever cared much about.
Since the governor’s tax proposal has no real constituency within the General Assembly, he starts out with almost no legislative allies.
Just about every legislator has fervently campaigned to reduce the property tax burden and increase spending for schools. Also, suburban Cook County and Chicago representatives are hearing loud and constant screams of anger from their voters about their region’s super-high sales tax.
There are some very angry everyday people demanding a solution to these festering problems. Yet, Quinn’s budget and tax hike proposals do nothing about any of them.
In fact, the governor’s proposals may be making the political situation for incumbent legislators far worse than they would be with a more “normal” tax hike and budget fix.
For one, the governor has proposed a relatively tiny education spending increase. That pretty much guarantees some local school districts, which are also experiencing serious problems in this economy, will have to raise property taxes even higher.
Local governments are strapped in this economy as well and are dying for money. Without help from the state via their usual share of the income tax hike, they may also have to raise sales or property taxes.
Quinn wants to expand the state sales tax to cover items like grooming and hygiene products, sweetened tea and coffee drinks currently exempted from the full sales tax rate. That’s not really a big thing, but in this sort of environment it could make for big headlines.
And not surprisingly, legislators aren’t particularly thrilled with voting for Quinn’s 50 percent income tax hike and still having to vote for well over a billion dollars in state budget cuts. Quinn’s tax exemption reform proposal took a tax hike that could’ve raised almost $6 billion down to only about $2.5 billion.
The governor said Friday that he hoped he could convince the business lobby to support his tax hike by showing them how he’s forcing teachers and state workers to pay more into the pension systems. But it’s the height of folly to assume the business lobby will ever get behind a tax hike.
The only groups that can be counted on to reliably support tax hikes are the very groups Quinn has gone out of his way to whack. Public school teachers, state workers and people such as Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley are absolutely key, and all of them are firmly in the “no” category.
I still think there will be a state tax increase in our near future. I just don’t think yet that it’ll be this one. Quinn has a horrific fight ahead of him.
* Related…
* GOP attacking Gov. Quinn over income tax increase: Republicans still haven’t answered that question, other than to call for spending cuts. That approach alone can’t erase the deficit, because much government spending is legally mandated, for Medicaid, education and other big-ticket items.
If an agreement is not reached, Communities for an Equitable Olympics, an umbrella group of neighborhood organizations, has threatened to protest during the International Olympic Committee’s visit to Chicago beginning April 2. The IOC evaluation team will be in town to review Chicago’s bid and tour proposed venues, such as the Olympic Stadium in Washington Park and Olympic Village on the former site of Michael Reese Hospital.
If a set-aside deal is worked out, it will be taken up at a City Council Finance Committee meeting set for Friday.
Buildings SS, NN and LL of the East Peoria Caterpillar complex that employs about 2,800 tractor and transmission workers is shut down for the week, which may explain the long lines at local unemployment offices, said Rick Doty, president of United Auto Workers Local 974 in East Peoria.
“Rolling layoffs have been going on since mid-December, but this is one of the first times a complete division has been shut down,” he said.
Ald. Howard Brookins (21st) said Monday he plans to introduce an amended redevelopment agreement at the April 22 Council meeting that would allow Wal-Mart to build its second Chicago store at a former Chatham industrial site.
“There’s no other way to get this moving. The [Daley] administration is not willing to do it themselves. The only way is to force their hand is by spelling out that Wal-Mart shall be permitted to come,” Brookins said.
Ald. Brian Doherty (41st) was hospitalized with a “nasty head wound” on Monday — and the paramedic who treated the “combative” alderman was slightly injured — after Doherty fell down a flight of stairs at his Far Northwest Side home.
Doherty, 51, is the City Council’s lone Republican. He was listed in stable condition in the intensive care unit of Resurrection Hospital. Barring further complications, he is expected to be released Tuesday.
Throughout the city, many Chicago Public Schools are getting education makeovers. Failing or under-enrolled schools are being closed and new ones opened, sometimes even within the same building. The Chicago Board of Education is scheduled to vote tomorrow on where next fall’s new schools will open up. But the whole process leaves some parents and education activists questioning the correlation between urban planning and school planning.
* 7:28 am - WLS Radio’s program director just announced that the disgraced, arrested, impeached and removed former Gov. Rod Blagojevich will fill in for Don & Roma tomorrow morning from 7-9.
This is supposedly just a one-time gig. We’ll see.
Man, are they that desperate for attention over there?
* 8:05 am - Blagojevich, of course, accepts. From a press release…
(PRNewsChannel) / Chicago, Ill. / He’s done dozens of interviews since being thrust into the national spotlight–and countless more during his political days. Now, for the first time, former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich will ask the questions when he takes over as guest host on a top Chicago-area radio station, the PR firm that represents the former governor announced today.
Blagojevich will fill in Wednesday morning for the vacationing Don Wade and Roma - “the dynamic duo” on WLS 890 AM.
“He’s excited about hosting,” says Glenn Selig, Blagojevich’s publicist and founder of The Publicity Agency (http://www.thepublicityagency.com). “He’s ready for the challenge and promises to be a fair interviewer. He’ll also be tough when he needs to be. He’s a talented communicator.”
“Broadcasters and the public were witness to his talent when he went national to tell his side of the story,” says Selig. “He thinks fast on his feet, is energenic and knows how to speak about complicated subjects so that anyone can understand what he’s saying.”
Blagojevich is in the midst of writing a highly anticipated book due out in October. The former governor received a six figure advance.
Blagojevich was a guest on the “Don Wade and Roma” show March 17.
Guests for Blagojevich’s fill-in show will be announced later today, Selig says.
Al Sanchez, the former commissioner of the city’s Streets and Sanitation Department in the Daley administration, was convicted this afternoon on charges he rigged city hiring by trading jobs for campaign work.
Sanchez, 61, is the highest-ranking aide to Mayor Richard Daley to be found guilty in the federal corruption probe of City Hall hiring. A federal jury convicted Sanchez on four counts of mail fraud and acquitted him on three other mail fraud counts.
The jury also convicted Aaron Delvalle, Sanchez’s former assistant, on a perjury charge for lying to a grand jury about the rigged hiring.
***Update 1x***[Posted by Mike Murray]
* Sanchez’s reaction to the verdict(s) as reported in the Sun Times…
“Today is not a fair day,” Sanchez told reporters.
“I did my job as I was supposed to do. I don’t think I should be in this position.”
“I just did my job the way I was supposed to do it,” Sanchez said as he left the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse after jurors convicted him on four counts of mail fraud and acquitted him on three other mail fraud counts.
Sanchez insisted he was trying to ensure that the city’s work force was representative of its diverse population. “I guess it’s a federal crime.
“I just don’t even think I should be in this position,” Sanchez added. “We all had a job to do, and we did it.”
* Thomas Breen, Sanchez’s attorney, also did some gripping to the media and continued to to point the figure at City Hall and Mayor Daley. From the Sun Times…
His defense lawyer had argued Sanchez was just the “poor jerk” indicted for a corrupt hiring scheme that was controlled by the mayor’s Intergovernmental Affairs Office.
“We are a little mystified at the verdict,” lawyer Thomas Breen said today. “It’s not a happy day for Al Sanchez … He’s a decent, decent human being.”
“He has to wear the jacket for it,” Breen said. “There was no crime committed here.”
Breen said it was “hypocrisy” for city officials higher-ranking than Sanchez to skate by. “No one has had the guts to come forward and take responsibility for it (the hiring system),” he said.
“I don’t understand why Al Sanchez has been singled out,” Breen told reporters.
* One of the jurors dismisses Sanchez’s claim that he should not be punished for doing what is business as usual in Chicago politics. She also explains that the jury was split over the verdict and finally settled upon guilty convictions for only those charges that were supported by a testifying witness…
One juror, Arlene Kaminski of the western suburbs, said the jury was split when deliberations began, though a majority favored conviction. The jury then went count by count, flipping through their notes to recount testimony, she said.
The jury ended up convicting Sanchez on counts where there were witnesses who were able to testify with specifics.
Kaminski said she was aware of hiring issues in the city as a whole. “It’s been going on from way back. It doesn’t make it right,” she said.
Asked about Breen’s argument that city higher-ups should also face scrutiny, Kaminski said, “The buck has got to stop somewhere.”
She said she hoped the verdict would send a message to City Hall.
Gov. Pat Quinn said today that lawmakers should not take their scheduled two-week Spring break unless they’ve passed parts of his construction plan to get people back to work.
Quinn stopped short of saying he would call lawmakers back to Springfield for a special session if they did not approve at least some portions of his plan, a tactic predecessor Rod Blagojevich employed several times during previous budget disputes.
“I don’t think the legislature should go home with people out of work in Illinois,” Quinn said in Chicago today. “We need our friends in labor, friends in business, friends everywhere to let our legislature know that you can’t just sit outside and sniff rosebuds while people are out of work.”
Governor Pat Quinn says it would be a show of good faith if state lawmakers would cut their pay.
* Meanwhile, Senate President John Cullerton spoke to the SJ-R editorial board today. The paper has lots of highlights online…
“There is no public support for the unions to have the pensions that they have so far. Everybody in the private sector is getting hit,” Cullerton said.
That’s about as blunt as blunt can be.
* Translation: John Filan…
[Cullerton] says House Speaker Michael Madigan, whose fights with Blagojevich over the budget and other issues dominated the legislature for several years, is “very wary of the continued influence of certain policy folks” who worked for Blagojevich and now work for Quinn. He did not name any names.
* By the way, Cullerton and others have suggested that the General Assembly pass a temporary income tax, but Quinn wants no part of it…
Quinn also said he would not support a temporary income tax hike, saying it doesn’t solve “permanent problems.”
* In other news, the Tribune leaves unchallenged Gov. Quinn’s assertions that newly resigned State Police Director Larry Trent was not forced out of his job…
The governor disputed suggestions that former state police Director Larry Trent, who resigned Friday, had been ousted from the post. Trent
One issue that surfaced this month followed an investigation by the Chicago Reporter, a monthly investigative publication. The Chicago Reporter reported that the State Police had refused to enforce about 1,800 of 21,000 expungement and sealing orders mandated by state judges. An expungement order calls for authorities to expunge, or remove, criminal convictions from a defendant’s record.
Earlier this week, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan demanded the State Police conduct an audit immediately to determine the exact number of expungement and sealing orders at issue. Madigan also said the ISP should comply with court orders and devise a strategy to reach those people affected by the issue. Madigan said she intended to meet Friday with Quinn about the matter.
“I felt there were some issues that may have concerned the governor,” Trent said. “I didn’t feel the support I needed was there. Certainly, I didn’t need the job, so I felt this was the right time to leave and explore some other opportunities.”
* 5th Congressional District Republican nominee Rosanna Pulido has admitted to NBC5 that she posts at Free Republic as “Chicago Lady.” A new blog is tracking her posts, including this one, which Pulido told NBC5 was an attempt at humor…
According to the African Americans in L.A. The Mexicans are the NEW KU KLUX KLAN with the TAN!! Sounds right to me!!
I AM a bible thunper who likes to tell everyone how to live their lives, STRAIGHT from the Owners manual!! The Bible!
* The state and national Republicans are steering clear of Pulido. But according to that NBC5 report, the Cook County GOP is helping Pulido with volunteers, signs and grassroots support…
Lee Roupas, Cook Co. GOP Chairman: “Give her a chance, and give the Republican Party a chance. Give our message a chance on economics and, and government. I think there’s a lot of serious issues going on today.”
Usually, media outlets tend to ignore fringe candidates because they have so little chance of winning. However, since this special general election will undoubtedly be noticed by few voters, perhaps the rest of the MSM can get off its collective rear and start informing potential voters about what sort of candidate the local GOP is, um, behind.
Democratic state Sen. Terry Link of Waukegan says he would support legislative efforts to streamline all levels of government, including consolidation of school districts, as a method of achieving savings for taxpayers before backing Gov. Pat Quinn’s proposal to hike income taxes.
Link, a member of the Senate Democratic leadership team, said today he doesn’t believe some of the cost-savings proposals Quinn outlined to legislators last week in the governor’s budget address will satisfy a public being asked to pay more out of their pocket.
“We’ve got to look at ways that we can help people save money, directly and indirectly, and if we could do things like consolidation of schools, do other things that are going to save people money, we’ve got to do that so when they put their hand in their pocket, there’s money there,” Link said on WGN-AM (720).
Link cited a need to achieve “efficiencies in government,” including the always controversial issue of consolidating the number of school districts and perhaps eliminating other units of government, to achieve savings for taxpayers.
* The Question: Do you support consolidating your own school district with neighboring districts? If you live in Chicago, do you support this concept? Explain fully, please.
* Gov. Quinn says he’s willing to sacrifice his own career to raise taxes and balance the budget…
Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn says he realizes that his proposal to raise income taxes could cost him another term, but he has to do what’s right.
Quinn said at a press conference Sunday that he thinks the state’s residents want a governor who levels with them. And he says that the tax proposal was the only honest and honorable thing to do.
Some have derided Quinn for taking a voluntary $25,000 pay cut as meaningless symbolism. They’re completely missing the point. He’s put his entire career on the line with this budget.
Voters hate tax hikes, which is why Gov. Quinn’s push for the state’s first income tax increase in 20 years is such an intriguing political gambit with the 2010 gubernatorial campaign ready to launch.
But do voters really hate tax hikes, or is this a media creation? The Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University conducted a poll last fall which showed voters were open to higher, more progressive taxes…
Interestingly, while 74.2 percent of respondents who make less than $50K annually favored a progressive tax, and 68.9 percent of those who make between $50K and $100K favored the tax, more than half of the people who make more than $100K and would presumably pay the higher rate still favored a higher rate for themselves. 57.5% of the respondents who make more than $100,000 support a higher rate for higher incomes.
My own opinion on this is that voters may support a tax hike in the abstract, but maybe not so much when a tax hike is imminent. And the world’s economic conditions are far worse now than they were when that poll was conducted.
Still, nobody in the General Assembly lost their seats after Gov. Jim Thompson increased taxes in the 1980s. And I don’t believe that any legislators lost after Gov. Ogilvie instituted the income tax after the constitutional convention. Ogilvie lost, however, so Quinn has that bit of history going against him.
And then there’s this story from New Jersey that’s worth a look…
New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine says his plan to shrink a $7 billion budget gap by raising taxes and cutting workers’ pay will create “a stronger footing for tomorrow.” By the time that tomorrow comes, Corzine may be out of a job.
The governor, a former chairman of Goldman Sachs and the only incumbent up for re-election this year, is trailing his likely Republican opponent amid voter anger over the economic crisis — and the steps he’s taking to deal with it: a fiscal 2010 budget that lops 9 percent from the current one, a wage freeze and unpaid furloughs for state workers, and possible cuts in property-tax rebates along with higher taxes on the wealthiest residents and on cigarettes and alcohol.
Keep in mind that New Jersey polling is notoriously inaccurate, but it certainly ought to give Quinn pause.
* And this Gatehouse story shows just how difficult Quinn’s task will be…
Pat Abney, a 63-year-old from Springfield, said that between buying medicines and paying monthly bills, many senior citizens are barely able to survive with their bills, let alone additional fees.
“Ninety-nine dollars for a little sticker every year is just a little too much,” Abney said. “But it is something that I’ll have to have to buy. I’ll have to pinch some pennies to pay for it and it could be kind of a tight squeeze.”
1) Not mentioned in the piece is that senior citizens don’t pay income tax on their pension incomes.
2) The governor’s proposed sticker vehicle registration fee increase is $20 per year, which isn’t mentioned anywhere in the story’s main body.
3) Expect many more misleading “woe is me” stories like this in the future.
* Meanwhile, the Tribune finally discovers the governor’s proposed sales tax expansion…
Buried deep within the massive budget proposal Gov. Pat Quinn presented last week to lawmakers was a caffeinated jolt to the bottled tea and Frappuccino crowd.
Quinn wants to apply the state’s sales tax on soft drinks to the coffee and sweetened tea products in grocery stores, adding a quarter for the state treasury for every $5 six-pack of sweet green tea.
Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich once bragged of his “testicular virility” for standing-up to his father-in-law, Chicago Ald. Dick Mell, over a landfill deal.
We think Quinn, by introducing an income tax increase, earns that distinction.
* But Chris Krug makes an interesting point about why the voters elected Blagojevich twice and why Quinn finds the going so tough now…
I’m not sure that any of us wanted a governor who was all that interested in doing something. I’m almost positive we just didn’t want Blago in there doing anything.
“The conventional wisdom in this building is that John Filan’s fingerprints are all over the budget,” said state Sen. Dale Righter, R-Mattoon.
You remember Filan, right? Gov. Blagojevich’s budget chief who loved smoke and mirrors and didn’t much care for state employees? Well, he was, indeed, part of Gov. Quinn’s budget team this year as well…
Quinn spokeswoman Katie Ridgway acknowledged that Filan was involved in the budget-writing process.
That explains some things, especially as we look at the pension reform proposals today.
* Kristen McQueary writes about pension envy and Gov. Quinn’s pension reforms in her latest column…
Public pensions are one of the rawest nerve centers in politics today. If you don’t work for government, the pension system seems patently unfair. If you do work for government and you paid into the system since your very first paycheck, you feel entitled to the nest egg promised.
Everyone - including state employees - has to recognize that the burden of getting the state out of its dire financial straits will require sacrifices from everyone.
We might argue about the degree of sacrifice, but the bottom line is that businesses need to pick up part of the check, taxpayers overall can expect higher taxes and fees, motorists will have to pay for better roads, park users will face fees they haven’t in the past and public employees will have to accept some of the same financial hits that workers in the private sector already have faced.
Cost cutting is crucial when asking taxpayers to hand over more money.
Quinn’s plan calls for state employees to take four furlough days and pay more toward their health insurance. That closely follows the actions many businesses have taken to limit layoffs or other more drastic action in this recession.
The state’s financial problems will not be solved with turf wars, partisan sniping or self-serving opposition that offers no realistic alternatives.
The problems will only be solved by working together and sharing the burden.
Gov. Pat Quinn said teachers unions and public sector employees should be open to concessions and voluntary cost savings as all agencies from state government down to local school and municipal districts struggle to balance their budgets.
“What I have found is that in a bind, human beings want to help their neighbor. They want to help themselves, but they understand that working together often times is the best way to get through a crisis,” Quinn told the Daily Herald in an interview Friday. “The bottom line is shared sacrifice in tough times. That’s what Americans do.”
The alternative retirement formula, which gives enhanced pension benefits to those holding hazardous jobs, will also go away.
Laurence Msall is president of the Civic Federation in Chicago, which has called for many of the pension changes being pushed by Quinn. He said good riddance to the alternative state employee formula.
“It’s been enormously abused by the state of Illinois,” Msall said. “Everyone in the Department of Corrections, including people who don’t do hazardous work, are in it.”
Quinn would’ve been better advised to stay away from Filan. Some of these pension reforms are reasonable. But Filan’s name attached to them may make his proposals too hot to touch. Not discussed in many of the articles above is the Quinn/Filan plan to short the pension systems of billions of dollars. It’s classic Filan.
…I suspect indictments are going to come down pretty soon [for former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich], and this is a soap opera with sort of sporadic episodes, and there may yet be more. Maybe not so much Burris, but Blagojevich will be back.
You might remember the story as well. The banks loaned money to a Romanian con man named Mihail Stancu, who had pretended to convert the Albany Park building to condominiums, in essence selling the seven unimproved apartments to himself before fleeing the country with more than $1 million in profits gleaned from the mortgages.
It was exactly the kind of mindless lending that put our country in its current straits, albeit compounded in this case by outright fraud.
And ever since, the seven families who live in the Spaulding building have been paying the price for someone else’s foolishness. The banks keep trying to throw the families out — using both legal and extra- legal means to accomplish their aims — despite a court order specifically granting them permission to stay.
With Illinois’ unemployment rate at a 26-year high of nearly 8 percent, more people are turning to technical schools and community colleges to learn new skills.
Spring 2009 enrollments are at near-record levels, up 3.1 percent statewide. LLCC’s increase is about 5.3 percent, and other community colleges are showing even more dramatic spikes. Enrollment at Rend Lake College, near Ina in Jefferson County, has risen 20.6 percent, while Southeastern Illinois College in Harrisburg is up a whopping 31.4 percent.
The Tollway will help property owners with relocation, which “may include help in locating a replacement building, payment of moving expenses and costs, mortgage or rent assistance, and other financial assistance,” according to Tollway regulations posted on its Web site.
Suburban members of Congress who voted this week to raise taxes on big bonus recipients at AIG say their votes in favor of that hike do not violate their pledges to never raise taxes. […]
And the taxpayer group behind the pledge, while opposing the tax hike on bonuses, indicated it did not consider such votes a violation of the signed pledge.
The Chicago Housing Authority is getting $143 million from the federal stimulus package. It’s money CHA says may help finish renovations that are behind schedule.
The smoldering, Egyptian-themed casino was closed after the fire and did not immediately have a reopening date, according to Penn National Gaming, the Wyomissing, Pa.-based parent company of Empress.
The Empress employs more than 800 workers, and after the nearby Harrah’s Casino, the Empress is the second largest single taxpayer to the city of Joliet. In February alone, the Empress paid $837,000 in casino taxes to the city and more than $1.8 million to the state.
With tax revenues plummeting, the Daley administration has pulled off the table an offer to raise the salaries of Chicago Police officers by 16.1 percent over five years, according to City Hall sources.
Buying carbon credits fights global warming only if they help finance new sources of renewable energy, such as new wind turbines, energy experts said. Yet 87 percent of the credits Chicago has purchased sent money to a wood-burning power plant that has been operating for nearly two decades.
Metra runs on paper, as in paper tickets. Although the majority of riders use monthly passes, passengers in January still bought more than 666,000 one-way tickets or used 10-ride tickets, which conductors have to punch individually.
* Transit trolling: RTA chief on fare hikes; parking contract going out for bid; beware Red Line bandit
* Daley’s official gift logs don’t include trips, free meals
Instead of providing the Board of Ethics with a list of gifts, though, Daley tells the board a “mayoral gift log is maintained in the mayor’s office and is available for public inspection.'’
But those logs are far from complete, a Chicago Sun-Times review has found, failing to disclose all of the gifts Daley gets.
They don’t, for instance, include any of the trips Daley has gotten from various organizations. Or any of the free meals he has eaten. Nor do the gift logs even list the birthday and Christmas presents he has gotten from his staff since 2005.
“The staff? We almost view that as a family gift to him,” Daley press secretary Jacquelyn Heard said.
“He has to record everything that’s considered a gift,” Heard said. “What you consider a gift and what we consider a gift are two different things.”
Eugene Kryczka, former candidate for Antioch Township assessor, has been charged with five counts of perjury for filing candidacy petitions that included 50 false signatures.
If convicted, Kryczka could face up to five years in prison. He was released from Lake County Jail after posting 10 percent of a $30,000 bond.
There’s a little-noticed public health crisis brewing in Illinois. It’s not especially sexy, but it’s serious. It’s connected to life-threatening ailments, nutrition and even job prospects… The problem is access to dental care. Illinois has the third largest underserved population in the country. The few clinics that treat poor people are overwhelmed. Now they’re bracing for a new flood of patients, as more people lose their jobs.
The state Senate’s two leaders are open to changes in the way the government divides transportation funding, which now sends the lion’s share to downstate Illinois. […]
Currently, there’s a major debate on formulas going on in Springfield, [Senate President John Cullerton] said. “District 1 has 80 percent of the population and receives 45 percent of the money,” he added, referring to Chicago, Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry and Will counties. […]
The Metropolitan Planning Council is backing legislation proposed by Vernon Hills Democrat Kathy Ryg to divvy up transportation dollars based on objective criteria - such as population, safety, pollution prevention and job creation rather than political horse-trading in the General Assembly.
“It makes sense to set up a program with clear criteria rather than a lump sum handed out to the caucuses,” Radogno said.
And Cullerton is open to borrowing…
Chicago Democrat Cullerton appealed to Republicans to bring real solutions to the table and said he’d consider any ideas. For example, if someone proposed borrowing money now and raising taxes to pay it back two years later based on the premise that the economy will have rebounded, “I’m open to that,” he said.
Word is Quinn plans to shake up the Illinois Commerce Commission and replace [Chairman] Charles E. Box with a top woman of Asian and African-American descent.
