* From yesterday…

Rauner also outlined a series of financial pressures he said totaled $1.4 billion, citing budget gimmicks mostly identified when the General Assembly left town last spring. The items included borrowing as much as $650 million from state funds set aside for myriad specially designated purposes.

The Republican lashed out at what he called “dishonest” Democrat-approved financial tricks, saying the price tag of the current year’s budget was masked by absorbing some of the costs in a previous budget to make the current one look better. In other cases, Rauner maintained that expenses were deferred and will be pushed into the coming year.

* Here is Rauner’s breakdown. You can click the pic for a larger image…

* But Rauner shouldn’t have been so surprised. This is what I wrote back in June of this year…

I based what follows on what I know about how the budget was crafted. But whatever the final number ends up being, it’s crystal clear that whoever wins the governor’s race will face a monstrous challenge after he’s sworn in next January.

Borrowing $660 million from special state funds, as this new budget does, is a one-off affair. The money is being put into the state’s spending base and will have to somehow be replaced the following year. A two-year repayment plan means another $330 million will also have to be found in the next budget, for a total hole of about a billion dollars.

Using about $500 million in one-time revenue increases from this fiscal year to pay forward some bills in next fiscal year means that same $500 million will have to be found again when the next budget is crafted.

Not funding employee salary and health insurance-benefit-cost increases kicks another $380 million down the road. So, now we’re at $1.9 billion. […]

Also, Rep. Greg Harris, who chairs a House appropriations committee, told reporters last week that the new budget could create as much as a “couple of billion” dollars in past-due bills in the coming fiscal year. If that’s accurate, then the FY16 hole becomes much, much worse, plus there’s all that new debt owed to providers which will eventually have to be paid back.

…Adding… Don’t forget that the state’s pension payment is expected to rise by almost a billion dollars next fiscal year.