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Same game, different time

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Illinois

* The Belleville News-Democrat published a story the other day about a vendor at a state correctional facility in East St. Louis. The gist of the story is that the vendor provides substance abuse treatment programs for inmates and wasn’t paid for a year.

The governor’s office blamed the comptroller…

Governor Bruce Rauner’s office criticized the order of bills that are paid by the comptroller’s office.

“The order of which payments are made are a question of Comptroller (Susana) Mendoza’s priorities,” said Eleni Demertzis, a spokeswoman for Rauner’s office. “We continue to encourage her to avoid creating a crisis and further harm to service providers by releasing the funds necessary to pay those most in need.”

* I learned decades ago that when any governor’s office attempts to blame the comptroller for late payments to service providers that the first question to always ask is when the agency controlled by the governor actually submitted the voucher for payment. One of the oldest games under the dome is for a governor to sit on a voucher then blame the comptroller when the vendor complains.

So, after reading Friday’s story, I asked the comptroller’s office when the administration submitted its vouchers. Click here to read the printout they sent me.

* You’ll notice, for instance, on page 3 that the Rauner administration submitted a voucher on December 2nd of 2016 for about $54,000 in services rendered in January of 2016. In other words, they waited 11 months to submit the voucher for payment.

Turn to page 5 and you’ll see a voucher submitted on December 28th of last year for services rendered in December of 2015. In other words, it took the administration a full year to submit that voucher to the comptroller.

On page 6, you’ll see a voucher submitted on March 8th of this year for services rendered in August of last year - 9 months after the services were rendered.

And on page 7 there’s a voucher submitted on March 22nd of this year for services rendered in June of last year.

* All of the above vouchers were paid on March 24th. So, yes, the comptroller did indeed sit on some of them for a few months. Here is the comptroller’s original explanation to the paper…

He said there is a six-month to one-year wait on all bills around the state, citing that no balanced budget has been proposed by the governor’s office nor the general assembly, during the budget impasse that has lasted almost two years.

“Every bill in the state is being held up because we have no budget,” Pallasch said.

A quick and vague paragraph was added later to the story about the administration’s own delays…

Pallasch said vouchers for payment of services from the Department of Corrections had not been turned into the comptroller’s office for several months after services were rendered.

* Lessons? The comptroller’s office needs to do a much better job of figuring out how they’re being played by the governor’s office and react accordingly. And reporters need to make sure they’re not being punked by an age-old game.

posted by Rich Miller
Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 11:58 am

Comments

Actually the media needs to understand they are bein’ played and start askin’ their own questions rather than waitin’ for Capt Fax.
First clue that should have been the MO with DopeyDuct……how about election nite phone calls that never occurred?

Comment by Annonin' Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 12:05 pm
So…is he also blaming his overpaid, hand-picked, wingman/Deputy Governor Leslie Munger - because she had over a year to make payment, according to his logic?

Comment by Dublin Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 12:16 pm
Did they happen to mention why they are paying FY16 expenses out of FY17 funds or doesn’t the fiscal year matter any more?

Comment by M Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 12:19 pm
I guess if Rauner wants to be the guy who decides in what order to pay bills, he should run for Comptroller.

Comment by Harvest76 Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 12:27 pm
This is what they teach at the famed Tuck School of Business -Dartmouth. This is is why I know higher ed needs serious cuts to their budgets.

Comment by blue dog dem Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 12:48 pm
And the media outside of Springfield needs to learn to quit looking at him with ga ga eyes when he comes to town to blame everyone but his disingenuous self.

Comment by Winnin' Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 12:48 pm
@ blue dog dem- at first i read Duct School of Business and laughed outloud. Do you thing Rauner knows that some people make prom dresses out of duct tape? Perhaps a fundraising idea?

Comment by Flynn's mom Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 12:56 pm
Flynns Mom. Maybe instead of a fundraiser to bail out our state, how about a lottery of some sort.?

Comment by Blue dog dem Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 1:47 pm
Don’t recall quinn blaming topinka for late payments. Maybe blago, thompson, ryan, edgar?

Comment by Handle Bar Mustache Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 1:49 pm
>an age-old game

This would be a good piece of business-as-usual for Rauner to end.

Comment by Earnest Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 2:04 pm
–“The order of which payments are made are a question of Comptroller (Susana) Mendoza’s priorities,” said Eleni Demertzis, a spokeswoman for Rauner’s office. “We continue to encourage her to avoid creating a crisis and further harm to service providers by releasing the funds necessary to pay those most in need.”–

Geez, what a way to make a living: purposely, knowingly lying, to accuse someone else of misanthropy that you know that you yourself are willfully committing and covering up.

Do you get a free hose down with Boraxo after a day of that?

Comment by wordslinger Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 3:01 pm
===Don’t recall quinn blaming topinka for late payments===

That’s because JBT knew how to kill those stories. It happened a lot.

Comment by Rich Miller Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 3:09 pm
“”Boraxo”"

Needed a 20-mule team to pull that load?

Comment by walker Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 3:32 pm
==JBT knew how to kill those stories==

I stand corrected.

But still, don’t remember much public acrimony between them.

She was syrupy sweet to him in public, especially in her last years.

Quinn spoke at her very moving funeral service and had many kind words for her.

Comment by Handle Bar Mustache Monday, Apr 10, 17 @ 4:57 pm