A bipartisan group of Illinois lawmakers has signed onto a new pension reform proposal designed to reduce the State’s massive pension costs. House Bill 3411, co-sponsored by 20 Republican legislators and 11 Democrats, was introduced in the Illinois House on February 26, 2013. Senate Bill 35 was amended a day later to mirror HB3411. HB3411 includes many of the changes proposed in House Bill 6258 in the last General Assembly and is expected to generate similar savings. At a press conference on…
Prior to the release of the Governor’s annual budget recommendation, the Institute for Illinois’ Fiscal Sustainability at the Civic Federation releases an analysis of the State of Illinois’ fiscal condition. The FY2014 Roadmap includes a review of Governor Quinn’s three-year budget plan, a rough five-year budget projection for FY2014 to FY2018 and recommendations for the Governor and General Assembly to improve the state’s financial condition. The analysis shows the State on track to accumulate…
After months of uncertainty, the date of Governor Pat Quinn’s budget address for FY2014 was officially postponed through action by the Governor on the same day it was originally required by law to be delivered. Although the later date of March 6, 2013 has been included on the General Assembly’s calendars since November, the the Governor did not sign the bill amending the State Budget Law to push the day back by two weeks until earlier this week. The State Budget Law requires the…
Even though the Illinois General Assembly recently appropriated an additional six months of funding for State group health insurance, unpaid bills relating to the program are expected to increase by more than $200 million to $1.6 billion by the end of the current budget year. The legislature appropriated an additional $550 million in general operating funds for employee and retiree health insurance in FY2013 as part of a supplemental appropriations bill that was signed by Governor Pat Quinn on…
The State of Illinois, like other states, is faced with a decision on whether to expand its Medicaid program in 2014 under the federal Affordable Care Act. The decision in Illinois is complicated by a State law that bans such a Medicaid expansion until 2015. As discussed here, the State moratorium was lifted by the Illinois General Assembly in 2012 for the limited purpose of allowing Cook County’s public health system to gain early access to Medicaid coverage for newly eligible recipients in…
State bond funding for infrastructure projects in Illinois is running out after a $500 million issuance was pulled from the market earlier this week. The bond sale was cancelled due to concerns about higher than expected interest rates from bidders on the competitive issuance in the wake of the State’s bond rating downgrade on January 25, 2013. Although the State has issued more than $5.0 billion in capital purpose General Obligation bonds (GO bonds) since the Illinois Jobs Now! capital…
UPDATE: In the face of unfavorable market conditions triggered by the downgrade of its bond rating last week, the State of Illinois announced that it would not complete the bond sale originally scheduled for today, January 30, 2013. A Governor’s spokesperson said that after talks with potential bidders, State officials are concerned about the deal and need to wait for markets to stabilize before selling its debt. The bond sale was for $500 million in new capital purpose General Obligation Bonds…
The Civic Federation's legislative priorities for 2013 include public employee pension and retiree healthcare reforms, requiring the State of Illinois to develop and implement a capital improvement plan, dissolving the Illinois International Port District, creating a new governing board for the Cook County Forest Preserve District, requiring all counties to hold budget hearings, authorizing townships to be dissolved by referendum, requiring school financial management accountability…
A new three-year budget projection for the State of Illinois by Governor Pat Quinn’s administration shows that significant spending reductions will be needed to balance the State budget in FY2015 and FY2016, when temporary income tax rate increases start to be phased out. Even with the projected spending cuts, the State is not expected to be able to make much progress in reducing its enormous backlog of unpaid bills. Due to the reduced income tax revenue and continued growth in pension…
The 97th Illinois General Assembly’s closing session ended on January 9, 2013, leaving many questions unresolved about the State’s current budget year and fiscal sustainability in the face of its $97 billion unfunded pension liability. At the end of each two-year legislative session, all of the bills not passed by both chambers of the General Assembly are cleared from the legislative agenda. Legislation must be filed under new bill numbers and the deliberative process must begin again in…
