Durkin steps in as House minority leader

Jim Durkin officially took over as the Illinois House minority leader today.

 House Republicans elected Durkin in August as their new leader after former leader Tom Cross announced he would be stepping down. Cross kicked off his campaign for state treasurer last week. He will continue to serve out his term in the House. “Tom Cross was a good leader. I wish him the best in his future endeavors and thank him for service to our caucus,” Durkin said in a written statement. “It is a privilege to have been selected the new House Republican leader by my peers, and I’m anxious to get to work. Illinois is a great state facing serious challenges. House Republicans have solid ideas on how to solve our fiscal crisis and get residents back to work. Like our neighbors, we want safe schools and neighborhoods, and an end to government corruption. We want to restore pride in Illinois — working together we can get the job done.”

Durkin served in the House from 1995 to 2002. He made a failed bid for U.S. Senate against Sen. Dick Durbin and then returned to the House in 2006. He has also worked as a Cook County state’s attorney and an assistant Illinois attorney general.

Durkin is taking over during a challenging time for the caucus. Republicans in both chambers suffered losses in the 2012 election that gave Democrats veto-proof majorities. Both caucuses have struggled with election fundraising, something Durkin says he plans to address.

Same-sex marriage isn't called for a House vote

By Meredith Colias

The spring legislative session ended in disappointment for gay rights advocates when the House failed to take a vote on same-sex marriage.

Illinois was poised to become the 13th state to legalize gay marriage, but it appears the measure did not yet have enough strongly committed support to pass. Gov. Pat Quinn was supportive of the legislation and pledged to sign the bill. Chicago Democratic Rep. Greg Harris, who sponsors Senate Bill 10, choked up as he told those in the galleries he was sorry he could not risk the vote. “I apologize to families who were hoping to wake up tomorrow as full and equal citizens of this state,” he said. Advocates reacted with emotion and deep disappointment as Harris took to the House floor to announce he did not want to risk the bill’s failure. Spectators in the gallery shouted out for Harris to call the bill for a vote. Equality Illinois CEO Bernard Cherkasov said the lack of a vote was “very painful and disgusting.”

Less than two years after Illinois legalized same-sex civil unions, public opinion polling indicates that residents are more supportive of granting full marriage rights, but a majority of House members apparently did not agree. A centerpiece of Equality Illinois’ push to legalize same-sex marriage was highlighting the public’s shifting stance on the issue. President Barack Obama also publicly supported the push when he made a visit to Chicago this week. “They looked at all of that and waved their hands and walked away,” Cherkasov said.

Sources familiar with negotiations estimated the vote count for months to be just under the 60 required to pass, and Harris was tight-lipped on lobbying efforts for much of that time. Harris said that he was uncertain that he had the backing to pass the bill, and he wanted to wait for a floor vote because some members said they would consider voting “yes” in the fall. Harris would not name names as to who was sitting on the fence. But lobbyists on both sides have been battling over the votes of the members of the House’s black caucus. With a potential roll call constantly shifting since the bill's passage in the Senate on Valentine's Day, it was uncertain if Harris had enough solid support to push the measure through the House. Even some lawmakers who that said they were open-minded to supporting the legislation would not publicly commit before a floor vote.

Seemingly, Illinois would be able to pass same-sex marriage without a problem because Democrats hold a veto-proof majority in the legislature. But the votes of many members of the caucus could not be  guaranteed because of the state's regional and cultural diversity. Theories on what factors were to blame for the lack of a vote followed Harris’ announcement, but he simply said he wanted to give the bill the time he hoped it needed to pass. Some lawmakers said they wanted more time to talk with their constituents before they would come back to support the bill. “I take my colleagues at their word that they shall,” he said.

Longtime gay rights advocate Rick Garcia, political director of the Civil Rights Agenda, criticized Harris for failing to share his estimated roll calls. He said community and minority groups that had a real life stake in the bill’s passage were not effectively employed, and Harris relied too heavily on House Speaker Michael Madigan to secure the vote. “That is why we lost,” he said. “This is a textbook case of how other states shouldn’t do it,” he said.

Harris’ fellow sponsor, Chicago Democrat Rep. Ken Dunkin, said the 20-member black caucus should not be blamed for the failure for a vote. He said other Democrats in the 71-member majority could have stepped up to support the legislation. He said he would still be an outspoken advocate for the bill, but he thought it may have been an a mistake for supporters to equate the ability to marry with the long struggle by African-Americans against racism and discrimination. “That may have actually offended African-American legislators, for that to be equated,” he said.

If same-sex marriage is brought back up in the legislature's fall veto session, it is not known how more time will help lobbying efforts. At least one representative, Chicago Democratic Rep. William Davis, who supported civil unions as a compromise in 2010, said he was not sure if he was ready to support full same-sex marriage rights.

The religious aspect of same-sex marriage is also underlying the debate. The bill protects religious institutions if they refuse to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies or lend their halls for receptions. Aurora Democratic Rep. Linda Chapa LaVia said she thought Harris genuinely wanted to include religious exemptions in the bill. “His intentions are not to impose this on anybody, and I take him for his word,” she said. Only one lawmaker during the Senate debate said its inclusion swayed his decision to vote for the bill.

Chicago Democratic Rep. Deborah Mell spoke of her life with her partner, whom she traveled with to Iowa to marry. She vowed the issue would reemerge. “This vote will be taken,” she said.

House passes the bulk of its budget

By Jamey Dunn and Meredith Colias

Illinois House Democrats passed several pieces of their budget today as Republicans bemoaned being cut out of the process.

Both higher education and K-12 will be funded at essentially flat levels, compared to the current fiscal year. Human services would see cuts under the plan, but the outlook is not nearly as gloomy as it seemed just a few weeks ago. Sponsors of the various budget bills say that the situation would have been much bleaker if a windfall of $1.5 billion in unexpected revenues had not come in. “In April, there was a large surge because people sold a bunch of assets at the end of [Fiscal Year] '12 in anticipation of capital gains rate changes,” said Rep. Greg Harris, who sponsored the human services budget bill.

House Minority Leader Tom Cross said Republicans do not support the $35.6 billion budget proposal, the bulk of which passed today. He said Republicans had been working on the budget, but Democrats stopped inviting his political party to talks in the last few weeks. “When it comes to spending ... the willingness to work with us goes by the wayside, and that is unfortunate,” Cross said. “Clearly we’re not going in the direction that we need to go if we intend to get our bills paid and if we intend to do away with the tax increase.” Republicans said they saw the budget bills for the first time last night.

While Republicans blasted the spending in the proposal, Harris, who took over the human services budgeting committee this year, said this is the first budget in recent years that will fully fund human services. “We’ve made cuts across the board but we’ve retained funding in core community services such as mental health, substance abuse, homelessness programs,” he said. This year and several other times in recent history, human services agencies have had to come back to the General Assembly midway through the fiscal year and ask for more money to avoid the shutdown of programs. “In other years, they’ve not appropriated for a full year, and they’ve always come back for [supplemental spending bills]. ... We wanted to pass something that was fully reflective of the realities of each department’s need,” he said. “I would say woe betide the department that comes back to us with a supplemental [request] this year.”

The budget does not explicitly include the raises promised to state union workers in a new contract. But personnel costs are provided in lump sums, and each agency is left to figure out how to work in the raises. “What we accounted for was their FY 14 raises, and they way we did that was to give our departments maximum flexibility.” A bill that would appropriate back raises, which Gov. Pat Quinn has said he will now give members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union after earlier freezing them, was not called for a vote in committee today.

Some of the unexpected revenue would be used to immediately pay down nearly $600 million in old human services bills. Harris said many of those payments would be eligible for federal matching funds under Medicaid. Some of the additional revenues were incorporated to the revenue estimate for next fiscal year and will be used to defer cuts to education and corrections. Republicans expressed concerns that the additional revenue projected should not automatically be used to increase spending in the budget. “We were conservative a year ago, and it served us well,” Arlington Heights Republican David Harris said.

Chicago Democratic Rep. Louis Arroyo said that the additional money allowed Democrats to funnel $70 million to the Department of Corrections to prevent the potential closure of more state prisons. “I believe there will be no prisons closing,” Arroyo said in a budget committee hearing this morning. “Corrections is going to be OK.” The House approved a public safety budget sponsored by Arroyo today. Higher education is seeing only a slight drop in funding.

Chicago Democratic Rep. Ken Dunkin said that higher education would avoid the 5 percent cuts the governor called for in his March budget proposal. The extra funds would give "additional breathing room for some of our communities," Dunkin said. The House higher education budget, which was also approved today, calls for the Monetary Award Program, which provides scholarships to low-income students, to be funded at a level slightly less than what Quinn presented in his budget. The program has suffered cuts in recent years.

The House did not approve its K-12 budget, but House Democrats who worked on it say a vote is expected tomorrow. The proposal adds more than $150 million to General State Aid for schools to keep the state's proration at 89 percent of the recommended funding level to schools. The bus transportation budget will be kept at 64 percent of recommended levels for schools. The new budget figures will also keep early childhood education and bilingual education at flat funding, compared to last year's budget.

Madigan: Same-sex marriage picking up some votes

By Meredith Colias 

After the Illinois House took up a major pension vote today, Speaker Michael Madigan told reporters that a bill to legalize same-sex marriage has gained some ground on its way to a final vote.

Last month Madigan said that Senate Bill 10 was about a dozen votes short of the 60 votes required to pass the bill. “We’re a little closer, but we’re not yet there. But we’re a little closer,” he said.

The Senate passed the bill on Valentine’s Day. Chicago Democratic Rep. Greg Harris, who sponsors the bill in the House, says he is waiting to know for certain that it will pass before bringing it up for a final vote. Gov. Pat Quinn has been supportive of the legislation and said he will sign it when it gets to his desk. If the bill passes, Illinois will join 10 other states that have legalized gay marriage in recent years. Rhode Island recently became the latest state, joining all other New England states that had already said "I do" to legalization of same-sex marriage. Harris said he is working to explain the legislation and to address the concerns of those who are opposed or undecided.

Under the legislation, religious institutions would be exempt from performing same-sex ceremonies. Protections were added to the Senate version to allow churches to also refuse to host wedding receptions on church property. “We’re talking about what the bill does,” Harris said. “It’s very clear, and it says it in black and white. I think there are a lot of red herrings being thrown out there. You’ve seen this in every state that this has come up. ... Scare tactics are scare tactics, but they are not true.” One Republican, Sen. Jason Barickman, a Champaign Republican voted for the bill when it passed the Senate. Two House Republicans, Rep. Ronald Sendack from Downers Grove and Rep. Ed Sullivan from Mundelein, have publicly said they would vote for the bill.

Persistent opposition remains to the bill. Ralph Rivera, a lobbyist for the Illinois Family Institute, said he is willing to wait out the push because he believes supporters do not have enough votes for the bill to ultimately pass. “It’s a lot to overcome,” he said.

But Harris is optimistic he will gain enough votes for the bill to pass. “Everyone I’ve talked to is very mindful of the fact in the past two years, public opinion has shifted so dramatically on this issue,” he said. “The shift has come from people saying, the time is right, we just need to get this done.”

Legislative roundup

By Jamey Dunn 

The Illinois General Assembly had a busy week, as the House worked toward its Friday deadline for final votes on bills that originated from the chamber.

Sex Education 
The House approved House Bill 2675, which calls for curriculum standards for sexual education that would emphasize abstinence but also teach students about contraceptives and using condoms to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. The curricula would be for middle schools and high schools, but local districts would not be obligated to use it. Parents could also opt not to allow their kids to attend sex education classes.

Abuse and neglect reporting 
Lawmakers voted in favor of HB 948, which is an effort to address problems in the system for reporting abuse and neglect of disabled adults. The Belleville News-Democrat uncovered problems with the system and found that the Office of the Inspector General Department of Human Services did not follow up on reports connected to the deaths of more than 50 people. The office claimed that “the dead are ineligible for services.” (George Pawlaczyk and Beth Hundsdorfer, the reporters who uncovered the department’s practices penned an overview of their findings for the October 2012 Illinois Issues.) Under HB 948, the Department of Aging will create a system and standards for responding to allegations of abuse and neglect. The legislation creates a multi-disciplinary advisory panel that would assist with response.

Workplace violence 
The House voted in favor of HB 2590, which allows employers to obtain orders of protection against employees who commit an act of violence at work or threaten individuals in the workplace. The order would bar the person from returning to the workplace.

Child Support 
Under HB2843, which the House approved, parents who get lucky at Illinois casinos or racetracks and owe child support could see their debt deducted from their winnings. The racetrack or casino would be required to hold out the child support owed and send the money to the Department of Healthcare and Family Services. In exchange, the casino or racetrack would be paid a fee of the lesser of either 4 percent of the winnings or $150.

Guns and pensions 
The House voted down HB 1296, which would have barred the state’s pension systems from investing in firearm manufactures.

Drones
The Senate approved Senate Bill 1587, which would regulate the use of unmanned aerial drones in the state. The bill would require law enforcement agencies to obtain warrants to use drones over private property and would ban them from using drones equipped with weapons. The legislation contains exemptions for emergency situations. Drones could also be used to photograph traffic accidents and crime scenes.

Concealed carry 
The House rejected two bills this week to regulate concealed carrying of firearms. Supporters of concealed carry in Illinois are pushing for a “shall issue” licensing system that would require the state to give permits to applicants who meet the requirements set out in the law. But earlier this week the U.S. Supreme Court opted not to hear a challenge to New York’s “may issue” law. That statute allows law enforcement officials to deny applicants who may be qualified on paper for a license if they think the applicants present a danger. A “may issue” amendment came before the House on Wednesday, and members voted 31 to 76 against adopting it to a bill. On Thursday, HB 997, a more permissive “shall issue” bill, fell seven votes short of passage. Those who are working on concealed carry in the Senate expect to present legislation in the coming weeks. A federal court overturned the state’s ban on carrying firearms in public and gave lawmakers until June to pass legislation regulating carry.

The House is not scheduled for session next week. The Senate is scheduled for session from Tuesday through Thursday, which is the deadline for passing bills that originate from that chamber. Senate President John Cullerton warned there will probably be long hours next week. While lawmakers are trying to get their legislation out of each chamber before the voting deadlines, there are always ways around those deadlines for more controversial bills, such as employee pension changes, concealed carry and same sex marriage. As the adage goes, no legislation under the dome is every truly “dead.”

Concealed-carry supporters hope for vote on Thursday

By Jamey Dunn

Supporters of concealed carry of firearms hope to pass a bill on Thursday after the House today rejected a proposal similar to a more restrictive system used in New York state.

The chamber voted 31 to 76 today against adopting an amendment to House Bill 831 that would give local law enforcement officials discretion when issuing licenses to carry firearms in public. Supporters of concealed carry in Illinois are pushing for a “shall issue” licensing system that would require the state to give permits to applicants who meet the requirements set out in the law. But earlier this week the U.S. Supreme Court opted not to hear a challenge to New York’s “may issue” law. That statute allows law enforcement officials to deny applicants who may be qualified on paper for a license if they think the applicant presents a danger. Those who would like a stricter law took the court’s action as a sign that Illinois should go for a “may issue” model. But today’s vote encouraged gun rights advocates. “Now more than ever, the ‘may issue’ should be completely off the table because it was really evident that they are a long way from passing a ‘may issue,’” said Rep. Brandon Phelps, a Harrisburg Democrat.

He said he plans to call legislation for a floor vote tomorrow that is similar to House Bill 997, a concealed carry bill he introduced earlier this legislative session. “We’ve got to have something done,” he said, citing the June deadline a federal court gave lawmakers to pass concealed carry. If there is no law regulating carry when that deadline hits, the court could opt to allow what many are calling constitutional carry, which would let anyone with a Firearm Owners Identification Card carry a gun anywhere in the state.

The New York law also requires applicants to provide a reason for their need to carry in public. Such a provision was in the proposal voted down in the Illinois House today. “Our communities are different. Since you’re establishing danger distinct from other members of your community, it would be unique to your community,” said Rep. Kelly Cassidy, the sponsor of HB831. Under the legislation, sheriffs would determine whether an applicant made the case for needing to carry a firearm. “In each community, the sheriff is going the have the best understanding of the questions of personal safety in the community.” After a sheriff signed off on an application, it would then go the Illinois State Police for another round of scrutiny.

Cassidy, a Chicago Democrat, said the bill was an effort to balance constitutional rights with public safety and recognize that geographic areas of the state have different issues with guns. Supporters agreed. “The court said that it was legitimate for us to impose a balancing act to set the rights of people to be safe from guns that are out of control against the rights of people to be able to protect themselves,” said Chicago Democratic Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie. She said the measure that the House considered today “does exactly that.” Currie said during floor debate, “If you want Illinois to be the wild West, I invite you to vote against” the amendment.

But opponents say the proposal would be a way to effectively exempt Chicago from concealed carry. “Downstate will probably be more liberal with their concealed carry permit, versus Chicago and Cook County,” said Elmhurst Republican Rep. Dennis Reboletti. “I believe this is just really an end (run) around what the 7th Circuit [Court of Appeals] has stated we should do.”

Phelps said he has worked compromise into his legislation, which was being drafted late tonight. Under his previous proposal, the state police would issue concealed carry licenses, but sheriffs could contest applications. Phelps said he also plans to give that option to Chicago city police. Phelps said he also plans to increase the fee for licenses from the $25 fee in his first iteration of the plan to $100 and call for $30 from each license to go to a special fund dedicated to repairing the state’s troubled FOID card system and ensuring that county mental health records are reported to the state police. He said training requirements would also be increased from four hours in the original bill to 10 hours and would include a live ammunition test. “We’re offering a lot of things,” he said. “This version of what we’re going to try to run tomorrow is a combination of about four bills that we have had in the time that I have been here.”

Phelps said supporters of his plan believe it is a “last chance” to get a compromise before the deadline runs out. “I don’t know if there’s another chance to pass anything. I think that there’s a lot of people who are going to say, ‘Look, we tried. Let’s just go off the cliff. Let’s do constitutional carry.’” He said a lot of House members who have never voted in favor of a concealed-carry bill are afraid of that happening. “I’ve got a lot of people who are interested in voting for this that never have before because they don’t want constitutional carry.”

But gun control advocates cautioned not to read too much into today’s vote. They said they knew the support wasn’t there yet, but they think they can find backing for a bill that allows Chicago some local control. While lawmakers must get something done, they say, it isn’t crunch time yet.

“I don’t think we should just rush to do something because we’ve got a deadline,” said Coleen Daley, executive director of the Illinois Council Against Handgun Violence. “We need to make sure that whatever we’re going to do will respect people’s 2nd Amendment rights, while also keeping people safe.” She said gun control groups have not had “true negotiations” in the House but are working with lawmakers in the Senate on a proposal. “I do think there’s promise that we’ll find something that will end up working,” she says. “We’ve been willing to negotiate from day one.”

Phelps said he would spend the evening lobbying House members. He thinks he is very close to having the 71 votes he needs to pass his bill tomorrow. “This is the closest we’ve ever been.”

House considers early childhood education

By Meredith Colias

The Illinois House today considered legislation that could shape the early childhood education of some students in the state.

The chamber approved House Bill 2762, which would require children to start school if they are going to turn 7 any time during the school year. The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Sue Scherer, a Decatur Democrat, said clarifying the starting time for school-age children would help elementary schools enforce truancy laws in cases where parents take advantage of the fact that the state technically does not require their soon-to-be 7-year-old child to attend school. Scherer said parents sometimes tell truancy officers that  their children are not “really truant.”

Opponents of the bill said a parent should have the final say about when they believe their child is ready to attend school. “At this point in the child’s life, the parent can make a very wise decision based upon what they know on the maturity of the child,” said Rep. Mike Bost, a Murphysboro Republican. Bost said the measure is “forcing the situation where we, the state, feel that we are better than the parents themselves.” Scherer said the cost of the change would be difficult to estimate because it is uncertain how many affected children are not attending school. “There’s just no way of knowing until we actually we do it,” she said. Senate Bill 1307, which would move the school age from 7 to 5, could also soon come up for a vote in that chamber.

A House committee today considered the pros and cons of requiring kindergarten for all school-age children. House Bill 2405 would require all districts to provide kindergarten classes for the entire school day. More than 85 percent of school districts already offer full-day kindergarten classes to students, according to the Illinois Federation of Teachers. Paula Corrigan-Halpern from Voices for Illinois Children said that because the Common Core curriculum being introduced in Illinois schools will require children to show a broader array of learning as they progress, it is important for them to be better academically prepared early on. “There are going to be skills that kids have to master in kindergarten,” she said.

Low-income and disadvantaged children would potentially benefit the most from the proposal because they tend to be most affected academically if they do not start school at an early age. They can enter school less ready to begin subjects such as reading and math because they typically have lower vocabularies and less developed cognitive skills than their peers from higher-income homes. Better-educated parents are usually more prepared to know how to encourage their children’s early cognitive development, giving them an academic advantage when they actually enter school. The State Board of Education (ISBE) estimates that 49 percent of Illinois students live in poverty, according to a recent analysis.

 A main issue with the proposal for full-day kindergarten is the potential cost. An ISBE spokeswoman said the board does not have an estimate on the cost of extending full-time kindergarten statewide, although she said the money to implement it would potentially come from General State Aid. Laura Farr of Chicago Public Schools, which is beginning a similar initiative, estimated the citywide program would cost about $15 million and affect 30,700 children. Farr said providing early childhood education is “an essential part of getting kids a learning base.”

Mike Chamness of the Illinois Association of School Administrators said the decision to offer kindergarten classes should rest with local districts. Because the state is prorating General State Aid further from 89 percent in FY2013 to 82 percent in FY2014, he said districts could not afford to pick up the cost. “There are a lot of good ideas out there, and those good ideas cost money,” he said. Chamness said districts are already struggling with how to deal with budget cuts from the state, and many are in the process of cutting further programs and potentially laying off staff. “It’s like holding a dam: You plug a hole and another one bursts open,” he said. “That’s what local districts are facing right now.”

The committee chairwoman, Rep. Linda Chapa LaVia, an Aurora Democrat, said she supports the idea, but said lawmakers would have to resolve the money question. “It’s almost child abuse if we don’t do it,” she said. “It’s just a question of money.”

House takes test votes on assault weapons ban

By Jamey Dunn

The Illinois House took several votes on assault weapons bans today but did not approve a bill to send to the Senate.

The votes were held as part of a "Weekly Order of Business" on gun safety. Steven Brown, spokesman for House Speaker Michael Madigan, described the process last week, after the House took similar votes on pension reform: “The strategy is to test the gambit of ideas. ... Test every idea that’s out there. You’ve heard people complain over the years about not being able to vote. Well, here’s a chance to vote.”

The House approved four amendments today that call for the ban of the sales of several types of so-called assault weapons, including guns used in recent mass shootings in Connecticut and Arizona. Another amendment that passed would ban the possession or sale of high-capacity magazines, which hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition.

Opponents called the measures extreme, saying that they would severely limit residents’ access to guns. “What we have here today is just a full out attempt to ban every gun in this state,” said Harrisburg Republican Rep. Brandon Phelps. “This bans every rifle in this state.” They accused supporters of playing politics and trying to back them into controversial votes. “At the end of the day this is no about public safety this is all about politics,” said Elmhurst Republican Rep. Dennis Reboletti. “This is nothing but a political exercise to have that gotcha moment.”

But those in favor said that the weapons the amendments would ban are dangerous and should not be available to the general public. “This is not a game. We’re talking about human lives, innocent lives, and this need to be addressed first and foremost. Keep our communities safe,” said Chicago Democratic Rep. Luis Arroyo.

House preempts Quinn and approves a spending cap the day before his budget speech

By Jamey Dunn

The Illinois House kicked off its budgeting process a day before Gov. Pat Quinn is scheduled to present his budget plan.

The House approved a spending cap of $35.08 billion today, preempting the estimate that will presumably be a part of Quinn’s plan. “It ... means that if the governor walks into this chamber tomorrow, walks up to that podium and proposed to spend more than $35.081 billion, then he puts himself at odds immediately with this chamber,” said Arlington Heights Rep. David Harris, the ranking Republican on the House Revenue and Finance Committee, which produced the estimate. Rep. John Bradley, who chairs the committee, said it moved ahead because Quinn’s budget office was “all over the place” with its revenue estimates. “If the House adopts this number today, the House will have already spoken,” he said before the floor vote.

The revenue estimates approved in the last two years have been the basis for the budgets that lawmakers ultimately sent to Quinn. Those estimates were approved, however, after Quinn presented his plan. “It’s the same process we’ve used for the last two years ... and it’s the first and most crucial step in beginning the budget process,” said Bradley, a Marion Democrat. The projection means lawmakers will have more to work with than last year, when the estimate was $33.7 billion. “The revenues are expected to be stronger this year than last year, and we have significant spending pressures that we’re going to have to deal with,” Bradley said. “I think we’re going to have close to $2 billion of additional pressures this year, and that’s not including whatever may or may not have happened with regards to the contract announcement.” He said that the committee was still working to estimate the cost of the new contract for state workers. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees is in the process of ratifying the proposed three-year contract, which includes pay raises and requires employees to contribute more to their health care costs in retirement. He said the estimate also takes into account federal across-the-board budget cuts, known as the sequester, that went into effect on Friday.

The revenue committee’s estimate was created by the bipartisan legislative Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability. “We drove down into the numbers of the COGFA report, and we determined that the COGFA numbers, unlike in previous years, we believed were accurate,” Bradley said. He said he thinks the estimate will be lower than Quinn’s projection. “I anticipate and I predict we’ll be below the governor’s number tomorrow.” Quinn’s office did not respond to questions about the House’s projection.

 Harris said that several issues before the legislature could bring in more revenue next fiscal year. “There certainly are unknowns out there, and maybe those unknowns will be favorable. Depending on what we do with hydraulic fracturing and gaming and telecommunications, maybe the revenue will be higher.” But he cautioned his colleagues not to expect new spending. “While the number is big, I believe that it’s reasonable, but let’s not plan to go out and spend it right away. Because my friends, we can’t spend it on education, or health care, or assistance to the developmentally disabled, or roads or any other needed service because our pensions payment alone goes up by $1 billion. So unless we make reforms to the pension system, this $1 billion increase in revenue goes to one place, and that’s for pensions.”

The next step in the House budgeting process will be to take fixed costs, such as debt service and the pension payments, off of the top of the estimate and then dole out spending numbers to the various appropriations committees. Members of those committees then make spending decisions in their specific areas of state government, such as education. “This was the first step of a long journey we have ahead of us this year,” Bradley said.

House members propose new plan for state employee pensions

By Jamey Dunn

A group of Illinois House members are pitching a new pension reform plan, which they say they hope will move stalled negations forward.

“There is absolutely no question that the pension issue is the most serious public policy facing the state of Illinois. ... I think there is a frustration, a genuine frustration, on the part of many members of the legislature that there has not been meaningful negotiation, meaningful progress on this most serious issue,” said Rep. David Harris, who has signed on as a sponsor of House Bill 6258. Harris is joined by 20 other House members as sponsors, including one other Republican “I can tell you that there are others on my side of the aisle who feel very strongly that this bill moves us in the right direction,” said Harris, a Republican from Arlington Heights.

 The measure would:

•  Allow cost of living adjustments on only the first $25,000 of a retiree’s pension, or on only $20,000 for those who receive Social Security benefits. COLAs would not kick in until a retiree turns 67 or five years after retirement, whichever comes first. 
• Increase the retirement age for employees younger than age 46. Employees from age 40 to 45 would see a one-year increase, employees 35 to 39 would see a three-year increase and employees 34 and younger would see a five-year increase. 
• Increase the employee contribution by two percentage points, which would be phased in over two years. 
•  Limit the amount of pensionable income to the Social Security wage base, which will be $113,700 in 2013, or the employee's current salary, whichever is greater. 
• Create a hybrid 401K-type plan, also called a cash balance plan, for newly hired teachers and university and community college employees, with employer contributions and a guaranteed return on investment rate. Employees unhappy with so-called Tier 2 pension benefit could opt into this plan instead. 

Supporters say that they cannot estimate how much the bill would save until they get actuarial analysis from the state pension systems. Sponsor Rep. Daniel Biss, who developed the cash balance plan, said the bill would eliminate the unfunded liability after 30 years.

Unlike other proposals, the plan does not present employees with a choice of keeping one kind of employee benefit, such as retiree health insurance, or giving up some of the value of their pension benefit. Senate President John Cullerton has in the past said that such consideration must be given to employees for a proposal to pass constitutional muster. “The Senate president is encouraged that members are identifying ways to capture the local share of pension costs from local school districts. However, the larger proposal appears to impose unilateral pension reductions without offering voluntary acceptance by participants. We appreciate the efforts of [Northbrook Democratic Rep.] Elaine Nekritz and her colleagues, but we will take a closer look at the plan to see if it can be squared with the pension clause [of the state Constitution]," said a written statement from Cullerton's office.

Nekritz, who is spearheading the new push for reform, said the group reviewed several opinions on the constitutionality of the changes to the system. “I don’t think anyone can know in advance what the seven supreme court justices will do,” she said. “I think all of us would agree that without some changes, Illinois will be sent into fiscal oblivion, and we have to avoid that.” Backers of the new proposal said that such a choice is confusing to employees and creates uncertainty about how much a plan would save because it would be determined by which option employees picked.

The new plan includes a provision that sponsors say would ensure funding from the state. The pension systems would be able to sue if the state did not make its required contributions. “Right now, there’s no mechanism for anyone to say to the state, ‘You must make that payment,’” said Nekritz. “This would be a mechanism to allow the state pension systems to go into court and enforce that payment.”

The measure would call on school districts outside of Chicago, along with universities and community colleges, to pick up pension costs going forward, but would not require them to pay for the billions in current unfunded liability. The employers would pick up those costs at the rage of .5 percent of payroll per year. Biss, an Evanston Democrat, said of the phase in: “It’s very slow. ... The slowest of any proposal we’ve seen so far.” But Republican leaders do not seem to be warming to a cost shift, no matter how gradual. “I have met with the primary sponsors and welcome their effort to offer new ideas on moving comprehensive pension reform forward,” said Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno. “As the supporters of this latest plan themselves indicated, we need a thorough actuarial analysis to determine if it could actually solve the problem. Illinois is desperate for pension reform – for the taxpayers and for those who are going to depend on a retirement check. But it has to be comprehensive and it has to work mathematically. And it cannot allow the state to set benefits but send the bill to downstate and suburban homeowners.”

House Minority Leader Tom Cross did say that he thought the measure is a good step in renewing negotiations. “There is a lot of merit to this proposal,” Cross said in a prepared statement. He said he was glad that the choice between COLAs or subsidized health care had been removed.

A coalition of unions commended the group of House members for moving the “pension conversation forward” but took issue with the specifics of the plan. “We were not consulted in the development of this plan, but our preliminary review suggests that there are significant problems with HB 6258 that need to be worked through. The pension debt was caused by the state's failure to make actuarially adequate pension contributions, not by public employees, but like its predecessors, this proposal essentially balances the pension debt on the backs of teachers, police officers, nurses, caregivers and other public servants, both active and retired. It is also unclear at this juncture whether this proposal is constitutionally or actuarially sound,” said a written statement from the We Are One Coalition. “We intend to thoroughly analyze this proposal's elements and provide a more comprehensive response in the coming weeks.”

Gov. Pat Quinn’s reaction to the bill was positive but vague. “As the governor has said, our focus is enacting comprehensive pension reform by January 9,” said a written statement from Quinn’s office. “As we continue negotiations and discussion on how to achieve comprehensive pension reform as soon as possible, this latest bipartisan proposal sponsored by Rep. Nekritz is a welcome contribution. We have been and will continue to work closely with the legislative leaders and members of the General Assembly until we get the job done on pension reform.”

Nekritz and Biss said their goal is to get legislation approved before the current legislative session ends on January 9, but Nekritz said if that deadline is not made, it does not mean the end of the push for pension reform. “We don’t fall off a cliff on January 9, so we would be able to continue this discussion through the spring session.” Both said they are open to tweaking the bill and hope to get feedback before the legislature is back in session in early January. They said that they think the new plan has momentum in the House because it has grown out of suggestions from rank-and-file legislators. “In order to produce the kind of comprehensive solution that has enough different ingredients to make it acceptable to a majority of the House, I think it makes sense for it to bubble up from the people who are going to have to vote for it,” Biss said.

Indicted lawmaker unlikely to face House reprimand in the near future

By Jamey Dunn

There seems to be little appetite in the Illinois House to take any disciplinary action against indicted Chicago Democratic Rep. La Shawn Ford.

Ford is accused of lying to the now-defunct ShoreBank, which was located in Chicago. A federal indictment alleges that Ford, a real estate developer, told the bank that a $500,000 line of credit was for his business but instead used the money on personal expenses, including mortgage payments, campaign costs and gambling debts. Ford, who says he is innocent, faces 17 criminal counts.

But unlike former Rep. Derrick Smith, who is accused of taking a bribe in exchange for helping a business get a state grant, it appears that the charges against Ford are not directly related to his duties as a lawmaker. That may make all the difference in terms of whether Ford will face disciplinary action in the House. “We’re going to digest that and not going to do anything at the moment,” House Minority Tom Cross said of Ford’s indictment. “We’re kind of curious to see what the Democrats are going to do at the moment. We’re evaluating it right now, and we’ll take a look at it. I think there’s a distinction between Ford and Smith in that Smith’s involved his office; we’re not sure Ford’s does.”

The House voted in August to remove Smith from office. However, Smith won the general election for his former seat and plans to return to the House in January when the new legislature is sworn in.

When asked what his thoughts were on the indictment and whether Ford should be disciplined, Steve Brown, spokesman for House Speaker Michael Madigan, said, “I have no thoughts.”

Ford said he plans to stay in his position in the House and declined to discuss the indictment today. “I’ve had a great day in the legislature today,” he said. But Ford did respond in a statement on his website shortly after the indictment was made public. “This has happened quickly; I became aware of this issue not long ago. I believe I am innocent of the charges brought against me today. An indictment is an accusation, not a conviction that the law was broken. I believe I did not break the law, and I look forward to the truth being told and justice being served. My family and I are grateful for all of the support we have received during this time.”

Budget was a chamber vs. chamber battle

By Jamey Dunn

After Democratic and Republican leaders in the House aligned early on, the budgeting process for the new fiscal year that begins today became a chamber-versus-chamber showdown that was less about party allegiance and more about spending.

House Speaker Michael Madigan and House Minority Leader Tom Cross came together in March to offer testimony on a fairly simple budget plan. First, pay all the bills the state has to pay, such as the annual payment to the employee pensions system. Then, dole out the rest of the money for operations and hope that basing the plan on a conservative revenue estimate will mean that there is some extra cash on hand to pay down the state’s billions of dollars in overdue bills to schools, vendors and service providers. The House’s projection for how much the state could spend this fiscal year undercut the legislature’s own bipartisan Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability’s numbers and was about $1 billion less than the Senate’s projection. “This setting up of really very different spending plans and revenue estimates was essentially House versus Senate,” said Kent Redfield, an emeritus political science professor at the University of Illinois Springfield.

Madigan fired the first shot in the battle of the chambers the day he and Cross publicly joined forces, saying that if Senate Democrats wanted to spend more, House Democrats and Republicans from both chambers could prevail on lower spending numbers by holding the majority in a conference committee. “My expectation in this scenario would be that the House members would vote for the number that [was] approved by the House. And the Senate, I think that the people that would raise the [revenue] numbers would be the Democrats. … They ought to be outvoted,” he said. In response, President John Cullerton said the two chambers could work out their differences, and a conference committee would not be needed.

The House then set to work. Budgeting committees that plan for different areas of state government, such as education and human services, were given dollar limits and asked to make spending plans. Meanwhile, the Senate worked in its traditional fashion with only two budgeting committees tackling seemingly endless hours of testimony from agency heads, associations, interest groups and experts. The days when the majority of the budget was hammered out during long closed-door meetings among the legislative leaders and the governor seemed all but gone. “It was much more a legislative-driven than executive-driven budget. That’s unusual for Illinois. That’s very unusual for Illinois,” Redfield said.

As the House begin creating its budget based on “conservative numbers,” the potential for deep cuts loomed in the higher chamber, and Senate Democrats passed their budget proposal in a just few days without taking committee votes on their bills. Sen. Heather Steans, who chaired one of the Senate budget committees, warned during floor debate on one of the bills that her colleagues might not like the House plan. After Senate Democrats passed a number of their budget bills, Steans said: “I am certainly hopeful that these bills look very reasonable over there to our House colleagues when they are comparing them to what they’re trying to pass. … I think it might help, in fact, put some pressure on House members to think about how they’re voting if they have an alternative that is out there.”

The two chambers ended up approving plans that were about $1 billion apart. The Senate plan called for about $63 million more spending on education, $885 million more on human services and $21 million more on public safety, along with more spending on economic development and other government services. Cullerton and Madigan continued to play nice in the press. “We’re not sending any ultimatums by the adoption of this budget today. We recognize it’s a two-chamber legislature,” Madigan said when the House approved its plan.

However, in the end the House plan prevailed. Senate Democrats tried to tack on a measly — when compared with the $33.2 billion overall spending plan — $430 million in additional spending for education and human services and were shot down when Quinn, Senate Republicans and the House all roundly rejected the move. “One chamber ended up, because of [Democratic] alliances with Republicans, dominating the other,” Redfield said.

Cullerton warned that he believes the House plan is not sustainable. “There’s a number of problems with the House budget that the House is aware of, that we’re aware of, where there are under-appropriations of things that need to be appropriated,” Cullerton said. He said because cuts were made but other necessary changes were not — such as a change to Medicaid reimbursement rates and the school funding formula —some funding will be used up before the end of the fiscal year. “What will happen is, they’ll get paid the same amount of money that they would normally get paid because the formula didn’t get changed. And then sometime late in the fiscal year … they would then run out of money,” Cullerton said.

Cullerton predicted that the legislature will approve more spending in January, and other Statehouse observes agree that such a move is likely.

So why the showdown? Redfield thinks it is because Democratic leaders from both chambers had different goals for the budgeting process.

“I think Madigan believes and he’s selling to his members that they need to run [as] ‘new Democrats’—post-Blagojevich, balance-the-budget, we-can-govern new Democrats,’” he said. Redfield speculated that House leadership was trying to send a political message, while the Senate Democrats were more focused on policy. “In terms of what Madigan wanted to accomplish, both in terms of the budget itself and the process—promoting the idea that Democrats can govern—partnering with Cross made sense,” he said. “The speaker was setting up a set of numbers and an approach that [he] wasn’t going to get attacked from the right. … Ultimately, the people that want more spending didn’t have anywhere to go.”

Redfield said because the House got their work off the ground quickly and the members fell in line with the idea of a lower revenue estimate right out of the gate, the chamber was able to keep a generally unified front and push their agenda. “They had both a plan and an implementation that they got up and running more quickly, and they seemed to have more of a buy in [from members.]”

He added: “The Republicans could have tried to blow up the process, but I don’t think that was going to happen.”

Since the budget has typically been driven by legislative leadership and governors in the past, the abrupt departure of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich — not to mention his refusal to work well with others before he left — forced a change. “Blagojevich kind of blew that up, but there was nothing to replace it,” Redfield said.

The first two fiscal years after Blagojevich’s impeachment and removal from office, the legislature passed lump-sum budgets and let Quinn deal with the difficult choices that came after a national financial crisis. But this year, lawmakers wanted that responsibility — and power — back. Quinn played a marginal role in the budget process, and his plan to borrow billions of dollars to pay down the state’s growing bill backlog went all but ignored. Redfield predicts a budgeting process similar to the one that occurred this year will play out next year as well. However, he said the House Democrats’ truce with Republicans might not last once they can gauge how they fared in elections under the new legislative map. “I think it’s going to look very similar next year. The question is what does it look like for 2013?”