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State lawmakers react warmly to Peoria's pitch for middle class housing help, but budget realities could complicate things

A sold sign hangs in front of a house in Brighton, N.Y., on Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2023.
Ted Shaffrey
/
AP
A sold sign hangs in front of a house in Brighton, N.Y., on Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2023. Increased incentives to develop and buy "missing middle" housing is a key feature of the City of Peoria's 2025 legislative agenda.

Peoria-area lawmakers have come to expect a couple of things each January: chilly weather, and a new list of legislative asks from local governing bodies.

Elected officials gathered on a cold Wednesday morning in downtown Peoria's Gateway Building to hear out the annual list of legislative requests from the city, county, and health department.

The Peoria City Council unanimously adopted their joint 2025 legislative agenda with the county Tuesday night. Municipalities use legislative agendas to give state legislators an idea of the capital funding requests and bills they’re pushing for in the coming year.

This year’s agenda includes many long-running asks, like protecting the local share of tax revenue and reforming public safety pensions. It also highlights requests for “missing middle” housing and Safe-T Act revisions.

WCBU spoke with several Illinois lawmakers before the annual legislative breakfast to get an idea of where the region’s representatives stand on some of these requests.

Housing assistance for the 'missing middle' finds bipartisan support

The city’s legislative agenda includes a suite of suggestions for addressing a housing need the document refers to as the “Missing Middle.” That designation includes residents earning between 80 and 140% of the area’s median income (approximately $52,000 to $91,000 based on U.S. Census data).

“The challenge with not only low-income housing, but with affordable housing in that range of people that are making from $50,000 a year up to $100,000 a year, is do we have enough housing?” Peoria city manager Patrick Urich told WCBU last week. “I think last summer when we looked at this, we only had somewhere in the area of 250 houses for sale in the region. So, we need more inventory to be able to support the housing needs of the community.”

The proposed solutions include tax credits to encourage the rehabilitation and sale of single family homes, as well as the development of new multi-family workforce rental housing. The document also proposes a partnership between the state and regional land banks to speed up the acquisition and construction process.

“Home ownership is one of the best things about America,” said Republican Sen. Chris Balkema, a former Grundy County Board chairman representing portions of Peoria. “And I think anybody that can be able to buy a home versus renting a home is going to put the money ahead in the future.”

Republican Sen. Li Arellano, a former Dixon mayor now representing the 37th District, calls housing an “overlooked” part of economic development.

“That hurts our ability to pull in large employers,” he said. “They’re looking at what the housing population is and what the employee population is.”

State senators Dave Koehler, D-Peoria and Neil Anderson, R-Andalusia agreed, increasing housing availability is important. However, Koehler said spending on new programs may be a tall order, with a looming budget deficit in fiscal year 2026.

“It’s going to be a tough budget this year, so we have to keep that in mind, because we do have to make some pretty drastic cuts,” he said. “But, certainly, housing is the top priority for many of us.”

Anderson sees the issues as connected, claiming economic development means a wider tax base and a start to solving the state’s financial issues.

Lawmakers roundly expect a tough state budget this year

Looming over any legislative requests is a projected deficit in the state’s fiscal year 2026 budget of $3.2 billion. The fiscal year starts in July.

A report from Capitol News Illinois points to several possible causes of the deficit. Those reasons include the end of one-time COVID-related federal funding, a “true-up” process correcting a 2021 tax overestimation by the Illinois Department of Revenue and a slowing economy.

Capitol News Illinois identifies health and human services as the majority of projected spending increases in 2026, at least partially due to the end of one-time FEMA reimbursements of Medicaid and state health care plans.

Republican Neil Anderson points to past health spending, specifically the state’s healthcare programs for noncitizen immigrants, which the Pritzker administration projected to total as much as $1.1 billion in fiscal year 2024.

“We need to stop doing that. We need to prioritize our own citizens,” said Anderson. “And you ask any one of my constituents, or anyone in this room what they could do with a billion dollars, and there’d be a lot of things before what we’re spending it on in Springfield.”

Proponents of the noncitizen healthcare program have argued the benefits to the labor force and capping enrollment help offset the cost.

Overall, Anderson says his confidence in a balanced budget is “low” heading into the process. He touts “pro-growth” policies, like lower taxes and worker incentives like removing taxes on overtime pay, as the way forward. He also says cuts need to come from legislators with “intestinal fortitude.”

Every lawmaker at Wednesday’s breakfast told WCBU they're ready to make cuts.

“We will have a balanced budget. No doubt about that,” said Koehler. “There will be some cuts. There will be some painful cuts. I’m afraid that’s a big deficit to have, but, you know, that’s what we have to do.”

Li Arellano and Chris Balkema are both newly elected to their positions. This will be their first budget process.

“It will be a challenge,” said Arellano. “The difficulty for the state is they kind of got used to the federal government’s COVID spending for a number of years. Was using that to balance the budget. That’s not going to be there anymore. So there’s going to be some very hard decisions to be made.”

Arellano also mentions spending on migrants in Illinois, education spending and the possibility of the end of federal matching programs under returning President Donald Trump as issues facing budget talks.

“I’m of the position that if the federal government pulls back from some of that spending, the state will need to as well, because we simply don’t have the money to make up the difference,” he said.

Balekma says the state needs to “tighten their belts,” particularly when it comes to state agencies.

“We need to become more efficient,” he said. “And I am very comfortable we can do that. I’m not going to go try and cut specific programs or organizations carte blanche. But I think, on the other hand, we can ask everybody to look for ways to increase the efficiency of their operations and reduce costs, and do that through people, not around them, I think we’ll get much more buy in.”

Like Anderson, Balkema also voices support for policies that stimulate Illinois business development as a path to overall growth and, eventually, a balanced budget.

The city wants pretrial detention to be mandatory for certain felony offenses

The city/county 2025 legislative agenda includes requests for a handful of changes to the SAFE-T Act. The controversial bill introduced sweeping justice reform and ended the practice of cash bail in Illinois.

The agenda suggests making pretrial detention mandatory for Class X, Class 2, and Class 1 felonies. It also recommends elevating the potential penalties for crimes like a felon in possession of a firearm, motor vehicle theft, fleeing and eluding police, vehicular hijacking, and possession of a stolen motor vehicle.

“We have to decide here if we are more interested in coddling criminals and allowing errant juveniles and their criminally negligent parents to slide, or if our priority in Peoria is protecting our law-abiding citizens,” said 2nd District council member and mayoral candidate Chuck Grayeb at Tuesday night’s council meeting.

Dave Koehler was noncommittal on the suggested changes, but assured continued discussion on the legislation. He pointed out multiple trailer bills have already made changes to the SAFE-T Act.

“We’ll get some legal advice on it. Get some input from my colleagues,” he said. “You know, I’m one of 177 people. So, you know, it takes a lot of people, having a like mind, to be able to make those kind of changes.”

Neil Anderson, who represents Pekin and much of western Peoria County in Springfield, took a harder stance towards the SAFE-T Act than the city.

“I’m going to be introducing a bill here this month that’s a complete repeal of the SAFE-T Act,” he said. “We at the very least, if not repeal it, need to start from scratch. We do need to address a lot of the things our officers are talking about.”

Anderson argues the SAFE-T Act has played a role in staffing issues, saying retention and recruitment at police departments is down because the state government treats them “really, really bad.”

Anderson says his caucus is all for repealing the SAFE-T Act and he believes some Democrats “quietly” agree.

Republican Senators Li Arellano and Chris Balkema also voiced concerns the current SAFE-T Act is too “lenient” or “liberal” when it comes to determining pretrial detention.

Since September 2023, prosecutors in Peoria County have filed 271 petitions for pretrial detention. 76% of those were granted, according to data from the Office of Statewide Pretrial Services.

Collin Schopp is a reporter at WCBU. He joined the station in 2022.