Next week, Governor Bruce Rauner will introduce a new spending plan for Illinois. But that’s supposed to focus on the next fiscal year. He’s also got to worry about the current budget.
Imagine a sunny, hot Illinois summer day. That’s when state agencies are supposed to be running out of money. At the end of the fiscal year, in June. Not now, when it’s snowy and cold. And yet today there’s no more money for a subsidized day care program, or to pay prison guards. The budget lawmakers passed last spring, when Rauner was still a candidate, was intentionally incomplete.
“I agree with the governor that we’ve got a serious problem with the fiscal condition and it ought to be addressed. The first order of business ought to be the deficit in the current budget.”
That’s House Speaker Michael Madigan, who says the legislature has previously given governors extraordinary authority to unilaterally manager budget situations. Rauner has asked for the same sort of control. Discussions are underway to see whether Democrats in the legislature will agree to give it to him.
