Rep. Greg Harris • 13th District
Springfield Update • February 19, 2016
Gov. Rauner’s FY17 Budget Speech
Wednesday, Governor Rauner delivered his budget speech to the General Assembly for our next fiscal year, despite having no budget for the current fiscal year. Typically, the House and Senate budget staffs and the news media are provided advance previews of the proposed budget. This year that was not done, so I am not in a position yet to offer a detailed analysis. Here are some top line items, however.
First, the Governor’s proposal is $3.4 billion dollars out of balance as presented, including an increase in the Foundation Level for K-12 education by $348, an increase of $75 million in early childhood education, and $150 million more for road programs. Childcare is restored to his pre-FY16 cut levels requiring another $300 million. These very laudable items alone represent another $873 million but have no new funding source. In addition his proposal counts on non-repayment of $454 million in prior year interfund borrowing (fund sweeps).
Next, the Governor proposed 20-25% cuts to higher education spending, and complete eliminations of many of the programs that he also tried to cut in last year’s Good Friday Massacre including The Autism Program, immigrant/refugee programs, Teen Reach, after-school and violence prevention programs, substance abuse prevention, supportive housing for non-mentally ill, homeless prevention and homeless youth services. As well there are major cuts to senior services, the Breast and Cervical Cancer program, HIV/AIDS, mental health and others. Programs which he attempted to cut last year but generated a large public backlash like Early Intervention and Child Care are restored in his FY17 proposal.
The Governor’s budget proposals are an expression of his values and priorities, but not the final product. As mentioned above, there is still a $3.4 billion shortfall which he envisions as filling with new taxes if he gets his “Turnaround Agenda” items, or with massive additional cuts. The next step is that the House and Senate in the coming weeks will hold public hearings on the Governor’s proposals, and then craft a legislative budget that will be sent to him to sign, veto totally as he did last year, or use his line item veto powers to cut those things that do not reflect his values or priorities.
This week in his speech, the Governor repeated that he would raise revenue and taxes if items in his non-budget Turnaround Agenda were passed. He also made the statement that if we passed some of these items that “In a few years we would have a balanced budget without a tax hike” because of new job growth. I don’t think the math works on this. There are no magic beans. Comptroller Munger projected recently that our unpaid bill backlog at the end of this fiscal year will be about $6.2 billion. Add to that the shortfall in the Governor’s proposed FY17 budget and you get to $9.6 billion. I do not think that changes to workers comp, 2020 legislative redistricting or tort reform will produce 4.6 million new jobs next year, which is the number of new jobs required to generate that much new revenue.
Instead, we should focus on closing tax loopholes on corporations that are not paying their fair share, such as those in HB4300 (Rep. Jack Franks) of which I am a cosponsor, or some of the recommendations from groups such as the Civic Federation and Center for Tax and Budget Accountability which lay out good menus of sound alternatives for the legislature and governor to consider.
When a more thorough and detailed analysis is ready, I will share it with you. As always, I look forward to your comments and can be reached at greg@gregharris.org.