Proposed legislation a $700 million ‘stop-gap’ for various human service agencies

SPRINGFIELD — An Illinois House committee has given preliminary approval to legislation to spend $700 million to help out financially strapped human services.

The House Human Services Appropriations Committee OK’d the measure on a unanimous vote Wednesday.

However, Rep. Patti Bellock, R-Hinsdale, cautioned that Republicans were given late notice of the measure and hadn’t had a chance to thoroughly review it yet.

Rep. Greg Harris, D-Chicago, said the bill is a stop-gap measure like legislation approved by the General Assembly to get partial funding to universities and community colleges. In this case, though, about $700 million is being directed to a variety of human services programs that aren’t covered by consent decrees or court orders that have kept much of state spending going out the door even without a budget.

“We hope that this will be a stop-gap measure that we hope will be able to make whole all of the agencies who have been providing services to our seniors, people with disabilities, disabled children, immigrants, refuges, all down the list,” Harris said. “We acknowledge there are many other needs of the state in other departments not covered in this legislation.”

Harris said the spending in his measure does not rely on general state taxes to cover the costs. Instead, most of the money comes from the Commitment to Humans Services Fund that was set up as part of the temporary income tax hike and contains unspent money. The rest of the spending is covered by tapping into other dedicated state accounts that are supposed to be used for human services-related programs, like the Foreclosure Prevention Program.

Harris said a “ballpark figure” is his bill would provide 46 percent of the spending those programs covered by the legislation would have seen this fiscal year. Illinois has been without a budget since the fiscal year began July 1.

Harris attached his proposal to Senate Bill 2038, which already passed the Senate and provides money to human services programs. However, the Senate version didn’t cover as much spending as Harris’ plan.

Gov. Bruce Rauner “supports full-year funding for human services, public safety and public health in the context of a complete balanced budget for fiscal years 2016 and 2017,” spokeswoman Catherine Kelly said.

Administration officials said the bill doesn’t address spending problems faced by the Department of Corrections, which is unable to pay vendors who provide food and other supplies to state prisons.

They’re also concerned that the bill may signal that House Democrats are preparing to pull out of talks going on by rank-and-file lawmakers that reportedly are producing progress toward a budget agreement.

The administration is being sued by dozens of human services providers who say they were issued contracts to provide services but have not been paid for those services because of the budget stalemate.

Home health workers

Also Wednesday, the Senate approved legislation to set the pay for home health workers and personal assistants at a minimum of $15 an hour.

Sen. Mike Hastings, D-Tinley Park, said the bill would provide about a $2-an-hour raise to those workers.

“The job these people do is not a job you would even consider doing,” Hastings said. “On average, they get paid a very, very small amount of money.”

Republicans complained about the cost of the bill. They said the raise will cost the state $90 million more a year, money the state does not have.

Hastings argued that half of the cost would be covered by federal Medicaid.

The bill must still be approved by the House.