Saturday, June 13, 2015

Illinois governor rejects possibility of temporary budget - Yahoo News

 

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner on Thursday rejected the possibility of a short-term spending plan to keep the state operating beyond the July 1 start of fiscal 2016 if there is no deal over a full-year budget.

"An unbalanced short-term budget with no real reforms is still a phony budget and unacceptable to the people of Illinois," said a statement from the Republican governor's office.

On Wednesday, Illinois Comptroller Leslie Geissler Munger said nearly all payments handled by her office will cease on July 1 without appropriation authority contained in an enacted fiscal 2016 budget. That includes workers' paychecks and new payments to Medicaid providers.

The Illinois Hospital Association said on Thursday that a lack of state funding for Medicaid, the healthcare program for poor residents, could jeopardize access to services for children, seniors and families, and the ability of hospitals to meet their operating expenses.

"If a budget resolution does not appear likely by the end of the month, the adoption of a temporary one-month budget should be considered to preserve access to essential health services until a final budget agreement is reached," the group said in a statement.

The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31, a union local which represents 38,000 people employed by the state of Illinois, could go to court as it has done in the past to ensure workers are paid, said Anders Lindall, its spokesman, adding that an interim budget could avert a shutdown.

"Failing that, our union will be prepared to do whatever’s necessary to ensure that public services are not disrupted and public service workers are paid on time and in full," he said.

Democrats, who control the House and Senate, have passed a $36.3 billion budget that relies on cuts and at least $3 billion in yet-to-be-identified new revenue. Rauner has insisted that lawmakers approve his so-called turnaround agenda, which includes term limits and a local property tax freeze, before he will consider a tax increase.

The governor's office said a budget deal can still be reached this month with Democrats if they embrace "real reform and compromise to grow the economy."

In 2007, the Illinois legislature passed a one-month temporary budget amid a fiscal 2008 spending dispute with then-Democratic Governor Rod Blagojevich. A full-year budget was not signed into law until Aug. 23, 2007.

Illinois governor rejects possibility of temporary budget - Yahoo News

Some Democrats say Governor Rauner is 'personable' when he's not gutting services for the poor and infirm

Some Democrats say Governor Rauner is 'personable' when he's not gutting services for the poor and infirm

Posted By on 06.12.15 at 07:30 AM

Alderman Danny Solis (above) says Governor Bruce Rauner is pretty friendly for a conservative, right-wing  Republican.
  • Peter Holderness / Sun-Times
  • Alderman Danny Solis (above) says Governor Bruce Rauner is pretty friendly for a "conservative, right-wing Republican."
Governor Bruce Rauner scheduled time to meet with Chicago alderman Danny Solis on Friday, January 23, just a week and a half after he was inaugurated.
Solis says a Rauner aide got in touch and asked him to have a chat in the governor's office at the Thompson Center. Like almost every other elected official in Chicago, Solis is a Democrat, while the governor is a Republican who campaigned by attacking entrenched Democratic leaders in Springfield.
Still, members of the two parties have been known to speak before they start cursing each other's children, and the alderman welcomed the meeting. "I thought it was a good idea," Solis says.
Solis says he sat on a couch in the governor's office as they talked casually and agreed to keep the lines of communication open. "He told me there were a lot of issues that we were going to have different positions on, and he understood that I would be publicly against him, and he would appreciate some contact with his staff," Solis says.
When Rauner asked Solis for his input, the alderman says he advised him not to attack President Obama's immigration reforms, as other GOP governors have done. Rauner appeared to listen. "He is very personable," Solis says.
Unless, he adds, you're house speaker Michael Madigan or senate president John Cullerton. Rauner is ripping them by name as he tries to turn the state budget impasse into a referendum on machine politics.
"I feel that he is definitely a conservative, right-wing Republican," Solis says. "And on the issues I'm going to be more with the speaker and John Cullerton."
While Rauner pushes his "turnaround" agenda of restricting union rights and workers' compensation, he's filled his daily schedule with meetings, briefings, and phone calls around the state. And he's made it clear that he's interested in hearing from a range of elected officials.
That's the part of the story he wants you to know.
Here are the parts he doesn't: the governor is also consulting people whose names he wants to keep secret. As Ben Joravsky and I reported this week, Rauner redacted more than 150 appointments from the copies of his daily calendar that he released publicly—and that's just for the first three and half months of his tenure.
At the same time, elected officials from both parties are listed by name on his meeting schedule. But that's not all it appears to be either.
Reaching out to legislators and local officials is something Rauner should do as the state's chief executive. It's also something he wants to do as the state's political blamer in chief: it allows him to claim the high road while blasting Madigan, Cullerton, and "the legislators they control" for putting politics ahead of Illinois.
Several of the Democratic pols who met with the governor describe him as friendly and attentive—and committed to scoring points against the Democratic leadership.
A couple weeks after his talk with Solis, the governor sat down with freshman state rep Pamela Reaves-Harris, another Chicago Democrat. She says she requested the meeting after Rauner proposed axing $6.7 billion from the budget, including funds for day care and mental health services.
Reaves-Harris grew up in the former Cabrini-Green public housing development before working her way through the University of Illinois and becoming an attorney. "I wanted him to see me as evidence of what government can do," she says.
She says Rauner seemed concerned when she spoke of how social service cuts would hurt people in her near-north and west-side district. But he noted that state finances are a mess, and "he made it clear that he has an issue with legislators who have made a career out of politics."
Reaves-Harris argues the state needs to bring in more money, yet the governor won't discuss it while his probusiness proposals flounder in the Democratic legislature. "Most of the conversations he's having in the public are more about his turnaround agenda, and I have a problem with him holding the budget hostage."
Cook County commissioner Richard Boykin also made the governor's appointment calendar, on March 13. Boykin says he too requested a meeting so he could ask the governor not to cut mental health funding.
He was pleased when Rauner agreed to declare May 31 "No Stigma Sunday" as a way to encourage people to seek help for mental health issues. "He not only responded to me verbally—he responded in deed," Boykin says.
But when May 31 came around, the governor was fighting with Madigan and Cullerton as the deadline to pass a budget came and went. His office didn't even send out a press release about "No Stigma Sunday."
Boykin argues that legislators should give the governor something he wants—as long as he agrees to sign off on a tax increase on the wealthy to pay for social services. "That's called compromise."

FROM:  http://www.chicagoreader.com/Bleader/archives/2015/06/12/some-democrats-say-governor-rauner-is-personable-when-hes-not-gutting-services-for-the-poor-and-infirm