Week of February 18, 2008

    Last week, we spent the first three working days of the 2008 spring session mostly in committee hearings. Hundreds of bills have been assigned to committees to start the process of winding their way through the bicameral legislative process. Once legislation receives a favorable vote in committee, then the bill moves to the House floor for an eventual vote. If the legislative proposal receives a majority vote on third reading, it is passed over to the second chamber for action. After the same committee procedure and another successful majority vote in the second chamber, the proposal might make it to the Governor’s desk for either his approval, or perhaps an amendatory or even full veto. If he vetoes the measure, we return in the fall during the veto session to either accept or attempt to override a veto.

    There are several important deadlines regarding this process. For example, last Friday, February 15th was the deadline to introduce House Bills. Of course, dozens of “shell bills” were introduced prior to this “deadline” that will serve as vehicles for substantive language later in the year. A “shell bill” really has nothing in the legislation except a title and a few lines related to the type of legislation that it could contain. March 14th is the “deadline” for bills to be acted upon in House Committees and April 18th is the “deadline” to pass bills from the House to the Senate. After that, basically, Senate bills come to the House for action and House bills go to the Senate for action. We are supposed to be finished and have acted on a budget by the end of May.

    The Governor is scheduled to give his Budget Address on Wednesday, February 20th at noon. This is actually the first step in the budget process. Last year that process which started in February of 2007, did not end officially until January of 2008. A budget was not passed until August 10th and the final action on implementation came after the New Year.

    There is a lot of speculation surrounding the Governor’s Budget proposal for FY09. By all accounts, Illinois is facing a very large deficit at the end of FY08. Many experts say the deficit will be well over $2 billion. Comptroller Dan Hynes has confirmed that Illinois had $1.7 billion in unpaid bills as of December 31st, 2007. That only marks half way through the fiscal year. In addition, revenue estimates included in the FY08 budget are expected to fall several hundred million dollars short of expectations. Some nursing homes and many Medicaid providers are several months behind on payments received from the State and increases in scheduled pension payments in FY09 would easily consume any projected increases in State revenue.

    The bottom line is that Illinois is facing a very difficult budget year. It will be interesting to see what approach the governor takes in his Budget Address. He is known for proposing huge amounts of increased spending on education and health care. He is also known for then proposing revenue sources like the Gross Receipts Tax (GRT) to pay for these spending proposals. He is also well known for demonizing somebody or some group during his Budget Address. There is much speculation surrounding this budget address. I will provide my perspective next week after we hear what he has to say. I hope that he realizes that in order to get out of the hole we are in it is important that we stop digging deeper!

    The Governor has also become known for implementing his desired spending priorities even when the General Assembly does not include the item in the final budget. We could go back to the first couple of budgets of his administration when he authorized spending for embryonic stem cell research by “executive order” and find example after example of this defiant attitude. Last year though, he may have crossed the line that even his party will not tolerate when he implemented health care expansion that was not included in the final budget “by rule”. When the legislative Joint Committee on Rules (J-CAR) rejected his rules, the Governor began expansion anyway.

    JCAR is a bi-partisan committee which was established by legislative authority and is supposed to meet to approve rules written by various executive agencies. The rules are designed by the agencies to allow for legislation which has passed both houses and been signed by the governor to be implemented according to legislative intent. This process has worked for decades.

    However, now that the governor has stated that he does not want to follow the decisions of J-CAR and will implement public policy without legislative approval, the Speaker has written an amendment that is being attached to all new legislation that moves through the House of Representatives. The amendment is well worded and too long to include here. What the amendment does is simply state that the governor or any executive department or agency cannot make any in change legislation through rule-making.

    This appears to be the Speakers first effort to reign in the Governor this year. I am sure we will see a continuation of the problems that were evident last year. More next week!

    Your questions or comments are always welcome. Write to me at either P.O. Box 125, Hutsonville, IL 62433, or 222-N, Stratton office Building, Springfield, IL 62706, or you can e-mail me at reddyunit1@aol.com. I will also keep you updated on my web site: www.peopleforeddy.com