November 17, 2008
With the 2008 election now behind us, the Illinois House of Representatives will convene November 19ththrough the 21st in what is commonly referred to as the “Fall Veto Session”. Normally, this session covers two weeks and lasts for around 6 days. This year, that two week planned schedule has been whittled to one week. The reason for the reduction is that the Illinois House has met several times in special session to consider budget veto issues since our original adjournment date in the late spring. During those dates, the Speaker decided that it was prudent for the House to use the time we were called to Springfield to address other vetoes issued by the Governor. That action by the Speaker resulted in the need for less days in the Fall Veto Session. More>>
Although the fall session is commonly referred to as a “Veto Session”, the work of the General Assembly during the fall session is not limited to legislation that was vetoed by the Governor. Any legislation can be advanced during these three days as long as posting requirements are met during the time table of the session. That means that any legislation that was introduced during the spring or that might be introduced during these 3 days can be acted upon.
The fact that the “Veto Session” is not limited to vetoed legislation is complicated by the fact that the House has “lame duck” legislators finishing their two year term if they did not run for re-election, were defeated in the November 4th election or might be thinking of leaving their current position to go to Washington to work in the newly elected President’s Administration. We already know that the Governor needs to fill a now-vacant Illinois Senate seat. Suffice it to say that there is a lot of jockeying going on that could result in many lame ducks this fall.
Members, of the 96th General Assembly are scheduled to be sworn in during a ceremony in Springfield onJanuary 14th, 2009. The Speaker has scheduled two more days for the 95th Illinois House to finish any final business on January 12th and 13th. By then, even more changes could occur to House membership and there could be more lame ducks to vote on legislation those two days that is “leftover business”. It is important that we stay on our toes this time of year and watch for legislation related to controversial issues to surface. Lame duck sessions are known for surprises and this session plus the two days in January could be the lamest of all! You can track legislation at www.ilga.gov There are already bills posted in several committees for consideration next week and all you need to do is click on “Committees” under the House or Senate heading and you can check out all of the legislation. If there is an issue that you are concerned about, contact me by e-mail:reddyunit1@aol.com
Adding to the lame duck factor is that in both the Senate Republican and Democratic Caucuses, members are in the process of electing a new leader. The battle for these coveted leadership positions is intense. Deals are being made and alliances created within those caucuses that will carry over into the spring session and the next General Assembly. No matter what, most observers expect a much different climate next year without long-time Senate President and strong Blagojevich ally Emil Jones in charge of the Democrats. It is Jones that formed an alliance with Governor Blagojevich which has frustrated Speaker Madigan and others within the Democratic party. It will be interesting to see who replaces Jones. Whomever it is, the first order of business is to figure out how to heal the deep divide between the Governor, and the House Speaker.
The Senate Republicans are also in the midst of electing a new caucus leader as Frank Watson has resigned that post due to health concerns. While that caucus, which still has 22 members after the fall election, may not be considered as important of a factor since they are in the “super-minority”, it is still very important to their members and many observers as to who is elected Minority Leader. All of the contenders for the Senate Democratic top spot have pledged to work with the Senate Republicans next year and the new Minority Leader will have a seat at the table as the spring session unfolds.
As far as the House is concerned, both Speaker Madigan and Minority Leader Tom Cross will be re-elected as caucus leaders. But, there will be changes in other leadership positions within those caucuses as we head into the spring session due to retirements and election losses.
The main focus of the three day veto session will likely be the budget problems that we face here in Illinois. The budget that was passed by the Democrats in the spring was grossly out of balance. The Governor made cuts and the General Assembly restored spending to many of those cuts. However, just because line items are restored to the spending side of a budget does not mean that the revenue to pay for the spending will materialize. That is what has happened in Illinois. Since the beginning of the Blagojevich Administration, the Illinois budget has been out of balance by billions of dollars. The revenue to meet the record spending has been borrowed, raided from pensions and other dedicated funds (like teacher retirement), bonding schemes (which are the target of federal investigations), or obtained by selling state assets. Most of those budgets included new spending to satisfy a never ending appetite for the government to do more for people and many of the programs sound great. The problem is that just like putting everything in the cart at the store that you want or looks good, there comes a time when it must be paid for. Illinois has run up a deficit that is likely truthfully between $4-5 Billion if bills are paid on time.
The irresponsible budget practices of the Governor and Democratic majority started several years ago. The fact that the economy is faltering, while a factor, has only a little to do with our budget problems in Illinois. Our budget was unbalanced before the downturn and we are now facing what State Comptroller Dan Hynes calls a crisis. He warns that the state may not be able to pay for fuel for State Police cars or other basic day to day spending. We have been warning about this possibility for a while now. Don’t believe for one second the budget problems we face in Illinois are caused solely by the national economy.
The real question is how we finally deal with the problem. That will take leadership and tough choices. I am ready to go to work for the people of the 109th district in the next General Assembly to help solve these problems and others. There will not be easy decisions to turn this around but I will pledge my involvement in a bi-partisan effort to get us back on the right track. More next week on how we started to address these issues during the three day veto session. In the meantime, I look forward to hearing from you.