Gov. Rauner To Give Budget Address As Stalemate Continues
(CBS) -- After eight months of operating without a budget, tomorrow Governor Rauner outlines his state spending plan for next year.
But with the state already facing seven billion dollars in unpaid bills, that won't be easy or painless.
CBS 2's Derrick Blakley has a preview.
Illinois' budget crisis isn't so much a math problem, it's a political problem. Both sides know the state needs less spending and more revenue, but Governor Bruce Rauner wants anti-union reforms first, which Democrats reject.
The result: a crippling stalemate.
Governor Rauner admitted at a Springfield pork farmers convention it's tough to give a budget speech for a state without a budget and by law, Rauner's spending plan must be balanced.
"He will be required to work in five to six billion dollars' worth of cuts into the budget," said Emily Miller of Voices for Illinois Children.
That's more bad news for agencies serving children, the elderly and disabled, providers that haven't had any state funding for months.
Kevin Flint is a former prison inmate, now homeless, who counts on state help.
"How am I gonna pay our apartment when I haven't even gotten my first paycheck yet?" Flint said. "How am I gonna pay for such things when I'm barely sliding by?"
The non-partisan Civic Federation mapped out a financial rescue plan for Illinois.
"What we're talking about is some very tough medicine for a government that hasn't even realized it has a cold," said Civic Federation president Laurence Msall.
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The pro-business group recommends restoring the personal state income tax to five percent, seven percent for business; temporarily applying the sales tax to food, drugs and services; taxing seniors' non-social security income;
and spending cuts to pay down old bills.
The problem: Democrats rejected Rauner's first budget and instead passed one with a $4 billion hole.
"It's not enough just to reject the governor's plan," Msall said. "You have to come up with an alternative."
But Democrats chose not to produce a balanced budget, so the state drifts and bleeds. The cost of doing nothing? The Civic Federation estimates Illinois' could face a whopping $25 billion in unpaid bills in three years.
WBBM Political Editor Craig Dellimore labor leaders and workers are looking ahead to Governor Rauner's second budget address Wednesday with dread and anger.
Mary Jones, a retired library worker, joined other workers saying the governor should acknowledge that the battle over his first budget has left many people suffering.
"If he's telling the truth, the governor should say that his failure to do his job has plunged our state into a crisis," Jones said.
Chicago Federation of Labor President Jorge Ramirez admits he doesn't expect Governor Rauner's position to soften, but he has hope.
"A lot is going to have to change," he said. "You're going to have to a lot of people in his caucus that you know know better. And when they know better they're supposed to do better and what's happened is he's had such a hard grip, a tight grip on the Republican Caucus, he's kept them from making good, rational decisions that are based on good principles."
The governor's office continues to say that Democrats sent him a budget that was billions of dollars out of balance.
In the speech on Wednesday, the governor's office says Rauner will call for $4.8 billion in general state aid for K-12 education and $393 million for early childhood education.
CBS Producer Ed Marshall contributed to this report.
