Advocacy Updates

April 26, 2016

 Current list of legislative bills with potential impact to occupational therapy - click here for PDF

Springfield News, Spring 2016

Maureen Mulhall, ILOTA Lobbyist

Just When You Thought It Couldn’t Get Worse

After taking off most of the month of March (at least in the case of the House) the General Assembly returns to Springfield on April 4 for three weeks of committee and floor action before they take off the week of April 25 for Passover.  The deadline to pass bills from one chamber to the next is April 22 so the three session weeks in April will be action packed.  At this time, the General Assembly is scheduled to adjourn on May 31.  Only time will tell if they in fact adjourn on time, and if so, will the State have a budget, for either FY 16 or FY 17.

Somehow, despite not having a budget for the past nine months the state of Illinois has mostly stayed open for business.  The current situation of operating without a budget cannot go on very much longer.  Many vendors have reached the end of being able to get credit to see them through until state payments are available.  The state owes tens of millions of dollars to communities for electric and water utilities.  In fact a number of counties have started lawsuits in order to receive some of what they are owed.  Will college students be willing to commit to Illinois state colleges and universities without knowing whether grants will be available through the Monetary Award Program (MAP)?  Of for that matter, will their school even be open?  The fallout from the budget impasse continues to grow.

And just when you thought it couldn’t get worse, the revenue estimates that were projected for FY 2017 from the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability (COGFA) are alarming. COGFA, the legislative agency that has a pretty consistent record of correctly predicting anticipated revenues, has predicted that Illinois will only see $200 million in new revenues for the new fiscal year, an amount that falls far short of the need.  According to the COGFA report, corporate income taxes, sales taxes and public utility taxes won't generate as much revenue as anticipated.  This is not the news the General Assembly or the Governor wanted to hear, considering there is a $4 billion revenue gap before this development.

To add fuel to the fire, the Comptroller indicated a few weeks ago that she expected the state's stack of unpaid bills to reach $10 billion by summer.  When Governor Quinn took office there was a $10-12 billion backlog.   During the Quinn years the legislature took control of the budget process, and with the exception of the last Quinn budget year, the General Assembly tried to rein in the process by conservatively estimating revenues, setting aside funds for required payments such as pensions, health care, debt service, etc. and budgeting the remainder for programming. Over four years the bill backlog was reduced to about $4-5 billion.  Without a doubt,  the temporary income tax revenues increase helped reduce the backlog.  We are certainly going in the wrong direction fiscally to have increased the state’s liability back to more than $10 billion.  While this sum may seem insurmountable, based on past actions we know this deficit can be reduced.  But it will take the General Assembly working in concert with the Governor to make a meaningful progress.  The question everyone should be asking is how the Governor and the legislature are going to make ends meet with whatever budget they can agree on ... if that ever comes to pass.  Increasing taxes is always a tough sell in the General Assembly and in an election year it may be even tougher.

The Supreme Court To The Rescue?

The Illinois Supreme Court recently ruled that the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) members couldn't be paid back wages without a specific legislative appropriation.  Does it then hold that the same argument applies to regular wages?  How about other state contracts?  Last summer Governor Rauner told state employees that they would be paid whether or not there was an appropriation and he has kept his word.   If the courts determine that regular pay should be treated the same as their ruling on back pay, will state agencies have to shut down? Is this finally the impetus to get the Governor and legislative leaders finally working towards a real budget solution?  There are lots of questions and hurdles to be answered and overcome even with this scenario, especially where the additional needed revenue is going to come from, so it remains to be seen if this decision can be a catalyst.  Let’s keep our fingers crossed.