Good morning everyone, I just wanted to provide a quick update on the now completed Veto Session that wrapped up last Thursday evening.
There was little movement on the budget, as expected, during Veto Session. However, a House resolution sponsored by Rep. Dave McSweeney that stated the House was opposed to passing an income tax increase in any Lame Duck Session (which is now scheduled for Jan. 9 & 10), was passed by the House. Though this does not mean the General Assembly (GA) is legally prohibited from passing a revenue enhancement in order to facilitate the passage of a budget before the start of the next GA on Jan. 11, the chances are slim.
Some legislation did in fact pass the GA this past week, though none of it budget or revenue related. A highlight was the passage of Rep. Lou Lang and Sen. Kim Lightford’s legislation, SB 261, that protects people with disabilities and their personal assistants from service restrictions and limitations that the governor is attempting to impose by administrative rule. You can see the legislation here.
Lowlights of the session included failed override attempts of several of Governor Rauner’s vetoes, including, but not limited to:
On the budget front, while no legislation was proposed for a state budget (reminder, the state’s Stopgap Appropriations bill was designed only to go through the end of December), the governor and legislative leaders from each party, as well as Speaker Madigan’s designated Chief Budget Negotiator for House Democrats, Rep. Greg Harris, have been conducting meetings centered around the budget, but reportedly largely focused on the governor’s legislative agenda. It was reported that the governor demanded legislation on Workers’ Compensation Reform and Term Limits before allowing a budget to go through, and also that he would not support any further stopgap appropriations. These talks will continue through the break.
Both the House and Senate are scheduled to reconvene for a Lame Duck Session (the last session days of the current, 99th GA) Jan. 9 & 10 of 2017, with the inauguration of the new, 100th GA taking place on Jan. 11.
BudgetWatch is a weekly update from the AIDS Foundation of Chicago's on-the-ground team in Springfield about the state's longstanding budget impasse. Follow along at aidschicago.org/budgetwatch.
Categorized under BudgetWatch.
