Return we now to Springfield, for while we’ve been gnashing our teeth about the goings-on in the nation’s capital there’s been a bipartisan breakthrough in Illinois.
OK, a potential breakthrough.
Don’t want to get ahead of ourselves. After all, the entire country is dividing into extremes not seen since the late ’60s. The ascent of President Donald Trump, of partisan media, of everybody’s-an-expert digital sloganeering, is fast eroding the old deliberative order. The center is not holding.
But lo, what light through Springfield window breaks?
It’s a state budget compromise proposed by Senate President John Cullerton, D-Chicago, and Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno, R-Lemont.
That’s right, Democratic and Republican leaders have actually agreed on something. Not just the time of day, mind you, but a raft of interlocking legislation — 13 fat bills to be exact — that attempts to give Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner some of what he wants, to give teachers and state employees some of what they want and, most important, to give fiscally stricken Illinois a real budget after almost two years of going without.
Trouble is, politics along Springfield’s Sangamon River has not been immune to the winner-take-all fever that has swept up the Potomac in Washington. No sooner did Sens. Cullerton and Radogno surface their handiwork in January than did our state’s competing constituencies line up to take whacks at the pieced-together pinata.
"Act now to stop a ‘grand bargain’ that would give in to some of Rauner’s reckless demands!" thundered the Illinois Federation of Teachers, likely fearful of the two-year local property tax freeze contained in the proposal.
"The package on the whole is very much a net negative for the business community," harrumphed Todd Maisch, president and CEO of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce. The chamber especially doesn’t like new taxes on services such as dry cleaning, a new payroll tax on small business and restoration of the state’s income tax to just under 5 percent for individuals, 7 percent for corporations.
Gov. Bruce Rauner speaks to the Tribune editorial board
Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner speaks to the Chicago Tribune editorial board at Tribune Tower on Feb. 1, 2017. (Abel Uribe / Chicago Tribune)
Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner speaks to the Chicago Tribune editorial board at Tribune Tower on Feb. 1, 2017. (Abel Uribe / Chicago Tribune)
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And so it goes. When lawmakers return to Springfield on Tuesday, the governor’s allies will fume that items from his proposed "turnaround agenda," such as reforming the decennial remap process, are nowhere to be found. And that other items have been watered down, such as imposing term limits only on legislative leadership positions and not on all the lawmakers as Rauner wanted.
Opponents of legalized gambling will mobilize against giving Chicago permission to build a casino to fund police and fire pensions. Most loudly of all, state workers unions — emboldened by court decisions that their pension benefits are sacrosanct — will fight a proposal that they trade away their guaranteed-but-unsustainable pension cost-of-living increases for a different kind of guarantee: that future pay raises will count when computing those pensions.
The unions’ standoffish attitude may change, however, now that Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan has asked the courts to vacate an order that state workers get paid on time, even though, without a budget in place, other state contractors and institutions have been getting IOUs. Many of those IOUs, incidentally, carry late payment penalties that by July are expected to add $700 million to the whopping $15 billion in bills that are past due.
Illinois’ fiscal mess is so bad, and deteriorating so quickly, that the single biggest obstacle to the Grand Bargain might even move out of the way. That would be the personal animus between our Republican governor and House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago. Many think the two are willing to let the crisis deepen for two more years so they can blame one another during the 2018 campaign. So eager are they for this showdown that they soon may agree — gasp! — to protect pay for essential state workers and let the rest go begging.
That would be madness.
A bipartisan budget compromise has been placed on the table in Springfield. Nobody likes all of its many moving parts. Nobody.
So tinker with the details if you must, fellas, but do not walk away. Help find the center. Then hold it.
John McCarron teaches, consults and writes on urban affairs.
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