Political Rewind: New Casinos and the State Budget

Editor's Note: This article was created by aggregating news articles from Illinois Statehouse News that were written by various Illinois Statehouse News reporters.

Tax hike drives Illinois budget growth

Illinois taxed residents more — instead of create more jobs — to amass about $1 billion more in revenue in 2011, according to a new report.

The Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability, or COGFA, a legislative budgeting division, reports that personal income tax revenue grew between 2010 and 2011 by $564 million, from $831 million to $1.3 billion. 

Corporate tax revenue climbed $147 million in the same budget years, from $256 million to $403 million again according to the report from COGFA.That's a 67 percent and 57 percent increase, respectively. The 67 percent collected in personal income tax revenue mirrors the 67 percent personal income tax increase.

The 57 percent collected in corporate income tax revenue is a bit more than the 47 percent corporate income tax increase approved earlier this year. 

Quinn’s Medicaid reduction means 5-month payment delay

Lawmakers balanced the 2012 state budget by dragging out Medicaid payments to 110 days. Quinn’s order June 30 to cut Medicaid spending will increase the payment cycle again, to 162 days.

Illinois hospitals had been getting paid every 30 days because of the federal stimulus, but that stimulus expired July 1.

Many of Illinois’ hundreds of other hospital were reluctant to comment about changes in Medicaid payments. The hospitals contacted by Illinois Statehouse News did not want to speak on the record.

Illinois’ safety-net hospitals — those that have a disproportionate number of Medicaid patients — “will be protected,” said Kelly Kraft, Quinn’s budget spokeswoman, though she did not specify how quickly those hospitals will be paid. 

More than a half dozen safety-net hospitals existed in Illinois in 2010, though the state Department of Healthcare and Family Services said a safety-net hospital does not have a clear definition.

Kraft said the longer Medicaid payment cycle will add to Illinois’ backlog of unpaid bills.“The budget passed by the General Assembly will push $1.4 billion in Medicaid bills into next year,” said Kraft.

New casinos could go to Quinn in October

Illinois lawmakers approved five new casinos in May, but the bill isn't expected to reach Gov. Pat Quinn's desk until October.

"I find it curious that if the House and Senate vote for something … that they don't swiftly send it on to the governor," said Quinn on Wednesday. "I am prepared to use (my veto powers). I have done it in the past, but I don't have any particular plan right now."

State senators are holding the plan to add one casino in Chicago, two in its suburbs, and one each in Rockford and Danville with a special legislative maneuver. 

The governor has expressed skepticism about the casino legislation to add five new casinos and expand gambling opportunities at racetracks and Illinois' 10 existing riverboats, yet he has not said what changes he would like to see in the bill. Quinn supports a new casino in Chicago, but not the proposed casino in Danville. Also, he's all but declared he will not allow slot machines at the racetrack at the Illinois State Fairgrounds.

Lawmakers: Court challenges, overrides likely for Quinn budget

If a lawsuit doesn’t settle questions about pay raises for state workers in the next week or so, lawmakers in Springfield say they’ll have to act in the fall veto session, said Illinois budget experts.

After Gov. Pat Quinn approved a $32.9 billion budget with $366 million in spending cuts, he told nearly 30,000 state employees that lawmakers did not include funding for their salary increases in the 2012 budget. If the state paid for them, Illinois would run out of money by spring, he said. 

“We have got to run the government, got to make sure (the money) lasts for an entire fiscal year,”  Quinn said. “I had no choice.”

Audit: Lotto manager chosing ‘flawed’

Some of the dates don’t add up for how the state chose the Northstar Group to run Illinois’ Lottery.

The state’s Department of Revenue gave Northstar, a consortium of companies that handles lottery machines in Illinois, the nod in September to take over day-to-day operations of the $2-billion-a-year lottery.The company is set to take over the lottery July 1 and has promised to generate more lotto sales, $1 billion in five years. In return Northstar could get $313 million.

But those dates are not the ones that caught the eye of Illinois Auditor General Bill Holland.  Holland on Tuesday released an audit that focuses on how the state chose Northstar.

July 1 brings new laws to Illinois

Illinois newest laws cover the spectrum from death to taxes to antifreeze.Illinois will be the 16th state to abolish the death penalty, beginning Friday.

Jeremy Schroeder, executive director of the Illinois Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, a grassroots organization that pushed for the abolition of the state’s death penalty since 1976, said Gov. Pat Quinn, who signed the bill into law in March, ordered life sentences for anyone on death row, including defendants in a handful of death penalty cases statewide.

“It’s certainly kind of a sad waste of taxpayer money, knowing that those people aren’t going to be placed on death row,” added Schroeder.