$50 Bil. budget: Bipartisan Opposition:
2024 IL budget as voted on in May 2023
Pay Raises for IL Politicians
Let this sink in: they voted themselves a 22% increase in pay… in 5 months.
Rep. Katie Stuart, D-112, voted herself a salary where she makes $44.79 per HOUR plus plus leadership bonuses and paid travel expenses.
Initially, the legislators voted themselves a higher pay raise of 5.5% which is higher than what is Constitutionally allowed (5%). Since it was unconstitutional, Gov. Pritzker had to lower the percentage.
IL politicians say it would be unconstitutional for them to forgo a raise for politicians, however, they voted themselves this yearly raise and put it in the IL Constitution. In ADDITION to their yearly raise, they voted for themselves a pay raise in January that was outside of the 5% pay “bump.” IL Constitution also says that a member’s pay raise cannot go into effect for the term in which they were elected., but it seems IL politicians get to pick and choose which part of the constitution they follow.
Pensions are unfunded
While IL politicians claim the budget is balanced, the budget is NOT balanced. Politicians keep kicking the can and avoid making any decisions to make the pensions sustainable.
IL politicians will eventually need to make tough decisions. The problem becomes more of an issue with each passing budget. As you can see from IL State Comptroller Susana A. Mendoza, the unfunded pension liabilities keep increasing. Ms. Mendoza prides herself on fiscal transparency and gives IL residents the facts to see how IL pensions are poorly managed.
Funding for Immigrants
Initially, IL legislators budgeted quite a bit of money for non-citizens to receive free healthcare.
However, Gov. Pritzker could see this was not sustainable and had to lower the amount of funding given to Chicago. It is estimated it would cost over $1 Billion to fully fund healthcare for non-citizens.
