SJR: State Can Balance Budget without Tax Hike, Borrowing
Kristina Rasmussen has an op-ed featured in the State Journal-Register. She outlines the path the legislature should take to balance our state's budget.
For Illinois legislators, it’s a time for choosing. The clock on the regular legislative session is ticking down. When legislators return to Springfield later this month, they’ll be reminded that some choices will be harder than others. How we handle this year’s $4.7 billion budget deficit will continue to be one of the most difficult questions facing state leaders. Other choices, like throwing a lifeline to 30,000 kids in Chicago’s worst performing public schools, should be no-brainers. Both will require courage from legislators to stand up to entrenched interests and do what is right for Illinois’s future.
Illinois hasn’t balanced the books in almost a decade, leaving us with $6 billion in past-due debt. On top of that, Gov. Pat Quinn proposed a budget that relied on borrowing an additional $4 billion. This fiscal irresponsibility is unsustainable and shortchanges future generations.
Some commentators continue to insist that a tax hike is the solution to our troubles. Though Illinois’s economy is hemorrhaging, they want to bleed the patient even more. Sapping more resources from families and businesses — the money used to keep the lights on or make payroll — is the last thing this state needs. What would go from your family budget if the state sent a tax bill significantly larger than the one you’re already paying? What happens to the small business next door when the money you would have spent in the store goes to state coffers instead?
Illinois can balance its Fiscal Year 2011 budget without revenue increases or new borrowing. To prove it, the Illinois Policy Institute put together “Budget Solutions 2011,” a line-by-line alternative budget. By focusing on spending realignments, right-sizing government labor costs and pension funding reform, we came up with a sustainable path to fixing our state’s mounting budget woes.
Cutting spending isn’t easy. It never is. That’s why our budget’s spending decisions were based on four principles: setting priorities, spending fairness, transparency and accountability, and last in/first out.
With these guideposts, we funded core services and even increased resources for programs like general state aid for K-12 education, MAP grants for college students and the Statewide Sexual Assault Evidence Collection Program. We’ve put our numbers online in a downloadable spreadsheet; if you don’t like our allocations, try making your own budget at IllinoisPolicy.org.
Some will call these recommendations “radical.” Try “reasonable.” Many of the ideas outlined in Budget Solutions 2011 are already being pursued in other states. For example, Gov. Chris Christie, R-N.J., is reducing transit subsidies, cutting low-priority boards and commissions, and tackling public employee retirement benefit costs. Gov. Bob McDonnell, R-Va., is reducing state employee pay and addressing Medicaid costs. Christie and McDonnell are working to tackle their deficits without tax hikes — so should Illinois.
State Rep. Jack Franks, D-Marengo, has a good idea in what’s called “zero-based budgeting.” Under this approach, the state doesn’t assume the continuation of spending from the previous year. Rather, we start at zero and grow the budget based on a comprehensive review of what we can afford, what is a need versus a want, and what works.
Illinois can return to its glory days as an economic colossus, but that will require leaders who are willing to stand up for spending restraint and budget process reform. If New Jersey can put its reputation as a budgetary basket case to rest, so can we.
Even as fiscal matters soak up much of legislators’ attention, they have a golden opportunity to pass life-saving policy independent of the budget.
Faced with persistently failing public schools in his area, the Rev. Sen. James Meeks, D-Chicago, introduced legislation earlier this year that would give kids in Chicago’s worst-performing and most-overcrowded schools an opportunity scholarship to go to a school of their choosing.
The voucher legislation, Senate Bill 2494, wouldn’t have grown the budget or diverted resources from suburban and downstate schools. No tax hike is needed, either. Rather, state money that already flows to Chicago Public Schools would follow the child to his or her new place of learning. Legal experts weighed in on the bill’s constitutionality, and a comprehensive survey of academic research by my colleague Collin Hitt found that both students who use vouchers and the public schools affected by them improve academically. School choice creates a rising tide that lifts all boats.
Meeks’ voucher legislation passed the Senate in March on a 33-20 vote with support from Democrats and Republicans. When Rep. Kevin Joyce, D-Worth, put the legislation up for a vote on May 5 in the House, the bill won enough support to be brought up for consideration in the future. Legislators can send that bill to the governor’s desk when they come back this May.
Now, more than ever, Illinois is at a crossroads. We can’t afford to kick the can down the road again. Lawmakers should return to Springfield and pursue the fresh ideas that will put our budget in order and do right by Illinois’s most disadvantaged children. It’s their job.
Kristina Rasmussen is executive vice president of the Illinois Policy Institute.