The Institute is cited in the following opinion piece by the Peoria Journal Star.

Only in Illinois could you end the fiscal year with $6.1 billion in red ink and have it be considered good news.

On Monday Illinois Comptroller Judy Barr Topinka said that a $1.3 billion unanticipated windfall in April allowed the Deadbeat State to pay down some of its bills — which at times have flirted with 11 figures — but that it will be a mighty short reprieve, returning to $9 billion by December.

The great danger, of course, is that some legislators will read that the state’s budget situation was marginally better for a few months and conclude that some of the painful reforms they’ve been debating are no longer necessary. Not that the Illinois species of legislator needs much excuse to do nothing when action is required.

As Topinka rightly noted, “Despite years of hand-wringing about state finances, nothing has changed. We continue to force businesses, hospitals, schools and service agencies to wait months on end for promised payment from the state. It is unconscionable” — did someone mention a conscience? — “and further highlights the importance of keeping spending flat and restoring our fiscal integrity.”

Meanwhile, more bad news on the pension front, with revelations that Illinois’ worst-in-the-nation $97 billion unfunded pension liability actually may have been low-balled. Moody’s Investors Service puts that number at least at $133 billion, and perhaps closer to $200 billion. And that first number is from fiscal year 2011 and only includes three of the state’s five major pension systems. The state has been overly optimistic in its revenue assumptions, particularly regarding its anticipated 8 percent annual investment return, said Moody’s, which now pegs it at little more than half that. The Illinois Policy Institute also has been using that $200 billion figure.

None of the proposals to address pensions in Springfield gets even remotely near addressing the true scope of the problem, with the governor establishing a July 9 deadline for a bipartisan House-Senate panel to come to some sort of agreement on a fix. Really?

Forget the Deadbeat State. The Land of Lincoln is the Laughingstock State.