NW Illinois News

State Rep. Win Stoller (R-Peoria) recently used a Senate Appropriations, Revenue and Finance Committee hearing to press for clarity about operations in the Governor’s Office of Management.

“Can you give some background as to why some (employees) are funded through GRF and others are funded through other sources,” Stoller asked Director Alexis Sturm about the agency’s 60 employees. “I was looking at some of the headcount numbers, correct me if I’m wrong, but it looks like you have about 60 employees and 34 are funded through GRF and the other 26 are (paid through) other funds.”

With Sturm explaining that operating funds from other sources such as the Capital Development Fund, the Build Illinois Bond Fund and the GATA Fund are routinely used to cover such obligations, Stoller moved on to seek answers about what funds may be left from the roughly $7.5 billion in ARPA funds recently received by the state.

“I would have to check but there's probably about $7.5 billion that has been unspent,” Sturm said. “More has been appropriated but that's what's the unspent balance is. It’s in the state’s Cure Fund.”

With somewhere in the neighborhood of $8.3 billion allocated to the state in total, Sturm said about $3.5 billion of that remains uncommitted. He later said nothing has been decided as of yet when it comes to how those funds will be used, though the state’s unemployment insurance trust fund and support for the healthcare industry, small businesses and public health needs have all been identified as potential uses.

Stoller’s questions came just days before Gov. J.B. Pritzker took the stage at the Old State Capital to deliver his annual budget and State of the State address, where he unveiled his new $45.4 billion spending plan.

While saying that the plan would save taxpayers as much as $1 billion in tax cuts while increasing resources for public safety, the governor said "the state of our great state is strong, unbreakable and enduring.”

Pritzker also highlighted several state initiatives enacted on his watch that he credits with improving the state’s overall financial standing, including two credit upgrades and reducing a backlog of bills.

“I made a promise,” Pritzker said. “I said budgeting will not be done any more by taking the state hostage, or by court orders, consent decrees and continuing appropriations but instead by debate and compromise and a return to regular order.”

By the governor’s estimates, the state ended the most recent fiscal year with a $1.7 billion surplus. Pritzker also highlighted the “Illinois Family Relief Plan,” a tax reduction plan that his office said will save state residents at least $1 billion by eliminating a 1% sales tax on groceries for 2023 and keeping the gas tax unchanged over that same period. The plan also includes a one-time property tax rebate.

“The Family Relief Plan can’t solve all the challenges of global inflation, but we can do our part to alleviate some pressure on Illinois’ working families,” he said.

Pritzker’s plan also includes $9.6 billion in contributions to the state's pension systems, along with $1.4 billion in pension buyouts, representing the first time in well over two decades that the state will provide raised contributions to the state pension systems.