Democrats Propose Higher Income Taxes and Fund Sweeps for Temporary Budget

Springfield … State Representative Mike Fortner (R-West Chicago) today, voted against Governor Quinn’s 50% income tax increase and a temporary budget which delays the tough decisions on the state’s fiscal problems.

“After six years of the backroom, shady dealings of Governor Blagojevich, the Democrats still proposed and passed a budget that lacks transparency. By making lump sum appropriations instead of identifying each line item, they essentially were able to hide where your tax dollars are being spent,” said Rep. Fortner. “In addition, fund sweeps does a disservice to the people who paid fees for a specific purpose – such as a hunting license. The Democrats have talked about change and reform and yet their actions don’t follow their words.”

Rep. Fortner noted that even though the legislature has been in session since January, the Governor and Speaker did not hold one single budget hearing and negotiations were only held between the Democrat leadership. The Republicans were not even given details on the budget proposals until days before the vote.

The “band-aid’ budget which passed the House has numerous components to it, including fund sweeps for mental health and drivers education; refinancing of state bonds to a lower interest rate, and spending which would have been used to partially reimburse social service providers that service the developmentally disabled, low-income residents, etc.

“The only portion of the budget that made fiscal sense was taking advantage of lower interest rates by refinancing the state’s bonds. However, the other two options are irresponsible and do nothing to change the status quo.” said Rep. Fortner. “The Democrat’s budget that passed the House is just smoke and mirrors. It doesn’t provide any real fiscal reform and even worse it just delays the inevitable shut down of government by a few months. We need change and the Democrat leadership of this state failed us.”

Rep. Fortner added that before the Governor and Speaker looked at increasing the income tax and severely cutting social services there should have been an attempt to first prioritize state spending, make cuts to the budget and implement meaningful fiscal and ethics reform. Some budget reforms suggested by the Republicans include Medicaid reform and mandating that any new spending must be offset with eliminating an existing program or identifying a dedicated revenue source to pay for it, etc.

For additional information, Rep. Fortner can be contacted at (630) 293-9344.