Illinois Lawmakers Back in Session -- And Clashing With Governor
July 26 2017 - 12:20PM
Dow Jones News
By Quint Forgey
Less than a month after Illinois's Democratic legislature
overrode Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner's veto to pass the state's
first budget in more than two years, lawmakers are back in
Springfield and at loggerheads with the governor.
Mr. Rauner called a special session that begins Wednesday
focused on approving a new K-12 school funding formula before the
start of fall classes.
The $36 billion budget package passed earlier this month
included a funding increase of roughly $350 million to K-12
schools, but the state must still establish a mechanism to
distribute the new money.
The General Assembly approved legislation in May to enact a
funding formula allocating funds to the neediest school districts
first, but the governor has pledged to use his amendatory veto
power to rewrite the bill.
The governor has said the new funding formula, outlined in
Senate Bill 1, favors the hard-pressed Chicago Public Schools
district -- the only school district in Illinois that funds its
teacher pension system without state aid. Senate Bill 1 would
allocate CPS roughly $221 million in extra funds to help cover
those costs.
"The point of the school reform bill is to ensure every child in
Illinois, including kids in Chicago, get the education they
deserve," Mr. Rauner said in a video message last week. "What we're
not here to do is bail out CPS's mismanaged teacher pension system
at the expense of every other child in the state."
Backers of Senate Bill 1 say it attempts to establish adequate
funding levels for school districts based on students' and
institutions' individual needs, and takes into account factors such
as districts' property tax contribution to school funding.
"We have the most inequitable system of school finance in the
country," said Democratic Sen. Andy Manar, the bill's lead sponsor
in the Senate. "The bill is well-vetted and it represents the
culmination of four years of public discussion, and there's only
one person who is opposed to it today, and that's Gov. Rauner."
Officials with the state Board of Education said the new funding
formula must be signed into law by early August to give the Board
of Education enough time to issue vouchers for state aid payments
to the Illinois State Comptroller by Aug. 10.
The current backlog of vouchers awaiting payment by the
comptroller to school districts totals roughly $1.2 billion --
another repercussion of the state's record-breaking, 736-day budget
impasse.
Write to Quin Forgey at quint.forgey@dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
July 26, 2017 12:05 ET (16:05 GMT)
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