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Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Illinois budget will shape or limit social service agencies : article : May 17 2011

Quincy Herald-Whig : Quincy, IL
By DOUG WILSON : Herald-Whig Senior Writer

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. -- Budget battles that are looming between the Illinois House and Senate will make a big difference at Quincy's Madonna House.

"The House version would cut 52 percent -- about $28,500" from an emergency and transitional housing program that serves women and children, said Madonna House Executive Director Barb Hicks.

Hicks said the non-profit agency, where expenses are forecast at $200,000, would be hard pressed to absorb such a huge loss. So she is rooting for the Senate budget plan, which would preserve emergency and transitional housing at current funding levels.

"I'm working on our own budget right now. It's

supposed to be ready to go July 1, but I don't know what amounts will be coming from the state," Hicks said.

Madonna House is full at this point and receives two or three calls each day from people seeking housing, food, clothing, diapers or other assistance.

Rep. Jil Tracy, R-Mount Sterling, said it may take the two final weeks of this legislative session to reach a state budget agreement. The House approved its $33.2 billion budget plan last Friday. It shaves $2 billion off the plan unveiled by Gov. Pat Quinn in March.

"We did ours in piecemeal fashion. We did General Services and Human Services and Public Safety separately, the way they used to do it back in the 1990s," Tracy said.

The Senate budget plan also was approved Friday, but by way of amendments that got little deliberation. The Senate's $34.3 billion plan trims $1 billion from the governor's plan, but would spend $1 billion more than in the House proposal.

Sen. John Sullivan, D-Rushville, believes it will take hard work to come up with a compromise budget, but he is optimistic.

"There's definitely enough time to get it done" by the May 31 end of regular session, Sullivan said.

Either the House or Senate plans will involve "pain shared by about everybody" involved in human services programs.

That pain would be much worse under a Senate Republican plan that has been discussed, but has no legislation in place.

"They want to cut $5 billion or $6 billion, but they're not engaging in the process," Sullivan said.

Mike Rein, executive director of Transitions of Western Illinois, has seen lots of possible budget scenarios. Some would hurt more than others, but none will leave the agency with all the funding it has had to treat those with mental health problems, disabilities or dependence issues. Rein dealt with mid-year budget cuts in recent months that have hampered local efforts.

Rein said either the House and Senate budgets would be preferable to the one proposed by Quinn, which would harm the residential care facilities for people with developmental disabilities. The loss of those programs would put more people in state facilities, which cost more than residential sites.

Charlie Wheeler, director of the public affairs reporting program at the University of Illinois-Springfield, said Quinn has limited control over what happens with the budget. Although the governor got to propose his budget first, now he can only negotiate with House and Senate leaders, reduce individual line items, or veto the budget bills. That would put Quinn at odds with fellow Democrats who have majority status in the Legislature. A veto of budget legislation also would give Republicans a bigger role in the funding plan, and Wheeler said Republicans would seek less funding rather than more.

"The governor has ultimate budget control over the whole thing, but all he can do is reduce or cut entirely certain line items. He can't increase those line items," Wheeler said.

Both Tracy and Sullivan expect the release of redistricting maps will temporarily take center stage later this week. After that buzz dies down, they believe budget work will dominate the Legislature.

"The interesting exercise will be in the meetings where they work on something that's between the House one and the Senate one," Tracy said.

-- dwilson@whig.com/

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