http://www.pontiacdailyleader.com/articles/2008/04/28/news/news1.txt

Passed budget? Right

April 28, 2008

Pontiac Daily Leader

John Faddoul

Illinois won't have passed a budget by the end of May, state Sen. Dan Rutherford predicted today to a Pontiac audience.

Speaking at a Pontiac Area Chamber of Commerce-held Issues and Eggs breakfast at the Pontiac Elks Lodge, the Pontiac-based Republican senator said he expected an extended session of the Legislature, although he did not indicate how long it might last.

No capital-improvements bill will be passed by the General Assembly, he also predicted.

Rutherford said it was known that for the current budget, for the fiscal year that ends June 30, "timing for cash would be very, very tight," and that some unexpected factors, like the amount of snowplowing and salting by the Illinois Department of Transportation, put some agencies budgets "out of whack."

"The budget was not managed very well up to this point," with two months left in the fiscal year, the senator contended.

The Senate has passed and sent to the House a bill allowing Gov. Rod Blagojevich to "sweep" $570 million out of funds dedicated for certain purposes to go for other uses. Rutherford opposed it and said "there's something completely wrong with that" because residents should expect that fees they pay, like for boating, would be used for purposes related to those fees.

"The governor is putting the squeeze on the soft underside of state government," Rutherford said, mentioning 4-H and Extension money, and noting that asphalt contractors and others are concerned that if the budget isn't passed by May 30, all highway work will cease.

"That's not how you manage," Rutherford said. "It is an attempt of governance by confrontation," a phrase he returned to several times in his 30-minute talk.

For the new budget, he said, there should be enough cash to get through fiscal 2009, if cash is managed properly and the state pays for programs already in place. But if the governor wants increased spending for new health-care measures, that would pose budgetary problems, he suggested.

Rutherford said he did not think the state would get a capital-projects program for the coming fiscal year — the last public works program was approved under Gov. George Ryan, he noted.

Rutherford said he wants a capital bill and would be willing to vote for the revenue to fund it, but he said he would not vote for one unless it's spelled out what it will pay for, with no lump-sum figures that the governor would control. "At least the sunlight will shine upon it," he said of such a plan.

He also said he would have to be given "objective criteria" for grants to be made by state agencies and when the money would be released, for projects like school construction and road work.

"That game has been played too many times," Rutherford said about not having such standards.

An example he cited was the old State Police headquarters on Route 66 south of Pontiac. Money to refurbish it and to promote growth and tourism along Route 66 is in the current budget, but it's been almost two years now since the state turned it over to local control, and the state money has yet to be released.

"I don't trust this administration," Rutherford said of some of the reasons he would not support a capital plan without assurances and specifics about the money in it.

Rutherford ended by commenting on the current trial of Tony Rezko, a backer of the governor. That trial and some of the things that have come out during it has "dropped a nuclear bomb on the process in Springfield," he said.

In answering questions from the audience, Rutherford he did not expect big increases in agriculture-related programs, just getting them to the level "where we were before."

He said did not believe Peter Fitzgerald would be replaced as U.S. attorney, and that if efforts were made at that he and other Republicans would go to President Bush to oppose removal.

He said he did not think the state's voters would approve holding a constitutional convention; that question will be on November ballots.