Scott T. Holland

Nine of the governments that did submit plans took note of a fundamental challenge: they don’t control their residents’ salaries.

The present reality, at best, makes it harder for taxpayers to advocate for better allocation of public resources. At worst, the system offers an inviting shield for elected officials to deflect blame for poor (or intentionally harmful) decisions.

Density, infrastructure and other factors vary widely by ZIP code, but every state agency deals with similar regional discrepancies and SB 2111 simply didn’t go far enough in addressing concerns about the shared basic need to get from here to there.

The projects might’ve cost less if started earlier but the Department of Natural Resources budget was shuffled down the priority list during years when even social service agencies weren’t close to adequately funded.

What’s a better framing for the reserve, 2% or $29 million? What about Pritzker’s proposal versus what Democrats formally budgeted: who wanted to pull which levers of power at what time or, from the other side, who was willing to bear the criticism if the money doesn’t move?

Whether these bills might become law is analysis best saved for someone more familiar with Madison than Springfield but it’s interesting to at least consider the proposals as well as underlying factors in order to draw comparisons to Illinois.

After visiting a teller in person and signing off on several forms, we got seven letters confirming the change – one for each checking and savings account affected – then two days later seven more initially sent to the old house and rerouted to the current address.

The number of living veterans has generally decreased yearly, but again Illinois account for about 3.2% of the nation’s 14.2 million veterans.

That failure contradicts the General Assembly’s reputation as a place where powerful Democrats always get what they want and subverts the expectation of the veto session as a setting for ramming through transformative legislation on deadline in dark of night.

Proficiency rates “would have increased if we had kept the same cut scores. However, we changed the cut scores, so we can’t tell you what they would have been. But we know they would have improved.”

SB 2111 doesn’t represent a comprehensive, statewide solution and its passage puts the onus back on those dissatisfied with the status quo to push lawmakers to keep working on the challenges even without an imminent financial disaster.

The Budget Reserve for Immediate Disbursements and Governmental Emergencies is only $100 million. Democrats created the pool by sweeping money from 57 other funds in anticipation of federal decisions with negative fiscal implications for Illinois.

Clearly $20 is significant to someone counting every penny, but as a yearly figure it won’t sway anyone’s vote. The loss of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits is a different story, with an average of about $184 per beneficiary each month.

It is simply too late. Candidates have expended considerable time and resources gathering petition signatures, the filing deadline is Nov. 3 and any alteration now costs money the state doesn’t have while inviting legal exposure that could exponentially increase fiscal liability.

From pure cynicism, there may be wisdom in getting Republicans on board with anything Democrats could present as endorsement of gun registration. But more practically, there’s no faster way to clear an administrative backlog than to erase it altogether.