State Sen. Chapin Rose announced the Illinois General Assembly took the following actions on June 30:
Passed an agreed budget that:
· Funds K-12 Schools for the coming school year;
· Provides needed funds to Human Services;
· Provides needed funds to the Higher Education community; and
· Allows road projects and capital improvements to continue.
Most importantly, it is a budget that:
· Is grounded in reality;
· That lives within our means;
· Is fully funded, balanced, and,
· Does so without unfairly bailing out the Chicago Public Schools to the exclusion of downstate Illinois, as had been demanded by Speaker Madigan and Senate President Cullerton on behalf of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
“Nobody is happy about how long it took to get to this point,” Rose said. “But the fact remains, since Gov. Rauner stood up to Speaker Madigan, we are starting to see budgets that are a product of our ideals, not Chicago’s. Budgets that are grounded in fiscal reality and that most importantly, don’t break the bank due to Chicago’s mismanagement of their own resources,” Rose concluded.
“Moreover, today I voted to tell the City of Chicago to raise their own property taxes by $250 million to fund their own schools – not the rest of us taxpayers,” Rose said. “Our local schools have managed their budgets. It is not our fault that the Chicago Public schools ran their system into the ground, nor is it our responsibility to bail them out.”