There they go again.
With the delivery of a spruce-green, 2-inch thick volume crammed with $29 billion in proposed spending, the governor and state lawmakers rushed noisily last week into the annual rite of spring, the budget brawl.
It is billed as a titanic struggle over the fate of millions and billions, but in relative terms, it is a squabble over nickels and dimes.
No, make that nickels.
The weeks between now and the 4th of July will be punctuated by widely reported cries of anguish from mayors who want to keep their $211 million slice of the income-tax surcharge and a barrage of partisan invective hurled by legislative Democrats and Republican Gov. Jim Edgar.
Fought in the context of approving the budget that must, under the constitution, be balanced, the confrontation will have much more to do with next year’s gubernatorial campaign.
Although there are more numbers than words in the state budget, it is a thoroughly political document that underscores the reality of governing. Politicians will talk of “shaking things up” and “taking bold action,” which tends to raise expectations of taxpayers whose anger at government far outweighs their understanding of it.
In truth, the role of the men and women sent here to act on the budget is largely irrelevant because more than nine out of every 10 dollars in the budget are, for one reason or another, political, moral or legal sacred cows.
“It’s really a very small slice they have to work with,” said James Nowlan, president of the Taxpayer’s Federation of Illinois. “The budget is a huge pot of money, but most of it is obligated for programs that the federal government, the federal courts or state laws have obligated be spent and over which legislators have relatively little wiggle room.”
The lack of maneuverability is not unique to Illinois. Just as the federal budget is encrusted with a thickening layer of expensive entitlements, Illinois and every other state face an equally imposing array of education, health care, human service and law enforcement demands that-here alone-chew up more than 90 percent of the state’s general fund budget.
Court orders, consent decrees and unfunded federal mandates, which in the Medicaid program alone are projected to cost the state $386 million next year, further restrict policymakers. Add to that the politically popular and sometimes imprudent pledge not to raise taxes, which Edgar clings to and lawmakers obey, and the budget could almost fly on automatic pilot.
This does not trivialize the fight over the income-tax surcharge or the Chicago Public Schools’ hope that the state will help the system climb out of a $300 million-plus budget hole. But it does drastically state the Darwinian struggle for the few available dollars in the budget. It also explains the highly political nature of what will occur in the next three months.
In the search for other money, legislative staff members will flyspeck the vertical columns in the budget, scavenging for obscure items that have no powerful defenders.
In the vernacular of Ross Perot, the “look under the hood” is usually a circular journey that leads first into big-ticket budgets-education, public aid, mental health, corrections, children and family services.
These five budgets alone make up more than 85 percent of the state’s general fund budget and-short of closing schools, prisons, nursing homes or other facilities-they cannot be raided easily. Relatively small amounts can sometimes be milked from one fund or another, or commandeered in a manner that explains why health-care providers and other creditors of the state have to wait months to get money owed them. (This kind of gimmickry is one reason why the state’s accumulated deficit approaches $1.7 billion.)
After concluding that major budgets are largely impregnable, the staff members then course through the so-called minor agencies-the courts, public health, state police, rehabilitation services-which, though smaller, have their own influential constituencies.
“Most of the rest don’t amount to a hill of beans,” said George Hovanec, deputy director of the Bureau of the Budget. “There really is very little left.”
A case in point is the Illinois Arts Council, which Edgar suggested could be put to sleep by cost-conscious lawmakers. But that certainly will not happen unless House Speaker Michael Madigan of Chicago is put to sleep first, because his wife, Shirley, is the council’s chairwoman.
Despite the saber-rattling over budget proposals, Edgar will get nearly all of what he has presented. Robert Mandeville, former state budget director, said that “line-item by line-item, the governor gets about 97 percent of what he asks for.” And he probably will.
Budget director Joan Walters quipped last week that the budget document’s binding “is the color of money.” But its odor is unmistakably political, which is what much of the next three months will be all about.
Now is the time for the games to begin. Edgar first struck a blow for fiscal responsibility by making off with the cash that used to go to cities.
Just hours after that announcement, House Democrats, as if suddenly seized by the religion of fiscal responsibility, waved copies of the constitution and thundered against Walters for submitting a budget that is technically out of balance.
It has been in balance only once in the past nine years, in 1984, and only three times in 17 years.
There they go again.
