Some new factors have entered the budgeting picture for Illinois

Posted on March 18, 2022
House Majority Leader Greg Harris (D-Chicago). (Dave Dahl/WJBC)

By Dave Dahl

SPRINGFIELD – The Illinois legislature has three weeks until its self-imposed deadline to put together a budget.

One person with a big part of that job is House Majority Leader Greg Harris, who says there’s a multi (b) billion dollar shortage in the unemployment insurance trust fund.

“There are a number of solutions being discussed, including use of that ARPA money, and also potentially bonding out a portion of that debt,” Harris told reporters Thursday. “That’s a strategy that was used a couple of decades ago, during the Great Recession, when t/he state of Illinois and other states also ended up with trust fund deficits.”

A big wrinkle, says Harris, is – who expected the Russia-Ukraine situation and its worldwide economic effects?

Dave Dahl can be reached at [email protected]

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