Saturday, April 9, 2022
SPRINGFIELD – Illinois Comptroller Susana A. Mendoza applauds the legislature for passing a FY ’23 budget that saves for the future, utilizes extra revenue to support working families, and addresses the pension shortfall and other structural issues.
“I am very pleased and thankful to see an infusion of $1 billion into the state’s Rainy Day Fund,” said Comptroller Mendoza. “We know this is an important signal to the credit rating agencies that Illinois is getting its fiscal house in order and planning for the future.” Illinois celebrated two credit upgrades last year – the first upgrades in more than 20 years.
The budget also mandates an extra $45 million a year to be placed in the Rainy Day Fund starting in FY ’23. The budget expands the Earned Income Tax Credit for low- and moderate-income taxpayers.
The budget includes an additional $200 million pension payment, which brings the total pension payment beyond what is required, to $500 million dollars. This will save taxpayers more than $1.8 billion.
Comptroller Mendoza recently announced that her office had paid down the bill backlog to what is now “accounts payable.” Illinois has been paying its bills in about 15 business days since July 1, 2021 – down from a crushing 210-business-day bill payment cycle in Nov. 2017 – a result of the 2015-2017 budget impasse.
The shortened General Revenue Fund bill payment cycle, along with the two credit upgrades, happened before the state received ARPA federal stimulus payments.
“Overall, I believe this budget adds greatly to the momentum we have built toward further credit upgrades, which will mean further savings for taxpayers,” said Comptroller Mendoza.
Comptroller Mendoza thanks Gov. JB Pritzker as well as Illinois House Majority Leader Greg Harris, Sen. Michael Hastings, Rep. Michael Halpin, Sen. Elgie Sims, Rep. Michael Zalewski and all the legislators who supported reviving the Rainy Day Fund.
She looks forward to working with legislators to continue strengthening the Rainy Day Fund and Pension Stabilization Fund through further legislation.
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