Governor Bruce Rauner says he remains optimistic that a budget agreement can be reached. But commenting in northern Illinois Wednesday he remained determined that property tax relief should be tied to the budget. ‘’We should have been able to get this done two years ago. We’ve been advocating for true property tax relief for two years as part of our budget negotiations,’’ said the governor. ‘’We’ll never keep budgets balanced if we don’t have property tax relief because property taxes keep pushing people out and eroding our tax base.’’
The Governor says talks continue daily on trying to get a budget in place. ‘’We’re negotiating seven days a week. We’re trying to get a balanced budget. The fiscal year ends June 30th. We need to make sure that we have certainty so our schools have the resources to open, that our human services can get properly funded, that our universities can be properly funded. We need a balanced budget, and as part of that we should have property tax relief so that taxpayers can stay and continue to support these services that are so essential for the state of Illinois.’’
And although Illinois remains in the national spotlight for its lack of a budget and credit downgrades, Governor Rauner claims the state is also getting positive reviews. ‘’The exciting thing is I’ve been traveling the nation recruiting companies to come. We’ve added about 115,000 jobs since I became governor. Not nearly enough. Not nearly fast enough. But there are dozens of companies ready to come to Illinois very quickly if they see us with property tax relief, if they see us with regulatory reform. And they see that we’re going to have truly balanced budgets going forward – a lot of companies want to come.’’
The Governor says he spent several hours on the phone Wednesday talking to lawmakers in hopes of working out a budget agreement soon.
