Week of May 25th, 2009
After years of talking about a capital infrastructure bill, last week both the Senate and House voted to pass legislation designed to repair our infrastructure. The legislation would provide over eleven billion dollars in road and bridge repair and maintenance money, three billion dollars for new road construction, over three billion for school construction and maintenance, over seven hundred million for public university infrastructure, three hundred fifty three million for community colleges and three hundred million for private university construction and maintenance. In addition, there is over a billion dollars allocated for clean drinking water and sewage infrastructure, one-hundred million each for libraries and museums and three hundred million for parks.
Public transit is also addressed as over four billion dollars in public transit spending will be supported with ten percent for downstate transit, and there is three-hundred eighty million for airports. Finally, over seven-hundred million is dedicated to maintenance and building for state owned facilities.
One very important component of the legislation is that it is formula driven. That means that the existing IDOT road program will be used to determine where the road money is spent. The existing school construction program will determine where schools will be constructed and every school district in the state is eligible for up to fifty-thousand dollars per year for three years in matching maintenance funding. For distribution of community college and higher education capital spending, the location and program is written into the legislation so that legislators knew exactly where the money is going. For students in my legislative district there is funding for Eastern Illinois University, University of Illinois, Southern Illinois University, Olney Central College, Wabash Valley College, Lincoln Trail College and Lakeland.
Those interested in seeking funding for rural water, sewer upgrades, parks, museums and libraries will be able to fill out grant forms and compete for the available funding through existing formulas. Distribution will be geographically balanced.
There are some other important components of the legislation that merit mention. The Leaking Underground Storage Tank Fund (LUST Fund), which was created to help clean up areas where underground fuel storage tanks had leaked, has been the subject of repeated raids over the past several years. This capital bill sets aside $75 million to fund this program and protects this fund from future raids. The legislation also ends road fund diversions. In addition, for years, we have tried to pass legislation that would permit uniform weight limitations in rural areas for 80,000 pound trucks. Under this legislation, these 80,000 pound trucks will have uniform access to local roads unless the local government has posted signage limiting access. This is a major victory for farmers and others using rural roads for transport of goods.
So, the long awaited capital bill has passed. The obvious question is, how is it being funded?
The revenue necessary to pay for the legislation comes from a variety of sources. First, video gaming is legalized. While video gaming devices exist for “entertainment purposes” in Illinois, it is currently not legal for these video gaming devices to be used for gambling. Before you say it….yes, I know that in many places they are used for gaming. Every once in a while there is a raid and the machines are confiscated and fines are paid. An interesting scenario that has played out for years in Illinois.
This legislation would legalize 45,000 licenses for video gaming purposes. Each holder of a liquor license, truck stop license, or valid membership as a place of meeting for a fraternal organization or veteran’s chapter will be eligible to install up to five video gaming terminals. These machines are estimated to bring in about $400 million per year.
Other sources of revenue to pay for the capital bill are increases in the liquor tax, the inclusion of candy, non-carbonated sweetened drinks and beauty products to receive the full amount of sales tax (6.25% instead of 1%), and the increase of fees for registration and titles for motor vehicles. For example, car registration plate annual renewal will fee go from $78 to $98 and title certification will go from $65 to $95.
This is a major piece of legislation and very complicated. I have provided you with many of the provisions of the bill. You can find out even more by going to www.ilga.gov and typing in HB255 and HB312. HB 255 specifically deals with the revenue and HB312 outlines spending.
This legislation will provide Illinois with much needed infrastructure improvements for roads, bridges, schools, water, sewer, parks, museums and many other necessary investments for our future. Most importantly though, it will provide us with tens of thousands of jobs at a time when the unemployment rate for Illinois is at 9.4%. While nobody likes to see fee increases and there are many opponents of any new legalized gaming, this legislation is important and we had to make sure that any capital program that passed was paid for. I voted in favor of these bills and it was not an easy vote, I can tell you that. I would have preferred some different approaches. But, overall, I think that this had to pass for job creation and making sure that we repair our aging infrastructure here in Illinois.
Our work is not complete though and after this bill passed, the governor indicated that he is not signing the capital bill until an operating budget is passed and the General Assembly sends him an ethics bill that provides real ethics reforms for Illinois. As we move toward the scheduled adjournment date of May 31st, there is still a chance this capital bill could fall apart if we cannot agree on an operating budget and an ethics reform bill. Remember, the governor does have to sign this bill.
Please keep in touch this final week. You can e-mail me at reddyunit1@aol.com or call me at 217-558-1040 or 618-563-4128. Of course you can write to me as well- P.O. Box 125, Hutsonville, IL 62433. I also started twittering comments live at www.tweetillinois.org from the House floor and during meetings.