A vote for more spending is a vote for a tax hike (submitted by the Illinois Republican Party)
“By voting to override the Governor’s veto of HB 580, Mike Smiddy sent a clear signal today that he wants to raises taxes on Illinois families by $3.6 billion. This bill would have given an unelected, unaccountable individual the authority to force the state to pay $3.6 billion more to cover double digit pay increases and five weeks vacation time for state workers. As much as Smiddy wishes it were the case, money doesn’t fall from the sky. A vote for $3.6 billion more in spending is a vote for a tax hike, because we have to find a way to pay for that spending in order to balance the budget. – Illinois Republican Party Spokesman Steven Yaffe
The Rockford Register Star called HB 580 “one of the worst pieces of legislation we’d ever seen.”
The Herald & Review explained that HB 580 would have cost taxpayers $3.6 billion:
This is bad public policy for a whole host of reasons. First, it is clearly and narrowly aimed at Rauner. This bill applies only to collective bargaining agreements during Rauner’s current term and then would expire.
The bill could also be potentially expensive to taxpayers. AFSCME’s last proposal, according to the governor’s office, would cost the state $3.6 billion over four years. That’s money Illinois clearly doesn’t have. AFSCME is proposing four-year raises ranging from 11.5 to 29 percent, a 37.5-hour workweek and five weeks of vacation.
The Quad-City Times further says HB 580 would have represented an “end-run on democracy”:
HB 580 isn't just a bad bill. It isn't simply a retread, an even more costly mutated clone of SB 1229, which died last year when the House couldn't muster a veto override. HB 580 goes one further by removing almost all incentive for the unions to bother negotiating, through reinstating the terms of the previous contract. It's an attempt to undermine Illinois's voters, the same people who sent Gov. Bruce Rauner to Springfield in 2015.
…American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council (AFSCME), the state's largest and most influential public union, hates dealing with Rauner. Freeze across-the-board pay hikes, the Republican says. Cut the state's health care costs through union concessions, he demands. Replace the automatic pay hikes, a potential $400 million cost over the life of the contract, with merit pay that rewards good work, he argues.
AFSCME, used to buying politicians and milking the state dry, wasn't having it.
Rauner hates the middle class, screamed AFSCME's leadership, apparently unaware of the budget crises the union helped create over the years.
Again, AFSCME wants Rauner stripped of his negotiating power. Again, AFSCME demands home-field advantage in front of an arbitrator. And, this time, AFSCME is looking to kill the actual post-negotiation process by forcing through this end-run on democracy and, thereby, killing the ongoing case before the Labor Relations Board.
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