By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
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LOVES PARK — Illinois lawmakers have side-stepped solving some of the state’s biggest issues for too long, leaving it saddled with pension debt and high property taxes.
That was part of the message state Rep. Joe Sosnowski, a Republican from Rockford, delivered to business leaders on Wednesday during a state of the state speech hosted by the Parks Chamber of Commerce.
Sosnowski called for ethics reform that includes term limits and a fair process for creating legislative maps, and he said Illinois needs to address its pension debt and high property taxes. In the 25-minute speech, he was also critical of Democrats for passing an “unsustainable” budget and pushing forward criminal justice reforms he sees as anti-police. And he said Gov. JB Pritzker continues to overstep his authority with sweeping executive orders in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
“I don’t mean to go through just a litany of what our issues are, but we can’t ignore them,” Sosnowski said. “We have got to identify these issues — and we know what all of them are, we’ve been talking about them — they’re big, big budget items.”
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That starts with addressing the state’s unfunded pension liabilities, which stand at $139.9 billion as of June 30, according to a November report released by the Commission on Government and Forecasting Accountability.
“We haven’t made any changes to any pension laws or any of our obligations,” he said. “We still have all the same problems that have existed for many decades now. It’s still going to be a continuing and growing problem.
“You have to start addressing this now. You’re not going to get it all done in one year or five years or 10 years, but we’re not even setting up a pathway to showing that we can get that done.”
Sosnowski started his speech with a few friendly and a few pointed jabs at state Rep. Maurice West, a Democrat who was the previous speaker in the legislative series.
“I should have brought his slideshow … I could’ve just added some edits to it as we went along,” he joked. “I’ve enjoyed having Maurice, and it’s great for us old-timers because we got to have these young rookies who want to come and present here first so we can mark all the things they did wrong, and then hopefully our presentations are a little bit better.”
He did, however, give West credit for standing up against former House Speaker Mike Madigan, once the most powerful member of the state’s Democratic Party who is now facing criminal charges.
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Sosnowski said Democrats erred in pushing forward criminal justice reforms that end cash bail and allow for anonymous complaints against police officers, among other changes.
“There’s no doubt that there’s problems. There’s bad actors, but I would argue there are bad actors in every profession out there,” Sosnowski said.
He said better safeguards against those bad actors, additional police training, more supervision and the institution of body cameras — provided there is a mechanism to help communities afford them — have merit. But he said other aspects of the law make it more difficult for law enforcement to keep people safe.
“All those things I think we can agree on, but the tone that we kind of exacerbated in Illinois is truly driving people away from the law enforcement field,” he said.
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The state’s property taxes, ranked the second highest in the nation, make it tough to compete with other states to attract business. That, in part, has contributed to Illinois shrinking population. The latest estimates from U.S. Census Bureau released in December show Illinois lost about 0.9% of its population — about 114,000 people — as of July 1 since the official 2020 census.
Lawmakers need to focus on offering more than the short-term tax relief in the recent budget. That budget provided $1 billion in tax relief from gasoline, groceries and property taxes. But much of that relief only lasts six months or a year, Sosnowski said, and long-term changes are needed.
“By doing this, you’ll see areas start to turn around,” he said. “You’ll see businesses start to consider Illinois again.”
This article is by Kevin Haas. Email him at khaas@rockrivercurrent.com or follow him on Twitter at @KevinMHaas.