Municipalities Brace For Rauner's Proposed Budget Cuts
SKOKIE, Ill. (CBS) -- Some are calling Governor Bruce Rauner's new budget proposals heartless, while others say they're long overdue.
The governor outlined more than $6 billion in spending cuts, with drastic reductions in funding for local governments, state colleges, Medicaid, pensions and transportation agencies.
The cuts are just proposals right now, but as CBS 2's Brad Edwards reports the real world implications are already being felt.
Nine figure budget cuts to CTA sparks worry in In Skokie, which is serviced by the Yellow Line.
At city hall, they'd just about hammered out the budget.
"This throws everything up into the air," said Mayor George Van Dusen.
Van Dusen has been mayor since 1999.
"They're have been governors who have proposed reductions, but never by this magnitude," said Van Dusen.
They ran the numbers, and the hypotheticals are if the governor is successful in his 50 percent cut to the municipal share of state income tax collections, that equals $3.2 million for Skokie, according to Van Dusen.
Van Dusen says it, "throws us into a tailspin."
That's like 25 police officers, which could be offset by a 21 percent increase in the property tax levy, but the governor proposes freezing said tax.
"You can't on the one hand say we're gonna cut your funding and on the other we're going to hamstring you in how you're gonna manage your budget, it just won't work," Van Dusen said.*
