Guv bats budget ball back to lawmakers

From Crain's. One can conclude that this might indicate that the governor might not approve of this budget that was just passed, but at the moment it's unclear if the state General Assembly might be forced to reconvene this summer.

Gov. Rod Blagojevich charged Monday that the Illinois General Assembly — especially the House of Representatives — failed to do its job when it sent him a fiscal 2009 state budget “that’s $2 billion out of whack.”

But the governor declined to tip his hand on whether he would veto or take other action to block the spending plan, which was approved late Saturday.

Instead, affecting the air of a statesman, he said he first would call legislative leaders together for what he predicted would be successful talks to fill the budget hole — even though House Speaker Michael J. Madigan has indicated he likely would boycott such a meeting.

In a Loop press conference, Mr. Blagojevich also again pushed lawmakers to enact his proposed $33-billion capital construction program, which was approved by a wide bipartisan majority in the Senate but is stalled in the House. And he danced around whether he would sign or seek to amend a bill aimed at restricting pay-to-play politics by gubernatorial fundraisers.

Budget that passed the General Assembly clearly is unbalanced, a fact that even Mr. Madigan tacitly acknowledged in comments to reporters over the weekend. The position of the speaker, who has been involved in a long and bitter feud with Mr. Blagojevich, is that it’s the governor’s job to veto enough spending to balance the books.

But Mr. Blagojevich, while generally avoiding direct attacks on his political foes, stressed his view that the Illinois Constitution requires the Legislature to pass a balanced budget.

The proposed spending in the budget “is fine,” Mr. Blagojevich said. The problem, he continued, is that Mr. Madigan’s House didn’t approve some revenue enhancements the Senate did, including sweeping excess funds from state bank accounts and borrowing money to shore up the state’s pension funds.

Read more tidbits over at the Capitol Fax.