Despite a frigid reception from state lawmakers to the idea, Gov. Pat Quinn Thursday launched a public marketing effort to win support for a 33 percent income tax hike to support education.
Standing amid a couple of dozen students at Jefferson Middle School in Springfield, Quinn reiterated that elementary and secondary education faces stiff state budget cuts if lawmakers don’t approve more money for it.
“We’re talking about 17,000 teachers in Illinois losing their jobs,” Quinn said. “You have to understand reality. We are now without $1 billion that we counted on this year. We have to make it up.”
Illinois avoided steep cuts to education this year only because nearly $1 billion in federal stimulus poured into the state for education. That money is now gone.
“There’s no scaring involved,” Quinn said, a reference to House Minority Leader Tom Cross’s accusation that Quinn is engaging in scare tactics to promote the tax hike.
Springfield School Superintendent Walter Milton said the district is still trying to determine how the state’s budget problems will affect local schools.
“What we are looking at potentially at this juncture is not to lay off (teachers) but possibly not hire as many teachers as we have in the past,” said Milton, who attended Quinn’s appearance.
The district hires about 100 teachers a year to fill normally occurring vacancies, Milton said. That number may drop to 30 to 40, leaving other positions unfilled, he said.
“We would have to increase classroom size,” Milton said.
The Springfield district has also been forced to spend significant amounts of its reserve cash during the budget crunch.
Doug Finke can be reached at 788-1527.
Whitney hits Quinn tax proposal
The Green Party candidate for governor believes Gov. Pat Quinn’s call for massive cuts to public education is an “artificial device” to push for higher income taxes.
“It’s his attempt to frame the issue,” said Rich Whitney at a Statehouse news conference Thusday. “By holding out this thread and holding out the solution, you entice legislators to go along with the plan.”
Whitney introduced his own alternative to restore the state’s budget, which now has a $13 billion deficit. He said his plan would raise $15.8 billion.
It includes six steps, which range from creating a state bank, imposing fees for use of greenhouse gases and legalizing and taxing marijuana sales.
More than $7 billion in revenue would be raised by tax reforms that Whitney said would reduce Illinois’ reliance on property taxes, but also would raise the individual income tax from 3 percent to 5 percent and the corporate income tax from 4.8 percent to 8 percent.
– John Guidroz
Read the original article from The State Journal-Register.
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