Sangamon Sun

State Sen. Steve McClure (R-Jacksonville) is taking an action-speaks-louder-than-words attitude on some of the most pressing issues raised in Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s State of the State Address.

“My first take was: I did like that crime was mentioned, however the issue with crime has been not just throwing money at the problem, it's actually solving the issue and working with our side of the aisle to get that done,” McClure said soon after the governor’s address. “One of the concerning things for me and members of our caucus has been the fact that the governor talked about witness intimidation, however, while the governor says he's going to give money for a program to help hide witnesses, at the same time last year in January, at 4:30 in the morning, a bill was passed that takes away the ability of law enforcement to detain people in jail on pretrial detention for the offense of witness intimidation.”

McClure argues the message that this sends is clear, and what needs to happen next strikes him as being just as obvious.

“We have to address crime,” he said. “It's a crisis. Just speaking about it is not enough. The Democrats have to come to the table with Republicans to work on this issue. We're ready to do it, but unfortunately, our side has been totally ignored and we are seeing the terrible results of that throughout the state right now. What I'm focused on right now in representing my district is the long-term effects of these things.”

When it comes to the $112.5 billion spending plan being proposed by Pritzker, McClure also took exception. The plan that would go into effect on July 1, also calls for providing up to $1 billion in tax relief, steering more than minimum payments into public sector pensions and putting hundreds of millions into the state's ravaged rainy day fund.

As much as $45.5 million would come from the state's general revenue fund with the other funds being federal pass-through dollars.

“My concern is that the Biden bucks are going to be up soon,” he said. “My other concern is the fact that there is $2.5 billion in new spending and temporary tax relief. Well, the new spending is now permanent, so how are we going to wrangle that? It's going to be very interesting to vote on the actual budget and I'm going to have a long-term view when I vote on the budget.”

For fiscal year 2022, Pritzker outlined a proposed total budget of $95.5 billion, with $41.6 billion deriving from state funds. With the state’s unfunded pension liability having already soared in the neighborhood of $140 billion, the administration is also proposing fully funding the required contribution of $9.6 billion with an additional $500 million infusion.

The move is expected to reduce unfunded liability by a shade under $2 billion.