Day: March 1, 2013

Udate on pension reform and baffling gamesmanship from Madigan – WirePoints Original

March 1, 2013 1 Comment

What’s going on?  Take your guess. Earlier this week several leading legislators from both parties jointly sponsored a new, broad pension reform proposal described here.  That proposal is a serious one. Sponsors include Democratic Senator Elaine Nekritz and at least one bona fide fiscal conservative who understands numbers, Republican Representative David Harris. But afterwards House Speaker Michael Madigan, de facto ringmaster of Illinois government, proposed to the House for immediate vote a list of very specific and tough pension cuts, such as complete elimination of the COLA for some workers, higher retirement ages and bigger individual contributions. However, Madigan didn’t

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Government workers, Quinn have deal for new contract – just don’t ask what it is – WirePoints Original

March 1, 2013 No Comments

Congratulations, Illinois. Governor Quinn and AFSCME, the union representing some 35,000 state workers, announced they have reached a deal for a new contract. Just don’t ask what the deal is or how much it will cost us. Neither AFSCME or Quinn are saying, and no terms are released. The contract must be ratified by AFSCME workers and details will come out as part of that process, but in the meantime you’ll just have to trust our governor. That’s the same governor who got elected promising a big pay raise to those workers just before the election. AFSCME says it’s “very

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