·
With full start of 2018 spring
session, Illinois House committees convene and begin to hear bills.
Following the State of the State address on Wednesday, January 31, the
Illinois House and Senate began committee action for the spring 2018
session. The House will have five full weeks
of committee action prior to the deadline for substantive committee action on
April 13. Most of the work of presenting
a bill, hearing witness testimony on the measure and developing amendments to
perfect the measure are done in committees rather than on the floor of the full
House. The House schedules for spring
2018 can be found here. The General Assembly’s
website also includes a type-in box to track each individual bill under
consideration in Springfield by bill number.
Latest News
on
Wednesday, April 18, 2018
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Rep. Keith Wheeler |
“It is reckless and unwise for Illinois to
move forward with passing a plan to circumvent the state and local tax
deduction cap under the new federal law until we see how the IRS rules on it,”
Representative Wheeler said. “If we pass this bill now and it becomes law,
taxpayers who take advantage of it may well end up having made contributions to
this program for nothing, because the IRS could step in and rule that these
payments are indeed subject to the cap. The IRS is well aware what states like
Illinois, California, New York and New Jersey are trying to do by considering
similar proposals. We should not subject Illinois taxpayers to this risky
scheme.”
on
Friday, April 13, 2018
·
House Republicans oppose progressive
income tax. Illinois House Republican Leader Jim
Durkin, along with members of the House Republican Caucus, filed House Resolution 975 Tuesday to state their opposition to a proposed progressive
income tax on Illinois
residents.
“The
General Assembly cannot continue spending money frivolously and expect Illinois
taxpayers to pick up the tab with more tax increases like this progressive
income tax proposal from the Democrat party,” Durkin said. “It is our
constitutional duty to protect our constituents, and we will remain firm as a
caucus on blocking any progressive tax measures.”
Illinois
already has the highest effective state and local tax burden in the nation,
according to a report by WalletHub. Studies have shown that
states with progressive income taxes create even more of a tax burden on the
middle class and dissuade economic prosperity.
on
Friday, March 30, 2018
·
ADM, Deere, Caterpillar honored as top
Illinois firms. The honor was published in “Illinois Top
200,” a series of online surveys enabling Illinois respondents to honor local
leadership activities, institutions, and experiences. Illinois respondents were asked to honor
their favorite “homegrown companies,” in a list that also included McDonald’s,
Walgreens, Rand McNally, DeKalb AgResearch, Sears, State Farm, and Dairy
Queen.
The three named firms – ADM, Deere, and Caterpillar – all
share a historic orientation toward Illinois agriculture and heavy-industry
engineering. ADM helped make Illinois
corn oil and soy-based protein into global commodities, while Deere & Co.
helped invent the machines that grow the corn and soybean crops that are used
to grind or press out the oil and protein meal that Illinois crops
produce. Like Deere, Caterpillar makes
heavy off-road machinery used around the world.
“Illinois Top 200” is now welcoming votes for top
inventions and innovations. Candidates
include farm silos, blood banks, plasma display screens, and pinball
entertainment machines. Votes will be
accepted until Friday, March 30.
on
Friday, March 16, 2018
·
Illinois notches new all-time high in
payroll jobs. The Illinois Department of Employment
Security (IDES), which compiles Illinois nonfarm payroll job numbers in
cooperation with the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, announced this week that
revised employment numbers for January 2018 show that Illinois has notched a new peak employment level. The revised statistics show that nearly 6.1
million men and women were employed on Illinois-based nonfarm payroll jobs in
January 2018. The new high was achieved as
the result of net new jobs that had been created in calendar year 2017 within
Illinois.
on
Friday, March 09, 2018
·
Commission on Government Forecasting
and Accountability (COGFA) releases February 2018 report.
February 2018 State general funds receipts grew significantly over similar figures posted in February 2017. However, as with previous months in FY18,
this healthy year-over-year performance was significantly affected by an income
tax increase enacted in July 2017.
During the year-over-year period that spanned February 2017 and February
2018, sales tax receipts grew by 13%, individual income tax receipts grew 50%,
and corporate income tax receipts increased by 378%.
on
Friday, March 02, 2018
·
Tax credit scholarship clearinghouse
announces more than 33,000 applications. The benchmark news came from Empower
Illinois, one of the
nonprofit entities overseeing implementation of the Illinois tax credit
scholarship program created by the Illinois General Assembly in 2017. Under this new tax credit, Illinois income
taxpayers are authorized to donate moneys to an approved scholarship
clearinghouse. The moneys will be used
to pay for scholarships to be awarded to enable children to attend fee-charging
schools. Scholarships that will cover 50
to 100 percent of a student’s tuition and school-related expenses will be
awarded to children from income-eligible households.
Empower Illinois’ announcement followed the nonprofit’s previous
announcement of a glitch on January 31.
When the Empower office first tried to roll out their online scholarship
application window, so many applications were submitted that the website broke
down. The 33,000 valid applications
submitted in the second process, which generated totals announced on Wednesday,
February 28, reflect emergency repairs made to the application website. Empower Illinois reported receiving $45
million in pledged donations from Illinois taxpayers. The taxpayers will receive individual income
tax credits to cover up to 80 percent of the cost of their donations. Applicant households who do not get into the
program this year may choose to reapply again in early 2019.
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