ALTON – Illinois Sen. William Haine, D-Alton, has participated in a lot of historic legislation over the years, but on Wednesday, he will hear about a potential budget that could mean an increase in school funding and help for human services organizations.
A new fully funded, clean education spending plan that would increase funding by $760 million to the P-12 budget will be heard in the Senate Wednesday. The proposal, Senate Bill 2054, would mean an increase in in over $6 million to schools throughout the Metro East.
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Haine said he intends to put his full support behind the measure when it comes before the Senate.
“We need an effective, clean proposal to ensure our schools receive important resources to provide our kids with a good education,” Haine said. “This proposal does just that. I want to make sure our schools open on time, and this proposed legislation will insure this happens.”
The General Assembly is scheduled to reconvene Wednesday at noon.
“It’s important to note that under the governor’s education funding plan, our schools would get less money than they would in the proposal I will vote for tomorrow,” he said.
Haine is anxious to get the budget dilemma at least solved on a temporary basis to put back the needs of those who need mental health treatment and other wide-ranging social services in the state. These services are being dramatically influenced by the lack of a state budget to date, he said.
Last week, he visited IMPACT CIL and expressed his support to help keep the organization and others like them throughout the state in operation.
Sen. Haine said, without appropriated funds, different institutions that rely on some state funding to assist those with mental issues will not be able to function and this would mean many of the people needing help for drug addition and mental illness could be forced back on the street.
“We have to come together for some compromise,” he said about the budget issue. “This started to unravel as of Jan. 2, 2014. Many of our state agencies are near collapse because of the lack of a budget.”
Haine knows if a temporary budget is ultimately approved, it will only be a temporary solution and he said in the end, the budget calamity has to be addressed in both the House of Representatives, Senate and by the governor.
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