SR0370 100TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

SR0370 LRB100 12167 MST 24532 r

SENATE RESOLUTION

WHEREAS, The General Assembly and the Governor have failed to enact a State budget for the last 20 months; and

WHEREAS, The State adds approximately 11 million dollars in debt every day that a budget is not signed into law; and

WHEREAS, The State has not met its contractual obligations to the numerous vendors that render services; and

WHEREAS, The Illinois Comptroller cites that the bill backlog continues to increase and is a crippling 12.6 billion dollars; and

WHEREAS, The State, its local municipalities, and their institutions continue to suffer from continual downgrades from all of the major credit rating agencies, which is nearing junk status; and

WHEREAS, The lack of a State budget has caused homeless shelters to close on Christmas Eve, youth violence prevention centers to go out of business, domestic abuse programs to be defunded, and a myriad of other essential human services needs have gone unfunded; and

WHEREAS, The General Assembly and the Governor have not met their duty to fully fund the future of our State - the education of the children; and

WHEREAS, Teacher strikes, school closings, instructional time decreases, and faculty layoffs loom over school districts and institutions of higher learning across the State; and

WHEREAS, Like generations of Illinois students before them, thousands of current students continue to count on the funding of the Monetary Assistance Program to create promising futures for themselves and equal access to education; and

WHEREAS, Without the guarantee of those funds in-state students are seeking educational advancement outside of Illinois and over 16,000 thousand students migrated to out-of-state universities; and

WHEREAS, As economic development and opportunity in the State have become less available particularly to ethnic and racial minorities, Illinois has seen a historic spike in the murder rate; and

WHEREAS, For the 17th consecutive month, Illinois has had the highest unemployment rate among African Americans in the nation, nearing 15%; and

WHEREAS, Forty-four percent of African American young men in Illinois between the ages of 20 and 24 are unemployed and out of school; and

WHEREAS, Conditions are not improving for the middle class and poor citizens of our State during this historic budget impasse; people are hurting; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, BY THE SENATE OF THE ONE HUNDREDTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we wholeheartedly commit to enacting a State budget; and be it further

RESOLVED, That the Senate will desist from working on any non-essential State business until a budget is enacted; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we will dedicate all of the resources of the Senate to work toward a solution to the budget impasse; and be it further

RESOLVED, That any bill, initiative, or committee hearing not pertaining to the budget of the State of Illinois should not be advanced in a Chamber of the General Assembly until a budget is enacted.