March 17th, 2008
The New York Times had a piece today that shows Illinois isn’t the only state with budget problems, in fact, some states have it much worse.
Many states are reporting their largest budget shortfalls since the recessions of 2001 and 1991-2.
Of course, the usual suspects appear in the Times’ story as the reasons that states are hurting financially.
Ms. Lav pointed to a confluence of factors — including weak consumer spending, high energy prices, dropping housing values and growing foreclosure rates — that suggest states will face a protracted struggle to keep their budgets afloat.
Earlier we told you how the Illinois tax revenue is slowing, and the state’s mound of unpaid bills is growing by the day. In fact, even though our governor’s pet issue is health care, Illinois’ mutli-million dollar Medicaid debt landed the state on the list of states with proposed health care cuts. (Check out this great graphic that shows where Illinois and other states fall. You will need to click on the graphic to see it better.)
The governor delivered a skeleton budget this year with old revenue ideas that have failed before, but unsurprisingly, he was mum on the idea of a tax increase. A few Democratic senators, however, believe this is the only way to pay off the state’s bills.
A couple of other states agree.
While most states are looking to address their budget anguish through cuts, tax increases are occasionally broached.
The Maryland Legislature made the difficult choice of increasing the state’s sales tax to 6 percent from 5 percent, raising its corporate taxes to 8.25 percent from 7 percent, and bumping the state’s cigarette tax to $2 per pack from $1. In Kentucky, the governor has proposed a 70-cent increase on cigarette taxes, raising it to $1 a pack, and Mr. Schwarzenegger in California has spoken vaguely about closing “tax loopholes” in his state.
The piece ends with this warning:
Ray Scheppach, the executive director of the National Governors Association, said things were likely to worsen over all. “The major impact on states is the year after a recession stops or the following year,” Mr. Scheppach said, because personal income taxes tend to lag economic recoveries. “It is really sort of the worst as you begin to recover.”
March 17th, 2008
Rockford Mass Transit buses may soon carry more blue-haired passengers than normal.
RMTD spokeswoman Lisa Brown said senior citizens have been flooding the city’s mass transit office in recent weeks to make sure they can get their state-mandated free rides.
Today marks the first day that Rockford residents and others in metropolitan cities across the state can hitch a free ride on the mass transit buses.
“I think that we will see more and more people join the family of transit riders,” Brown said.
Of course, the governor, who is trying to deflect the negative publicity he is getting while a top fundraiser is on trial for federal corruption charges, is milking the free-ride story for all its worth. On Tuesday, the administration is sending one of its lackeys to Rockford, where he will be joined by other transit officials, to hold a news conference about the new option.
The press pops seemed to help Blagojevich’s poll numbers, which jumped a bit in January, and he was able to seem like he was swooping in to save the day for seniors. However, this plan did backfire when he visited seniors on the north side of Chicago.
In response to one lady who asked a lengthy question about the governor’s policies on mass transit and taxation, the governor finished with this:
“It’s not so bad. Just hold your nose and take a bus for free.”
At the end of the day, seniors got free rides and sadly for Blagojevich, the governor’s good press ended quickly.
In Rockford, people who are 65 years and older must have a RMTD-issued photo ID card to get their free ride. Brown said the office holds photo ID sessions every other Wednesday, and the sessions, which normal handle 15 people, have averaged 70 customers sinc late February.
Starting Monday, March 17, 2008, all senior citizens will be able to ride RMTD’s fixed routes for free. To take advantage of free rides To take advantage of the free rides, anyone 65 years of age or older will need an RMTD photo ID. Photo ID’s are taken every other Wednesday between 1:00 and 4:30 pm at 501 W. State Street.
The cost is $2.00 and proof of age, such as a State ID, driver’s license or birth certificate will also be required. For more information call 815.961.9000 today.
Before today, seniors purchased half-price tickets to ride the bus, but political manuevering in January created the free rides for seniors.
Gov. Rod Blagojevich agreed to break his campaign promise to not raise taxes in order break a legislative stalemate over crucial funding for the Chicago transit systems, but before doing so, he demanded the Legislature approve his free-ride provision.
In January, Brown said RMTD did not expect to lose much money on free-ride clause, because seniors, who already paid half price, also only consisted of 24,000 of the 1.4 million Rockford mass transit riders.
Rockford transit policy allows non-residents to also ride the bus, but they must have the same photo ID as Rockford riders. Because of the way the state law is written, each transit district must set their own rules, which means guidelines can vary between cities and seniors may not be able to ride for free everywhere.
March 17th, 2008
Well, it’s not quite the morning anymore, but let’s just pretend I’m not a little late in posting this weekend’s “Saturday Night Live” clips.
On Saturday, former SNL funnyman Tracy Morgan appeared on the ever-popular “Weekend Update” segment of the sketch show. He offered a rebuttal to his former castmate and current boss Tina Fey’s take on the presidential election. (Morgan co-stars in Fey’s hit show “30 Rock”)
If you haven’t watched the Fey’s bit, you should probably watch that first. Then, I recommend watching Morgan’s rebuttal. I must warn you that both segments do include some profanity, so don’t turn the volume up too loud at work.
After watching the Morgan’s take on the presidential race, I couldn’t help but wonder if his guest appearance had anything to do with this article.
On a completely unrelated but also funny note, Slate.com has a piece on its 
Web site today where readers were asked to submit their favorite sports metaphors for the Democratic presidential race. Why did the writers not include Republican contenders in their piece? Well maybe because the nomination was no contest? (Ok, I should probably leave these sort of metaphors to my much more well-qualified sportswriting colleagues.)
Here is an example of the Slate results:
Boxing. Several Gabfest listeners suggested that the perfect Clinton-Obama metaphor was a 15-round heavyweight bout that ends with several knockdowns but no clear winner. Some referred specifically to the famous Ali vs. Frazier matches, with Obama mapping to the faster, graceful Ali, and Clinton to the indestructible gladiator Frazier.
Photo courtesy of Slate.com
