From the Tribune

$678 million spending bill passed in Illinois Senate
House seen as unlikely to OK effort to give governor access to state funds
By Ashley Wiehle and Jeffrey Meitrodt | Tribune reporters
11:02 PM CDT, April 3, 2008
SPRINGFIELD—Democratic Senate President Emil Jones championed passage of a nearly $678 million spending package Thursday that would expand health care, give pork-barrel projects to House Democrats and provide broad powers to the governor to tap into state funds he now cannot touch.
Jones' allies said the measures, which passed largely with Democratic votes, represented an attempt to repair a badly broken political bridge to House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Chicago), who still is smoldering over last year's bitter session.
But the odds of success are particularly long in the Democratic House, where Madigan rules. Many of Madigan's top lieutenants have dismissed Jones' plan, questioning why legislators should spend more now when Gov. Rod Blagojevich has projected a $750 million gap in this year's budget.
House Democrats also say they are wary of giving the governor more leeway to use state money when they want to rein him in. The governor is expanding health care without lawmaker approval and challenging their authority to stop him.
The legislation would partially boost Blagojevich's efforts to expand breast- and cervical-cancer screening, as well as FamilyCare, to give low-to-middle-income Illinoisans better access to health care.
Senate Republicans charged the health-care expansion would cost tens of millions of dollars just in the final months of this budget year but would balloon to hundreds of millions in future years. They said Illinois should pay a backlog of Medicaid bills instead.
"We have become a debtor state," said Minority Leader Frank Watson (R-Greenville). "A deadbeat state."
Watson decried giving more than $50 million in pork projects to House Democrats who lost out last year when Blagojevich vetoed the money with Jones' support, prompting Madigan to feel double-crossed and creating hard feelings with Senate Republicans who also lost out.
Republican senators calculated the Jones package restored funding for 790 House Democratic projects and four for Senate Democrats. Yet Jones brushed off the idea of his move being an olive branch to Madigan, saying it is a way to "deal with the budgetary shortfall."