Peraica Proposes Reforms - Cook County Board Votes ‘Em Down

January 16, 2009 by CookReformer
Filed under: Budget, Casino, Mayor Daley, Reform, Spending, Taxes

This week, Cook County Commissioner Tony Peraica introduced a number of budget amendments designed to streamline the budget in these challenging economic times.

Given the fact that the County Board enacted a massive sales tax increase last year - and is looking to pass $740 million in bonds this year…you’d think they’d all jump at the chance to streamline the budget.

Yeah, right.

Here are the results of how these proposals fared:

Amendment to eliminate the $1,200 monthly “stipend” paid to each commissioner (as detailed in this Fox Chicago News segment): No commissioner (Republican or Democrat) would even second Peraica’s amendment.

Amendment to cap the budget of each commissioner’s personal office to $320,000 per year, which would equal a total budget cut of 10% of the FY 2008 budget. Currently commissioners receive varying budgets - and commissioners are certainly allowed (as does Peraica) to return excess or unused funds to the county coffers. This amendment failed to pass.

An across-the-board county budget cut of 4% of the FY 08 budget - which would still leave the budget significantly higher than the FY 2007 budget, which had represented a budget increase of 13% over the prior year. This amendment failed to pass - but all Republicans voted for it.

A compromise, modest 2% across-the-board budget cut of the FY 08 numbers. Commissioner Schneider joined all the Democrats in voting against this budget cut.

Looks like the county budget will continue to increase…and the county taxpayers will continue to foot the compounding bill.

Tags: Cook County, Peraica

Comments

4 Comments on Peraica Proposes Reforms - Cook County Board Votes ‘Em Down

Sandi Czyznikiewicz on Sat, 17th Jan 2009 4:14 am

Of course they voted it all down. They have expenses. Cars to pay for, constituents whose palms need greasing, and my personal favorite, Liz Gorman’s Masters Degree.

Tony, you are so on point! If only we could get the rest of Cook County to hear you!

Sun-Times Highlights Peraica’s Attempt to Axe Commissioner Stipend : Reform Cook County on Sat, 17th Jan 2009 8:31 am

[...] agree. Read our previous post on Tony’s reform amendments that were rejected by the county board this [...]

Today’s Board Meeting : Reform Cook County on Tue, 27th Jan 2009 6:20 am

[...] the last meeting, Tony Peraica introduced several common sense, budget-cutting amendments that were summarily rejected - including a measure to cap the budgets of commissioners’ [...]

laura on Wed, 11th Feb 2009 6:22 pm