This document has been formatted for printing from your browser from the Web site of the Illinois Association of School Boards. The Senate has one more week to hear House bills in committee. Only 13 more legislative days are scheduled before the April 14 adjournment deadline. The workload for substantive committees in both the House and Senate is relatively light in this election year. Appropriations committees, however, have been meeting steadily to hear testimony on the various aspects of the State budget.
Tax relief is the hot topic.
More specifically, the debate is centered on who should get what type of tax break. Once an agreement is reached on this issue, the rest of the budget could fall together rather quickly. The first major volley in the tax relief war came Thursday when the Democrats in the House of Representatives pushed a tax break bill out of the House Executive Committee. It would also allow the program to cover the costs of medications for cancer, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, glaucoma, lung disease and smoking-related illnesses. The bill also created, among many other provisions, an earned income tax credit based after the federal program of the same name.