By Capitol News Illinois
SPRINGFIELD – Illinois budget officials said Thursday that revenues are flowing into state coffers at a faster pace than previously estimated, meaning lawmakers will have more money to work with as they try to finalize a new budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1.
The Governor’s Office of Management and Budget officially raised its revenue estimate for the current fiscal year by more than $1.4 billion and by $842 million for the upcoming fiscal year.
Those figures are similar to the latest revised estimates from the General Assembly’s budget monitoring agency, the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability, which said last week that revenues for the current year would go up about $2 billion while next year’s revenues would be $792 million more than previously forecasted.
Top officials from Gov. JB Pritzker’s administration claimed Thursday that they were misled by leadership at the state Department of Veterans’ Affairs regarding a deadly COVID-19 outbreak at the state-run LaSalle Veterans’ Home.
Deputy Gov. Sol Flores and Illinois Department of Public Health Director Ngozi Ezike said, as a result of this misinformation, they were unaware of the breakdown in basic infection control protocols at LaSalle that led to a November COVID-19 outbreak that killed 36 veterans.
During the nearly four-hour House Veterans’ Affairs Committee hearing Thursday, Flores blamed senior officials at IDVA and the home for the staff’s failure to follow state and federal health guidelines.
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As a panel of state lawmakers prepares to grill members of Gov. JB Pritzker’s administration over how a COVID-19 outbreak at a state-run veterans’ home grew so massive it killed more than a quarter of the facility’s residents in the fall, Republicans in the Illinois House on Tuesday sent Attorney General Kwame Raoul a letter urging his office to open a criminal investigation into the matter.
The hearings and letter come on the heels of a damning report published by Pritzker’s office April 30, which places blame for the deadly viral outbreak at the LaSalle Veterans’ Home on a variety of factors, including lack of preparation, absentee leadership, lax COVID protocols and poor communication not just within the facility, but at the Illinois Department of Veterans’ Affairs.
Republicans call for investigation over governor s actions in virus outbreak that killed 36
Davidsmeyer, other Republicans want answers about governor’s handling of veterans’ home cases
Greg Bishop The Center Square and David C.L. Bauer Journal-Courier
May 12, 2021
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House Republicans are formally asking the Illinois Attorney General to investigate the Pritzker administration’s handling of the COVID-19 outbreak that killed 36 residents last fall at the Illinois Veterans’ Home in LaSalle.
A letter House Minority Leader Jim Durkin, R-Western Springs, sent Attorney General Kwame Raoul said the outbreak was avoidable.
“The (Inspector General for the Illinois Department of Human Services report) is very troubling and saddening,” Durkin said. “Based on the findings made in the report, it is clear that the transfer of COVID-19 to vulnerable patients at LaSalle Veterans’ Home was avoidable. Caring for our aged veterans in our state facilities should