John McCabe
Fred Crespo
Rita B. Garman
SPRINGFIELD — In the opening round of the state budgeting process, Illinois’ top court has asked lawmakers for a roughly $30 million hike in appropriations for the coming fiscal year.
Illinois Supreme Court Chief Justice Rita B. Garman has requested a $373.9 million allotment from the state’s taxpayer-supported general fund, telling lawmakers that the court’s share is a “small, but vitally important” investment — especially with calls to reduce incarceration rates that may increase the need for probation.
But Gov. Bruce Rauner’s proposed state budget for the fiscal year starting July 1 contains about $63.5 million less than that for the courts, and the House Democrat in charge of the panel that controls court funding said he doesn’t expect the money will be there for a bump in probation dollars.
Last year, the court was given $344.8 million from the general revenue fund, a $43 million increase over the previous year. The budget for the state’s top court also increased from fiscal year 2013 to 2014 after dropping between 2012 and 2013.
The biggest chunk of the court’s budget request for the upcoming year, $190.5 million, would go toward judges’ salaries at all three levels of the state court system, which are set by statute.
“Thus, any cut in funding for judicial salaries would require devastating cuts to other vital services,” Garman said in prepared remarks this month to House and Senate panels tasked with crafting parts of the budget.
Operating expenses — such as information technology, utilities and non-judicial salaries — comprise $64.3 million of the court’s request, with an additional $1 million for a foreign-language interpreter program.
Probation service funds would total $118.1 million. Last year, the court was allotted $97.4 million for such expenses.
Garman used the majority of her testimony to highlight the benefits of probation, saying a failure to fully realize its impact “jeopardizes the safety of our communities” and squanders a chance to help the most vulnerable citizens.
It costs about $22,000 per year to house an adult offender in a state prison, compared to about $4,237 to have a probation officer supervise one, Garman added.
John McCabe, lobbyist for the Illinois Probation and Court Services Association, said repeated calls from lawmakers and Rauner to reduce the number of people in prison should intensify the appetite to fully fund probation services.
“We’re in an era where the governor himself has appointed 28 people to look at ways to reform the criminal justice system, and the bottom line is they’re looking to find fewer placements in the Department of Corrections,” McCabe said. “And you can’t cut corrections and probation and expect anyone to have any faith in the criminal justice system.”
Although Rauner has shown a willingness to look at diminishing the burden on prisons, his proposed budget for the fiscal year contained a 10 percent cut for the courts.
Garman told lawmakers that because judges’ salaries cannot lawfully be reduced and because cutting operational expenses could force delays in cases, the brunt of a 10 percent cut — amounting to $34.4 million — would be borne by probation services.
She called that type of hit “unacceptable,” saying as many as 47,000 probationers could go unsupervised and the savings would be illusory, partially because more people would wind up in prison.
The continued existence of the state’s problem-solving courts — drug courts, mental health courts and courts for veterans — is also “not plausible” with a 10 percent budget cut, she said.
“The governor’s announced plan to tackle prison crowding relies heavily upon a vital and fully functional community corrections component,” Garman said. “Reducing the capacity and effectiveness of probation only serves to undermine that ultimate goal of reducing the prison population while protecting community safety.”
In a statement, the governor's office said, “Illinois is $6 billion in the hole because of years of over spending and fiscal recklessness. Every constitutional office was reduced by 10 percent to reduce state spending and put Illinois on a fiscally-responsible path.”
Rep. Fred Crespo, a Hoffman Estates Democrat who chairs the House Appropriations-General Services Committee, which heard testimony on the court’s budget, said the final fiscal picture rarely ever looks exactly like the proposals put forth by the governor or state agencies.
Lawmakers also have yet to agree on a revenue projection for fiscal year 2016, so that makes it more difficult to gauge what the end product will be, Crespo said.
Still, he said, he doesn’t expect the money to be there for lawmakers to increase probation funding like they have in previous years.
“The last couple years we’ve been very fortunate to give them more. Not what they asked for, but more than previous years,” Crespo said. “Will we be able to help them with probation like we have in the past? My guess, right now, is I don’t think so. I don’t think the revenue’s going to be there.”