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Quinn: Budget Address Will Highlight Cuts, Proposed Tax Increase -- LIVE COVERAGE WEDNESDAY ON WGIL
Gov. Pat Quinn is scheduled to deliver his budget address on Wednesday. He has a variety of options for dealing with a projected $9 billion budget deficit, and funding a statewide construction program.

Quinn is promising to cut spending, for sure. "There are gonna be cuts, and they are going to be painful," Quinn says. "Nobody likes to cut budgets of important programs, but everybody has to make a sacrifice in a very tough time. We wanna be responsible."

Quinn is considering raising the income tax from 3 percent to 4 1/2 percent, while increasing the personal exemption from $2,000 to $6,000, so that low- and moderate-income families would actually pay less.

He says he's against raising the gasoline tax to pay for road building, something Illinois Senate President John Cullerton (D-Chicago) favors. A gas tax increase measure also has passed a committee in the Illinois House of Representatives.

Other tax or fee increases, more casinos and pension reforms are also under consideration. Lawmakers are also looking at applying sales tax to more transactions, including consumer services, but Cullerton says he's for that only if the rate is decreased to that the result is dollar-neutral.

LISTEN FOR LIVE COVERAGE OF GOV. QUINN'S BUDGET ADDRESS WEDNESDAY AT NOON ON WGIL AND ON WGIL.COM's "SPECIAL EVENTS LIVE AUDIO" LINK.
03 15 09 by Newsroom
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