SPRINGFIELD -In a stunning move, the Illinois House on Monday voted to override Gov. Bruce Rauner’s veto of the Chicago police and fire pension bill that has sparked a war of words between the Republican governor and Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
The action came just hours after the Illinois Senate voted to override the bill.
The votes mark a significant defeat for Rauner and a huge win for Emanuel, whose own top aides had acknowledged last week that passage in the House was going to be a tough political battle to win.
The House voted 72-43, with Rep. David Harris, an Arlington Heights Republican, saying he disagreed with Rauner and would vote yes for the override, an exceptionally unusual move in the often politically bitter Springfield political environment.
The Senate voted 39-19 for the override earlier in the day.
On the Senate floor, Senate President John Cullerton called the bill “a negotiated settlement” and “very responsible.”
“I believe that this is pension parity,” Cullerton said before the vote.
After the Senate override, Emanuel, Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7 President Dean Angelo and Chicago Firefighters Union Local 2 President Tom Ryan thanked legislators for the vote.
“Senate Bill 777 reflects months of negotiation between our Fire and Police unions and the city of Chicago, through which we came together on an agreement to solve a decades-old pension problem, an excellent example of local control at it’s best,” the statement read.
The statement is perhaps a play on one of Rauner’s longstanding demands for more local control, specifically on issues like collective bargaining and prevailing wage. Those changes are opposed by most Democrats and labor unions.
Rauner on Friday vetoed the bill that seeks to give Chicago more time to bring its police and fire pension systems up to full funding. The bill would have covered contributions to the Policemen’s Annuity and Benefit Fund and the Firemen’s Annuity and Benefit Fund.
“The bill continues the irresponsible practice of deferring funding decisions necessary to ensure pension fund solvency well into the future,” Rauner said in his veto. “The bill effectively makes Chicago taxpayers borrow from the pension funds at an additional cost of $18.6 billion. It’s a game politicians like to play with taxpayers’ dollars by delaying payments today and forcing future elected officials to deal with pension funding issues tomorrow.”
After the veto, Emanuel accused Rauner of “shaking down Chicago residents, forcing an unnecessary $300 million property tax increase on them and using them as pawns in his failed political agenda.”
“With a stroke of his pen, Bruce Rauner just told every Chicago taxpayer to take a hike,” Emanuel said in a statement.
The bill would change a state law that helped to increase payments to public safety worker pensions to reach a 90 percent funded level by 2040. Chicago’s payment is $834 million this year, compared to last year’s $290.4 million.
The bill would have reduced how much taxpayers contribute to the retirement funds by $619 million. But that delay would come at a cost of billions of dollars.
The bill was approved more than a year ago but wasn’t sent to Rauner until late March because Cullerton had been holding the bill amid concerns Rauner would veto the legislation to squeeze cash-strapped Chicago and strengthen his own hand in the budget stalemate over the governor’s demand for pro-business, anti-union reforms. The Sun-Times reported last month that Cullerton, Emanuel’s closest ally in Springfield, had ended 10 months of cat-and-mouse by sending the legislation to the governor.
Rauner on Sunday described the bill as “terrible policy.” He also said it is “false,” “wrong” and “misleading” to suggest the bill would have saved Chicago $843 million over five years. Rather, he said Emanuel would have been allowed to “skip” payments and borrow from the pension funds.
Rauner then added: “If the mayor wants to get upset that he can’t borrow more to fund operations, what he ought to be doing is being down here in Springfield, advocating for reforms for his city.”
Emanuel quickly moved to brand an impending property tax increase as “the Rauner Tax” after the governor vetoed the pension plan. Mayoral spokesman Adam Collins said the mayor’s office is “unequivocally calling on legislators to override the governor’s veto and prevent the $300 million Rauner Tax from taking effect.”
