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IPFS News Link • Government

Illinois Commits "Fraud On Taxpayers", Lowers Maximum Lottery Payout To Just $600

• http://www.zerohedge.com

Susan Rick's boyfriend won $250,000 from the Illinois Lottery in July.

As the Chicago Tribune reported in August, Rick thought the winnings would allow her to "stop working seven days a week, maybe fix up the house and take a trip to Minnesota to visit her daughter."

No such luck.

Instead of real money, Rick's boyfriend - one Danny Chasteen - got an IOU from the state.

The problem: the state's inability to pass a budget even after hiring (and subsequently firing) budget "guru" and Laffer disciple Donna Arduin for $30,000 a month meant that any Illinoisan who won more than $25,000 couldn't immediately be paid. 

More specifically, without a budget the comptroller's office doesn't have the legal authority to make the payments. 

Fast forward to Wednesday and the state comptroller's office made national news when Comptroller Leslie Geissler Munger said Illinois would skip a $560 million November pension payment. By way of recap (via Bloomberg): 

The spending standoff between Republican Governor Bruce Rauner and Democratic legislative leaders has extended into its fourth month with no signs of ending. Munger said her office will postpone a $560 million retirement-fund payment next month, and may make the December contribution late.

"This decision is choosing the least of a number of bad options," Munger told reporters in Chicago on Wednesday. "For all intents and purposes, we are out of money now."

Munger said the pension systems will be paid in full by the end of the fiscal year in June. The state still is making bond payments, she said.

"We prioritize the bond payments above everything else," Munger told reporters.

We have of course been covering the Illinois budget story closely over the past six or so months and in response to Wednesday's pension bombshell, we said the following:

One wonders what these means for Chicago's bankrupt school system, which, as we reported early last month, was depending upon nearly a half billion in funding from Springfield to plug a gaping budget hole. Further, this would seem to suggest that anyone who wins more than a few thousand in the Illinois lottery can go ahead and figure on getting a pieces of paper with Bruce Rauner's picture rather than Ben Franklin's for the foreseeable future. 


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