The St. Louis Post Dispatch reported here Sunday that "Memos protect Illinois budget deal." Some quotes from the story:
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. - By Saturday, a term previously known only to the most hopelessly wonkish of bureaucrats - "memorandum of understanding" - had sprung fully into the everyday political language of Springfield.The Chicago Tribune reported this morning:It means, a written promise between negotiating parties that they won't go back on their word after the negotiations are over.
And the fact that Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich was forced to sign dozens of those guarantees this month, before legislators of either party would give him a state budget, may be the latest sign that the once-charmed chief executive is in deep political trouble. * * *
Those memos include guarantees that the governor won't use administrative tactics to shut down Vandalia Correctional Center after agreeing in the budget to keep it open; that he would allow tighter oversight of new state borrowing, an activity for which he has been widely criticized; and that he won't halt the progress of specific, previously approved capital projects.
While memoranda of understanding are sometimes signed to prevent confusion in complex policy negotiations, it's unprecedented in Illinois for dozens of the written promises to be used as a backup for a governor's word in something as basic and public as the state budget.
"It's a slap in the face," said Chris Mooney, political scientist at the University of Illinois at Springfield. "The best-case scenario is that they've got a bad communication problem. The worst-case scenario is, none of them trusts (Blagojevich)."
But in an extraordinary move, the legislative leaders demanded dozens of side agreements from the governor--in writing--to ensure he would stick to the deals he made.Posted by Marcia Oddi at July 26, 2004 06:35 PMLawmakers also restructured several legislative oversight panels to give the General Assembly more leverage over the administration in issuing contracts, making changes in state employee health insurance and implementing the finer points of new laws.
The moves reflected a growing distrust of a governor who has made a practice of accusing legislators of being beholden to special interests and spending like "drunken sailors," and who has aggressively used his bully pulpit to stump for his budget. * * *
The so-called memoranda of understanding between the governor and leaders "brought a level of comfort" to deal with a "certain level of distrust" among the negotiators, Madigan said Saturday. Other top budget negotiators agreed.
"It shows the distrust that exists, that we do have to commit every last thing to writing instead of simply saying we understand each other," said Rep. Gary Hannig (D-Litchfield), the House Democrats' point man in the contentious budget talks. "In the past there has been more of a willingness to say, `If I agree to something, that's what I will do.'"