IN THENEWS

Illinois Venture Capital Association Illinois Legislative Report
David Stricklin / Stricklin & Associates

Wednesday, May 28, 2025

FINALE

Legislators and the governor’s office are working to assemble an energy bill, pension changes, transit solutions, and the annual budget over the next few days before adjournment on May 31. This includes IVCA efforts to include in a revenue omnibus bill language to address the Department of Revenue decision resulting from our change to the partnership definition to deny a credit for taxes paid in other states in certain instances. We have worked diligently to introduce legislation and inform policy makers.

The number of substantial issues which are still under negotiation is typical of the last few days of session in Springfield. Overhanging this year’s session is the unknown effects of changes to federal law which could impact the state’s Medicaid program and other services it provides. To address a budget shortfall of $500M or more there is a laundry list of options and surely many others which have not been publicized. How viable any are in part or in whole depends on the political calculation of how much revenue it brings in vs. how difficult it will be for policy makers to explain and take the heat which results from a vote.
In the final days of the spring session, lawmakers are working on a legislative package aimed at addressing the state’s growing energy needs and rising costs without derailing the ambitious goals championed by Gov. JB Pritzker to make the state carbon-free by midcentury.

“What we’re trying to do is find ways to ensure those capacity spikes don’t continue for years into the future, and there’s really only two ways of doing that, and that’s by either decreasing demand for electricity or increasing supply,” said state Sen. Bill Cunningham, a Chicago Democrat who’s leading energy legislation efforts in the Senate. “I think that’s really the underlying impetus for energy bills this session.” […]

The legislative draft also would create an ambitious new goal for large-scale energy storage through large batteries that would absorb excess wind and solar power for later use, along with goals to deliver clean, low-cost energy, while also promoting several efficiency measures supporting virtual power plants.
Cunningham said that if the larger legislative package does not come together, proposals within the measure could still be pushed as individual bills.

ILLINOIS TO TAX SERVICES?
TIER TWO PENSION CRITIQUE
TRANSIT CLIFF

* Crain’s | Fitch downgrades Chicago’s financial outlook to ‘negative’: Fitch Ratings has revised its financial outlook for the city of Chicago to “negative,” citing a lack of meaningful progress in closing a $1.12 billion structural budget gap.