Editor’s note: On Wednesday, November 8, 2017, the Illinois Senate overrode Governor Bruce Rauner’s veto of the Debt Transparency Act. It will become law. Attached is the press release.
State Representative Tony McCombie’s (IL-71st) chief co-sponsored legislation HB3649, also known as the Debt Transparency Act, became law, with broad bi-partisan support. The Illinois House of Representatives and Senate voted to override the Governor Bruce Rauner’s veto.
In addition, the new law requires agencies to estimate the amount of late payment interest penalties incurred on these bills. The State’s Prompt Payment Act means a one percent per month penalty applies to unpaid bills,even though they are currently unknown to the Comptroller. As of November 8, the Office of the Comptroller reported a current bill backlog of $16.7 billion.
The Debt Transparency Act makes common sense reforms, by requiring all State agencies to disclose the unpaid bills they are currently holding, but have not yet sent to the Office of Comptroller at the end every month. This is a change from current law, which requires State agencies to report unpaid bills only once per year.
I am really proud to be a part of passing the Debt Transparency Act into law,” stated McCombie. It was amazing to me that this was not already our standard practice in Illinois. As the [former] Mayor of Savanna[, IL,] any time I needed information on bills that were due, it was always readily available. This is a good Government, non-political, and common sense piece of legislation.”