Community members representing seniors, health care workers, child care providers, working parents and more met at the Kankakee Federation of Labor yesterday to discuss the impact of the state’s growing state budget crisis and its affect on working families with State Representative Lisa Dugan.

“Vital public services like home care are already seeing the effects of a tight budget and payment delays,” said Joann Breathett, a home care provider from Kankakee. “Cutting an additional $40 million from home care like the state is proposing would mean thousands of seniors will be without the care they need. Budget cuts are not the answer to this crisis, it’s time for legislators to find the new revenue we need to get us out of this mess.”

“We simply cannot cut our way out of a $12.4-billion budget crisis and expect essential programs like child care and education to recover,” said Donna Morrow, a Kankakee child care provider. “Our schools are already having to cut back, and there’s a proposed $50 million cut to the state’s child care program. We need to protect our children, not threaten the care they need to grow up safe and healthy.”

The event was one in a series planned throughout the state to call on state lawmakers to protect vital public services by passing a fair tax plan that generates significant new revenue while emphasizing tax fairness.

See coverage and photos from the Daily Journal here.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 9th, 2009 at 10:45 am and is filed under Budget News, Chicago Area, Northern Illinois. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.