Quinn denies partisanship in closure decisions

Gov. Pat Quinn denied Republican claims on Friday that partisanship played a role in his decision to take steps to close seven state facilities and lay off more than 1,900 workers to live within the reduced budget passed by lawmakers.

“It’s very clear that I did not. There are some representatives who happen to be Democrats who represent generally those areas. I guess they’re not happy either,” Quinn said at an unrelated news conference in Chicago.

Five of the seven facilities Quinn has targeted to close have both a Republican state senator and representative, a sixth is represented by Democrats and a seventh is split with a Republican senator and a Democratic representative. While most of the facilities slated to close are in areas represented by Republicans, so are some of the facilities for the developmentally disabled and mentally ill that are to remain open.

Quinn says he is being forced to close a prison in Lincoln, a youth prison in Murphysboro and facilities for the mentally ill and disabled in Rockford, Jacksonville, Tinley Park, Dixon and Chester because lawmakers passed a budget with insufficient money to keep government running for an entire year without the cuts. Quinn already has canceled pay raises for 30,000 state workers. The Chicago Democrat has suggested lawmakers have the power to soften the cuts if they reallocate money when they go back to work in Springfield next month during the fall veto session.

Republicans have been quick to suggest Quinn may have had ulterior motives with his cuts.

“It appears that Gov. Quinn has targeted Republican facilities and Republican jobs in his endless quest to spend more money on things that he wants,” House Republican leader Tom Cross of Oswego has said in a statement. “It is still not clear how he chose the facilities and jobs on his list.”

Republican state Sen. Matt Murphy of Palatine questioned if it was retaliation because the GOP wouldn’t support Quinn’s proposed plan to borrow money to pay the state’s unpaid bills.

“How many of these jobs happen to be in districts where legislators, particularly Republicans, weren’t willing to go along with his borrowing plan and is this political payback and an attempt to ratchet up political pressure? That remains to be seen,” Murphy has said.