What's it like to be in charge of the state budget ... when there is no state budget? That's the topic for this edition of The Players: your look into who's who in Illinois politics and what they're up to.
On Monday (the 125th day of Illinois having no budget), the City Club of Chicago organized a panel discussion called "Madness on the Prairie: Illinois State Budget Process Gone Wild" (this link will take you to a video of the entire event). It featured a pair of journalists (Illinois Public Radio's Amanda Vinicky as well as Politico's Natasha Korecki), a Democratic state legislator, and Tim Nuding.
If you're not a government insider, you may not recognize the Nuding name. But you know his boss: Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner; Nuding is the governor's budget director.
A quick bit of background on Nuding: He's been dealing with the Illinois budget since 1991. Back then, he was a newbie appropriations analyst for the Senate Republicans. Then, too, Illinois politicians couldn't reach a budget deal by deadline; they figured it out by mid-summer.
That pales in comparison to now: Illinois' in its fifth month without a deal, and counting.
Here's what Nuding have to say about it? Here's some of what he had to say at the City Club, followed by a bit of rebuttal from Democratic Rep. John Bradley of Marion.
