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Illinois Governor’s proposed budget includes inflation relief
During his State of the State Address Wednesday, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker announced his proposed Fiscal Year 2023 Budget plan including efforts to alleviate financial burdens caused by inflation.
Pritzker says the Family Relief Plan would freeze the state gas tax for the upcoming fiscal year. The state gas tax doubled in 2019 to 38 cents per gallon and is currently set to automatically increase every July 1st at the rate of inflation.
He says this can be done without slowing infrastructure improvements.
“Because the Illinois Department of Transportation has been efficiently completing projects on time and on budget, it has collected enough infrastructure dollars already to allow us to freeze the gas tax for a year without effecting any of our road projects.”
He says the plan would also suspend the state grocery tax.
“We can afford to suspend the state tax on groceries in the coming year and have the state make up any lost revenue to local governments, so we can bring some relief to families at the checkout counter.”
The plan would also include $475 million in property tax rebates for families.
Pritzker also announced Illinois will end the current fiscal year with a $1.7 billion surplus, which will help alleviate impacts to the state from the proposed temporary tax amendments.
