SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — If you plan on doing
business with the state of Illinois, you'd better learn to beg — preferably to
an influential politician.
With the state billions of dollars behind in paying
its debt, collecting on unpaid bills can be a torturous, confusing process in
which how fast you get paid may depend on who goes to bat for you.
After receiving "hardship" appeals from
businesses and community organizations awaiting payment from the state, Gov.
Pat Quinn's budget office asked to speed up the payment of $1.1 billion on more
than 21,000 vouchers in the last 13 months. That's an average of 83 each
business day, according to an Associated Press analysis of state records.
But the rules for who gets paid and how quickly are
not always followed. Even state Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka, whose office is
in charge of writing the checks, acknowledges the system isn't fair.
Nearly 1,000 pages of emails and letters to the
state, obtained by the AP under the Freedom of Information Act and supported by
other documents and interviews, showed that businesses and nonprofits backed by
lawmakers or others with clout — Democrat or Republican — often get paid more
quickly than others.
"You're supposed to be able to write and tell
someone, 'We have a problem here,' but it's not working either," said
Moira Baker of Mary and Tom Leo Associates, a child welfare agency. The bills
"just stack up."
After months of waiting for phone calls to be
returned and on the "verge of having to stop services," Baker
contacted Senate President John Cullerton, who represents the district where
her agency is located. When Cullerton put the association's request on paper,
money flowed to her within days.
Similarly, cash quickly followed queries from House
Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie and her Senate counterpart, James
Clayborne. The responses included money for bills newer than what the state
considers to be a hardship. Some of the bills were submitted just days earlier.
"Is any of this fair? None of it is
fair," said Topinka, a Republican. "No matter what we do, we're going
to have to juggle."
To help them determine who needs it the most,
Topinka said her staff relies on what "a legislator or an agency director
tells us. I don't know another way to get at it."
Quinn's budget office encourages people to go to a
website and fill out a form if they want to claim a financial hardship, but
businesses can also call or write directly. The website says bills must be at
least 90 days old to be considered for hardship payment and that only bills
from the fiscal year that ended in June are getting attention while the state
catches up.
But some vendors get newer bills paid. Budget
spokeswoman Kelly Kraft called the 90-day mark "a guideline" and said
bills from this fiscal year can be paid if they're for "vital state
operations."
In an interview with the AP, Quinn expressed no
dissatisfaction with a system he said predates his time in office.
"You have to have a process where people who
are in dire straits can appeal and ask for expedited payment," the
Democrat told the AP. "But anyone is able to do that."
Some vendors, however, aren't aware the expedited
process exists. Glenda Farkas, executive director of the West Central Illinois
Center for Independent
Living in Quincy, said she struggled with late
state payments for three years before finding out about the hardship process in
July. A letter to her state representative and senator helped her receive her
payments for May and June, but nothing since.
"It was a temporary Band-Aid fix," she
said. "It's still a month-to-month struggle."
Though some nonprofits received payments within
days after appealing with just a hardship letter and no apparent written help
from lawmakers, records show skids get greased almost immediately when
legislators speak up.
Topinka's own legislative liaison, Peg Mosgers,
made a plea to the comptroller's bill-payers on July 15 about overdue payments
to a nonprofit with clients in Currie's Chicago district. "Barbara Flynn
Currie" is underlined and the memo asks, "They can't make payroll.
Can we pay something? Let me know and I'll call Currie's office."
But the nonprofit ended up with even more money
than it sought. Mosgers indicates that $29,432 was 90 days overdue to FCAN, the
Families' and Children's AIDS Network. But three days later when checks were
cut, they also included a $93,000 payment that was just over 60 days late and
an $11,000 payment submitted earlier that month, despite the rules on how old
bills must be to warrant hardship status.
Currie said she typically intervenes when a
business or community organization tells her that employee paychecks are in
jeopardy. She said she was not aware that in the FCAN case, all its bills were
paid, including newer ones.
"We're not asking them for that," Currie
said. "We're asking them to make sure these people have enough money to
make payroll."
FCAN director Linda Coon has had a professional
relationship with Currie and gave the Democratic lawmaker campaign
contributions totaling $650a half-dozen years ago. Currie said neither the
rapport nor the political gifts played a role.
Topinka spokesman Brad Hahn said the key factor in
deciding to pay the bill was that FCAN couldn't pay employees.
Cullerton, a Chicago Democrat, wrote Topinka on
Aug. 19 about money owed to Mary and Tom Leo Associates. On Aug. 25, the
comptroller wrote checks for $120,000, including $52,000 that had just been
billed days earlier.
"This would appear to be a case of the Senate
president and the state comptroller helping keep the doors open on a small
business that provides services," said Cullerton spokesman John Patterson.
He said Topinka's staff suggested putting the request in writing.
Baker said she doesn't know Cullerton personally
and called his office "out of desperation." Even then, there was a
long period of back-and-forth with his office, she said. The money she got will
see her through about two more pay periods.
Other legislators also have had success
intervening.
A $300,000 bill submitted on July 6 by a Chicago
Heights agency was issued on July 20 — the same day Rep. Anthony DeLuca,
D-Crete, sent a fax to Topinka titled "Hardship!"
More than $258,000 went to an East St. Louis
facility just two days after Democratic Sen. James Clayborne's staff sent an
email to the governor's office.
Sen. Linda Holmes and Rep. Linda Chapa La Via also
got $27,000 for an early childhood center in the Democrats' hometown of Aurora
three days after writing a letter.
"When I get a plea, I try to help,"
Holmes said. "It's the reason a lot of us go into politics, to help and do
something."
Hahn insists that each case where a legislator
intervened involved a "legitimate urgency" for agencies that were
waiting months for payment.
"We don't hand out money haphazardly over
here," Topinka said.
Associated Press writers Christopher Wills and
Sophia Tareen contributed to this report.
Copyright
2011 The Associated Press.
