Heres a question for you: would you be
satisfied to work a full day but be paid only
half of your wages? Or worse, only a quarter of
your wages?
I didnt think so. And neither are the Pay Now
Illinois Coalition members. Yet that is exactly
what is being proposed.
Today, the House and Senate passed a $700
million funding bill for social service agencies
that will now be sent to the Governor for
consideration. Of the funding that is included,
$450 million comes from the Commitment to Human
Services Fund. But collectively, the Coalition
members are owed more than $100 million, or
nearly 25% of that money. And, we are not even
one-fourth of the providers in Illinois that are
owed money. We believe the total amount owed to
providers throughout the State of Illinois could
be as high as $2 billion. Should the Governor
sign the bill no guarantee he will it
amounts to just a down payment on what is owed.
It does not change the fundamentals of our
lawsuit.
And by the way, how would that money be divided?
Who would determine an equitable distribution?
Who gets paid first? And why? The answers to
these questions are not clear, and that is why
we are suing for full and immediate payment of
what is owed to all of us under legally binding
contracts. Because paying your bills in full
thats just good business.