Supporters of the latest measure designed to help avoid public transit service and job cuts in the Chicago area are going to have to do more work to get Governor J.B. Pritzker on board.
Sponsors of the measure introduced in the House late Tuesday night want to raise $1.5 billion to help the agencies fill a budget hole that goes from $200 million next year to more than $800 million in 2027.
It calls for, among other things, a surcharge on tickets for big live performances and a mechanism to tax what they're calling unrealized capital gains from the wealthiest people in the state.
During an appearance in central Illinois on Wednesday, the governor says it's not clear how much money those proposals will raise.
"They sprung a whole bunch of things that have never been seen before," he told reporters, noting that the unrealized capital gains tax has "never been done before by any state ... never been done by the federal government."
Pritzker also said he opposes a provision that would let communities outside Chicago put up speed-enforcement cameras, with 50% of any revenue going to a new transit board. He cited past episodes of corruption: "I think we need to, you know, take a pause."
The governor has said he supports a measure to help the transit agencies head off service cuts that could hit the CTA as soon as next summer, but says the bill as it's currently written is "not going forward."
"There's got to be a lot of discussion between the House and the Senate in order to come up with a final bill, because it isn't going to look like what the House has put forward," he said.
The fall veto session is set to end Thursday.