County has announced a quote, good news budget for fiscal year.

2025, unlike the city of Chicago with its looming budget holes and, quote, everything's on the table approach, including tax hikes.

The county's 9.9 billion dollar proposal up 6.8% compared to last year includes no plans to increase taxes, cut services or lay off any workers to cover a 218 million dollar projected budget gap.

>> This year's 9.9 billion dollar balance budget.

And our strong financial position aren't by chance.

They are the product of smart policies year after year.

>> Joining us now with more on the county budget is Cook County Board.

President Toni Preckwinkle.

Madam President, welcome back.

Thanks for joining us.

Thank you.

So what are the priorities and investments of this budget?

Our budget is 9.9 billion.

As you heard 53% of at 5.9 billion is health care.

Half of our budget is health care Stroger Hospital, Providence Hospital in our doesn't primary care clinics and specialty clinics.

17% is public safety.

So that's the courts and the jail Sen.

So that's 70% public health and public safety.

And then 30% everything else.

We do forest preserve the on the budget But it's it's infrastructure work.

Its our violence prevention work.

It's our economic development work.

Its animal controls everything in the kitchen sink.

That's other the other 30% lot of work.

You as we mentioned, you previously expected or projected a 218 million dollar shortfall.

But this budget is balanced.

No taxes, fees or fines.

As we mentioned.

>> How did you do it?

Well, we have a great team headed by Todd Anthony finance and >> we've made some tough decisions and hard choices and our commissioners have been good enough to go along with those tough decisions and hard choices for 14 years.

So we've got ourselves in a pretty good place.

What would you say?

Those tough decisions?

Hard choices were pretty well I first came into office, there was almost a half-billion dollars for your budget gap to close for 87 Million.

And it required 15% cuts pretty much across the board.

It was a brutal year, but next year it was more than 300 Million.

So gradually we've been able to get control of the finances and frankly having us on a firm financial footing has enabled us to take on some of the challenges that we wanted to address.

>> 1, 1, of the things that you all have done is you are keeping 56 jobs unfilled.

And that adds to the 3600 plus jobs that are already begun across Cook County, mostly in health care and public safety operations.

Does that impact as you mentioned that, you know, the 70% of your budget, which is, you know, healthcare in public safety to those positions being empty.

Does that impact the services at those agencies provide?

You know, we've had some challenges as other units of government frankly, corporations have had as we've come out of the pandemic in trying to fill positions, things have gotten better in the last year or so those vacancies are particularly in health care.

to particularly in in health care, you say obviously because it's 53% of your budget there.

That right.

>> But, you know, going to work over the air to fill those positions.

And we believe that we can deliver great services with our present staffing levels.

But we know that we have a ways to go.

>> This budget does not include another year of the Guaranteed Basic Income program that was piloted over the last 2 years.

Cook County Promise.

What is the plan for that program going forward?

>> All we said we're going to this is a pilot we partnered with the University of Chicago, inclusive Economy lap and they have look not just at our participants and outcomes for them, but a control group as well.

Just like you to a medical test and will be that will getting out the last checks to participants in January.

And then the University of Chicago will begin to valuation analysis and we'll look at the outcomes and figure out how we proceed.

But I've committed that This is not the end of that program will continue.

What is preliminary research show about that program that people use it for what you'd expect, you know, food in utilities and rent and to meet financial emergencies.

So, you know, we I think we're gonna be able to show that.

Is that a real positive benefit for the families that have involved 3,250 Families, $500 a month for 2 years.

>> This program was funded using the ARPA dollars.

The COVID dollars is a lot of us refer to them.

as we all know, that money is running out for many agencies.

What is the status of the county's arpa allocations?

>> Well, like everyone else, our money will run on at the end of 2026.

So we've got to figure out what we're going to do in terms of continuing programs, which ones will terminate, which ones will.

We'll reduce in size and which ones will carry on.

But in our our our budget team has given us step down rather than a cliff.

We put money aside so that we can fund over the next 4 years after the money runs out until 2030, those programs that we think are our impact most impactful.

And we can also have a kind of a glide path so that we can look for external resources, whether it's grant programs from the state or federal government or whether its philanthropy to help us meet the needs that we think we need to address.

Does that include Cook County Promise the Guaranteed Basic Income program as well since it's something that's not happening for 2025, but >> when you first in this year initiated it, there were hopes and promises that you would be able to to continue it beyond arpa.

We are going to use our own corporate dollars to fund it going to But we're going to look at the evaluation first to see how we need to tweak the program in order to better make it more impactful, some municipalities and you kind of address this.

But they're finding it difficult to keep some programming going once that arpa funding is going, for example, we know this is something Chicago public schools is dealing with right now.

House Cook County going to going to continue.

I guess what bucket of funds will will cover something like a county promise and other programs that you have have to think about with.

But I think it's into the exact number.

We put money aside, as I said, >> to step down in the years following 2026.

So 27 through 30 money has been set aside so that we can continue those programs which we think have been critical and give us a chance to find resources to to fully fund the things that we we believe have been proving up in the arpa process.

>> Cook County Health has been without a permanent CEO for nearly a year.

Dr. Eric McKay to serving as interim CEO since last November.

Thoughts on when the board of directors might appoint a permanent replacement.

board of Board of Health it for the health and hospitals.

Some thank you.

We'll make a decision at the end of October.

And then followed up by a decision by the county board.

But it also calls for making maybe something in the air.

But the budget also calls for making a 568.3 million dollar pension payment how would you say that that payment amount lines up with the county's pension responsibilities and what is the status of the county's pension responsibility?

Well, 2015, I asked board of Commissioners and again, it was a tough vote.

>> To raise the sales tax by one.

And as a result, we have resources to meet our pension obligations and to invest in infrastructure.

And when we did that, I promise that that's what we would do with the money can use it for regular operating expenses.

And that's what we've got.

And as a result, starting in 2016, we were able to make the actuarial required contribution rather than the statutory one.

And what the actuaries believed was necessary was greater than the statute.

So we had a memorandum of understanding every year.

From 2016 until last year with our pension board to give them more money so that we could catch up and our pensions are funded at about 69%, which is very good for the state of Illinois.

And we're on a path to 2040, I think to be about 80%, 2050, to be about 80% funded, which is fully funded.

So we made some tough choices starting in 2015, we made agreements with our pension fund to give them more money than the law required.

And then finally, we got approval from the state of Illinois to make the actuarial contribution rather than the statutory one.

So we no longer had to do these annual agreements with the pension board to give them more money >> Chicago, the city of Chicago is is struggling financially in bit of a mess at the moment that that budget report or proposal is formally coming later on.

But it how can these 2 municipalities that share the same can be so different financially?

What would you say about what's happening in Chicago?

Well, first of all, I'm a teacher, but I don't it's still possible that officials and as I said in the county side, we've made tough choices and hard decisions for 14 years.

And so we're in a real good place.

And I'm grateful to our finance teams.

>> Over that period of time for for bringing us here.

Used to work with former well with current Mayor Brandon Johnson, who is a former Cook County Commissioner.

>> What are you what you know about his his his work as a chic chief executive?

And do you have any sort of empathy for him after having, you know, who's been a rough few weeks for him?

>> Well, you know, we work closely with both the state and the city we have agreements around meeting the needs of new arrivals.

We work together on the violence Prevention initiative.

So and we we collaborate with them on variety of of, of of of issues.

So.

We have a working relationship with both the city and the state.