The highly respected Chicago-based fiscal watchdog group, the Civic Federation, released a report yesterday detailing the dire state of Illinois' financial situation. The challenges facing Illinois are nothing short of frightening and monumental. Read the report here.

It is clearer than ever, Illinois needs real leadership from the Governor and General Assembly to tackle the state's massive spending problem and its unsustainable obligations in public pensions and Medicaid. Here at AFP-IL, we will keep the pressure on our leaders and demand pension, Medicaid and spending reform.

If there was any doubt that the very powerful state government employee union, AFSCME, is out of sync with most of Illinois, check out this article from the State Journal-Register.

Apparently, AFSCME does not believe that state government employees should be subject to a wage freeze proposed by Minority Leaders Cross and Radogno. Most Illinoisans would love to have had consistent 3% raises throughout the Great Recession. But, Illinois can't pay its bills and has the worst funded pension system in the nation. It certainly seems reasonable to ask state employees forgo raises as part of the plan to rescue our state from financial disaster.