Life in "Progress" State - Illinois edition

The state's miserable bond rating has driven up borrowing costs for state government by more than $500 million since last year, a government watchdog group says.

The nonpartisan, Chicago-based Civic Federation analyzed the near-record borrowing that the state has undertaken since last September and looked at similar borrowing during the same period in other states that have higher bond ratings than Illinois.

The result was a staggering $551.3 million extra that state taxpayers are having to devote to support the state's thirst for debt because of a series of rating downgrades, the group says in a report being released today.

"This is an actual quantification of what the cost of the state's fiscal irresponsibility has been because of the Illinois General Assembly and governor's failure to stabilize state finances and to allow our credit rating to drop so low we are now the lowest credit-rated state in the country, with California," said Laurence Msall, the Civic Federation's president.

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