Seeking to alleviate burdens on local municipalities, State Sen. Terri Bryant (R-Murphysboro) is sponsoring legislation to free locally sourced funding from excessive regulation standards.
Senate Bill 2192 amends the Grant Accountability and Transparency Act (GATA) to provide a carve-out that stipulates pass-through grants and State-shared revenues distributed from the Local Government Distribution Fund, the Personal Property Tax Replacement Fund, the Motor Fuel Tax Fund, and the Transportation Renewal Fund do not have to abide by the GATA standards.
“By requiring these locally sourced funds to follow current GATA regulations, we’re placing an undue burden on local municipalities,” said Sen. Bryant. “This legislation seeks to address that unnecessary ‘red tape’ that hinders local municipalities and delays the process of redistributing funds back to local governments.”
Sen. Bryant argues the monies collected are derived by local government. As such, these funds should not be classified as “grants” and therefore should not be subject to GATA regulations.
Currently, local municipalities collect monies on behalf of the State. Once collected, the State then redistributes funding back to local government via a statutory grant formula based on per capita population.
Sen. Bryant notes that this proposal also seeks to improve local municipality access to critical funding for future infrastructure projects.
“Through this carve-out, we are simply trying to streamline the process,” said Sen. Bryant. “I’m happy to be able to sponsor legislation that I view as a direct investment in local infrastructure.”
Sen. Bryant is a co-sponsor of Senate Bill 2192, but had already introduced identical language to this proposal as the chief sponsor of Senate Bill 1652 earlier this year.
Senate Bill 2192 passed unanimously out of the Senate on April 21.