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"Failure to enact pension reforms will eventually bring Illinois to its financial breaking point, and it will be worse than any fiscal calamity we have seen thus far in this state," Republican Treasurer Dan Rutherford said in a statement. The latest attempt at pension repair fizzled in the final hours of the legislative session on Tuesday. The plan would have required larger contributions from state employees and reduced eventual retirement benefits, but top House lawmakers had agreed to temporarily set aside the Republican-opposed idea of shifting the employers' portion of contributions for teachers to local school districts. Fitch noted that the negative outlook could "be resolved after an assessment of the extent to which the state takes action within the next six months that limits the impact of pension payments on the budget." Fitch is one of three agencies that monitor state finances and grades ability to repay debt, and its change in outlook matches the "negative" labels the other two
-- Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's -- laid on the state last year. ___ Online Fitch Ratings: http://tinyurl.com/adcwwe2
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