What will budget mean for DNR?

So we finally have a state budget. What a joke. What a saw commentary that our elected officials take this long to basically make no hard decisions.

We either need a tax increase or serious cuts. We got neither.

But enough venting. What will this mean for the Department of Natural Resources?

My hunch, and this is not based on any reporting yet, is that the DNR will fare OK. Much of the decision-making for the budget now falls on Gov. Pat Quinn. And I don’t think he will take an axe to the outdoors budget. Quinn has shown that he is a good friend of DNR and believes the agency has taken enough cuts already.

That said, can you imagine how bad things would be for DNR if Rod Blagojevich was still in office? Wow.

Anyway, that’s just my guess on this. But unfortunately I’ll probably have to dig deeper next week to see whether that hunch is correct.