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SurveyUSA poll released

Wednesday, Feb 15, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

SurveyUSA has released its monthly tracker of gubernatorial job approval ratings.

Gov. Blagojevich’s 41 percent approval and 54 percent disapproval is about the same as last month.

More details here.

UNRELATED UPDATE: Don’t forget about Illinoize.

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Mixed bag for Daley

Wednesday, Feb 15, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

More Tribune poll numbers.

Seven out of 10 Chicago voters don’t believe Mayor Richard Daley’s assertions that he was unaware of wrongdoing in city contracting and hiring, but more than half of voters still approve of the job he is doing, a new Tribune/WGN-TV poll shows.

A majority of the survey’s participants have concluded that Daley is responsible for personnel and contract decisions and aren’t satisfied with his past efforts to eliminate fraud and corruption in those areas. Still, the poll found that when it comes time to vote, most voters will view the scandals that have rocked City Hall as less important than what Daley has done to improve the city.

With one year before the next city mayoral balloting, the poll found that if Daley ran for re-election today against U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., the race would be up for grabs. In a three-way contest that also included U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez, the poll showed Daley could be forced into a runoff. […]

Only 18 percent of voters in the poll said they believe Daley had no knowledge of how city contracts and jobs were awarded.

Sixty percent said they think the mayor is personally responsible for overseeing the selection of city contractors, and only about one in four said they were satisfied with Daley’s previous efforts to prevent corruption in contracting and city hiring. Nearly four out of five said they believe political loyalty should not determine who gets a city job, the poll found.

But half of the voters said they are satisfied with the mayor’s efforts since the City Hall scandals broke to eliminate favoritism, corruption and fraud in contracting and hiring. […]

Nearly 60 percent of respondents said improvements were more important to them than wrongdoing at City Hall when deciding whether to vote for Daley. Only 27 percent said they rated the scandals more important.

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Question of the day

Wednesday, Feb 15, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

We had a lot of activity on the blog yesterday after I posted a few lines about Ron Gidwitz’s new TV ad. I figured it might be a good QOTD.

Here’s a roundup of the coverage with the question below.

Â· The Sun-Times proclaims “Gidwitz gives Topinka a venomous Valentine.”

“Judy Baar Topinka supports bigger government,” the narrator says in the 30-second spot. “More spending. More taxes. More debt.”

Topinka immediately fired off an angry letter to Gidwitz demanding he stop airing the commercials, calling them “reprehensible,” “dishonest” and “blatantly false.”

“He is misguided or he doesn’t understand or he is making a very grievous mistake,” Topinka told the Sun-Times.

Gidwitz campaign manager Joe Calomino said they have no plans to pull the commercial.

“The facts are the facts, and she’s wrong,” Calomino said.

There are facts and then there are political facts.

Â· “Gidwitz ad rips into Topinkaâ€™s record” writes the Daily Herald.

Gidwitzâ€™s 30-second ad claims Topinka doubled spending in the treasurerâ€™s office, sponsored a sales tax increase while a state senator and backed billions in new debt.

â€œTopinka. More of the same when itâ€™s time for a change,â€ a male announcerâ€™s voice says.

Topinka, who is the front-runner in polls while Gidwitz is running third, said her office has assumed more responsibilities than her predecessor, including the stateâ€™s lost-property program. Spending on regular operations has increased from just over $6 million to just under $8 million in her 11 years in office, aides said â€” far less than the double the ad claims.

â€œItâ€™s dishonest. If he wants to hit me on something, hit me on something that exists. That is fair,â€ said Topinka, who started airing her own biographical TV spot Tuesday.

And the Tribune writes:

The ad, called “More,” suggests that Topinka would continue the kind of state government Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich has led.

The ad’s first claim is that Topinka “doubled spending” on her office.

While the number of people in the treasurer’s office has increased during Topinka’s tenure, so have the functions assigned to it in recent years.

Personnel records from the treasurer’s office show that 185 people work for Topinka, compared with 141 in 1995 when she took office.

Her campaign said the additional employees were from other state departments that had duties moved into the treasurer’s office. When compared directly, campaign aides contend she has actually reduced staff.

The question is, what do you think of all this? Will the ad backfire? Will it work?

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Budget roundup

Wednesday, Feb 15, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

Here are a few excerpts from today’s budget preview stories.

Â· The Tribune’s story, “Election-year plan of plenty,” has several details.

Gov. Rod Blagojevich will unveil a $55.3 billion campaign year budget Wednesday highlighted by a broad-based social agenda that includes early learning programs and health care for kids while keeping his promise not to raise state income or sales taxes. […]

With something for nearly every constituency, the Blagojevich spending plan would pump a $400 million increase into prekindergarten programs through high school, including money to launch the nation’s first universal preschool for children as young as 3.

Blagojevich would pay to train 100 new Illinois State Police cadets, relocate the state’s Sexually Violent Persons program from Joliet to a new, larger facility in Downstate Rushville and partially open a long-vacant new prison in northwestern Illinois. For the first time in 6 years, the budget also would increase rates for child-care providers.

The governor also will propose $15 million to launch a 5-year, $100 million plan to provide funds for regenerative stem cell research, according to budget documents obtained by the Tribune.

Â· The Sun-Times writes about the pension proposal.

Gov. Blagojevich today will suggest diverting cash from the future sale of Illinois’ disputed 10th casino license to reduce the $38 billion shortfall facing the state’s public pension systems. […]

“I don’t think the idea even dignifies a response,” said Rep. Mark Beaubien (R-Wauconda), the House Republican’s lead budget negotiator. “That’s so classic Blagojevich: ‘When we sell the 10th license, we’ll give the money to pensions.’ In the year 2010? 2011? 2012? When? It’s pandering, that’s what it is.”

The Daily Herald takes my Capitol Fax story from yesterday and advances it an interesting notch.

Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich today will ask lawmakers to sell the stateâ€™s college loan portfolio to fetch as much as $500 million to pay for $1,000 college tax credits to parents of freshmen and sophomores at state schools.

The contract to sell the student loans, which would keep the same terms, could go to a firm with ties to the chairman of Blagojevichâ€™s 2002 governor campaign. […]

McNeil confirmed the contract to sell the loans could go to Scott Balice Strategies, which has served as the tollwayâ€™s financial consultant. The firm is a â€œstrategic partnerâ€ and has shared office space with lobbying outfit Wilhelm and Conlon. David Wilhelm was Blagojevichâ€™s 2002 campaign chairman but has said he stopped lobbying a couple of years ago. Scott Balice has given $15,500 to Blagojevichâ€™s campaign fund since 2000.

Use this as a budget address open thread. Live-blog if you can. I want commenters to get some practice doing this because I might have a big announcement in the coming days.

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Morning shorts

Wednesday, Feb 15, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

Â· I think we need a better title for this daily item. Suggestions, please.

Â· “Democrat Linda Hawker, secretary of the Illinois Senate, is running for Sangamon County clerk and hopes to take on incumbent Republican Clerk Joe Aiello in the fall.”

I’ve known Linda forever. I don’t endorse, but I do wish her well.

Â· Worker attacked in prison kitchen.

Â· 3 new judgeships eliminated.

Â· Not a single DeKalb County doctor accepts Medicaid patients.

Â· More later.

Â· Tollway settles big lawsuit.

Â· Power Point and Vikings.

Â· More character witnesses for Ryan trial.

Â· City workers wonder: What are my odds of being indicted?

Â· Badges for library trustees. Yep. Goofy.

Â· Blogger is polled, blogs about the questions.

I did not write anything down so I am doing this from memory but the reasons for voting for Mike Jacobs had to do with him being instrumental in getting funding for the WIU campus in Moline, support for the Thomson Prison, his support for education and things like that. The reasons for voting against Mike Jacobs were him â€œspeaking before thinkingâ€ when defending the riverboat gambling industry and him saying that union workers made too much money and since he was appointed rather than elected he was beholden to the party insiders rather than to the voters.

Â· Richard Norton Smith apparently has very thin skin.

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More on that absolutely bizarre jail break

Wednesday, Feb 15, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

It just gets weirder.

On Tuesday, six correctional officers were suspended with pay because they are subjects of the sheriff’s internal investigation of Saturday’s jail break, Cunningham said.

Sources said one of those guards, a 36-year-old ex-Marine, has admitted he helped the inmates escape to give a political boost to a former jail supervisor, Richard Remus, who is running for Sheahan’s post in the March 21 Democratic primary.

Prosecutors on Tuesday night charged that correctional officer, Darin Gater, with a variety of offenses, and he is due in court today. […]

Still, one official close to the investigation said, “I’m absolutely not convinced with the Remus angle. That’s one of the problems I’m having. At best, I think it was a hope that it would assist Remus. But I cannot and do not believe anybody would be that stupid that they wouldn’t realize their heads would roll if something bad happened on their watch.”

And weirder.

News also broke Tuesday the jailbreak itself was no secret.

Authorities had been tipped to the planned breakout hours before the escape, officials said. In fact, word of the planned escape had made it all the way to the maximum security section of the jail where the inmates were housed, officials said.

What happened next still remains unclear, but six guards from that wing, including Gater, were suspended with pay Tuesday pending the outcome of an internal sheriffâ€™s investigation, according to statements from sheriffâ€™s officials.

And here’s some background on Richard Remus.

Remus split with Sheahan after Remus and his brother lost their jobs with the sheriff’s office.

And the blood feud thickened in recent days when a jail guard who once worked for Remus reportedly admitted that he helped six inmates escape from Cook County Jail to embarrass Sheahan and Dart — and to help Remus. Remus denies any involvement.

Remus, 48, is half Irish and half German, and grew up in the 19th Ward since the sixth grade. He worked on Mayor Daley’s first mayoral campaign and helped Michael Sheahan in his first campaign for sheriff. […]

Richard Remus’ name surfaced in 2003 when inmates sued him for allegedly leading a mass-beating in 1999. They said Remus stood on a table shouting, “SORT runs the jail.” The county settled the lawsuit. Remus was forced out of his job after an internal affairs investigation. A grand jury that investigated the incident said of Remus:

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