The Blagojevich administration has expanded a state health insurance program to cover more adults, even though a legislative committee rejected the proposal earlier this week. […]
“JCAR’s role is merely advisory - it does not have the constitutional authority to suspend the regulation,” Abby Ottenhoff said in an e-mail. […]
“The administration may be inviting the legislative branch to sue,” Leitch said.
Ottenhoff would only say that the governor’s office has no plans of its own to challenge the committee’s authority in court.
According to an internal memo obtained Friday by GateHouse News Service, Family Care caseworkers were told to begin signing up Illinoisans who earn as much as 400 percent of the federal poverty level, or $82,600 for a family of four. The income cap had been 185 percent of the poverty level, or $38,203 for a family of four.
Every now and then, usually when I’m distracted elsewhere, I ask readers to come up with their own ideas for our “Question of the Day” series. That day has arrived yet again.
Question: What QOTD would you suggest? Explain, if you can.
* Yesterday, in an ironic twist, the Southern Illinoisan published a letter to the editor from Christopher A. Koch, the State Superintendent of Education. Koch bitterly complained in the letter that the House had not yet approved a budget implementation bill, which had already passed the Senate…
The price of the House’s unfinished business is hundreds of millions of dollars for local schools - $547,117 for Carbondale Elementary School District 95; $404,485 for Carbondale Community High School District 95; $430,960 for Trico CUSD 176.
By not approving the implementation bill that authorizes the State Board of Education to release these dollars, school districts have to put on hold plans to hire new teachers, reading specialists or tutors, as well as the purchase of new textbooks or laboratory equipment.
This simply isn’t right. I ask you to contact your legislators and urge the House to pass legislation that allows schools to receive the funding they were promised.
Trouble is, the House has, indeed, passed a BIMP bill and the Senate quickly followed suit. The letter had apparenty been sitting in the Southern’s in-box for several weeks and nobody at the editorial page bothered to check if the Superintendent’s complaint was still valild.
Oops.
* But here’s the rub: The governor has not yet signed that BIMP bill, which Superintendent Koch was so impatient to see enacted when he wrote the original letter…
Blagojevich spokeswoman Rebecca Rausch had little to say on the matter Thursday.
“The BIMP is under review,” she wrote in an e-mailed response.
* Over a month ago, Superintendent Koch had this to say…
State School Superintendent Christopher Koch wrote to local school chiefs that general state aid payments would decline beginning in November unless Blagojevich and lawmakers agree to raise the foundation level. Through October, the board intends to make general state aid payments at last year’s levels.
“We cannot continue to pay … at (fiscal) 2007 levels past the second payment in October,” Koch wrote.
* And more than two months ago, Gov. Blagojevich was whacking Speaker Madigan for not hurrying up already…
Gov. Rod Blagojevich sent letters to every school district in the state Friday, warning local superintendents that inaction by lawmakers means they’ll lose millions in state money.
In the letter, the governor laid the blame squarely on House Speaker Michael Madigan, a fellow Chicago Democrat he has squabbled with all year. […]
“The Speaker of the House, Michael Madigan, is the only person who can call an implementation bill for a vote,” Blagojevich writes in the letter.
Get on with it, already.
* More budget and session stuff, compiled by Paul…
* Daley: Republican leaders making CTA a scapegoat
* This isn’t getting a whole lot of play in the big media, but it’s significant…
(S)ix of the 12 [Midwestern] governors signed a greenhouse gas accord that would set up a cap-and-trade system to reduce the gases over the coming decades. The governors haven’t agreed yet on how much emissions will be lowered, but several states are developing plans to cut emissions 60% to 80%.
Environmental groups hailed the agreement as significant because it would put the Midwest in a position to capitalize on its strength in renewable energy, such as wind and biofuels, as movement builds to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
“The Midwest is now breaking the logjam when it comes to changing global-warming policy in this country,” said Howard Learner, director of the Environmental Law and Policy Center.
Congress will take notice that states that rely heavily on coal are ready to reduce emissions, he said
That includes Illinois, where Gov. Rod Blagojevich this week made the “difficult” decision to sign on to the accord, Learner said; the task was tougher for Blagojevich than for most Midwestern governors because Illinois is a coal-mining state with coal-mining jobs and 60 coal-fired power plants.
Those six states were Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin. Illinois ranks sixth in the nation for the most carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. Indiana, which didn’t sign the agreement but did sign onto other pledges, ranks third.
“I’m proud to join my fellow Midwestern governors to strengthen our energy security and fight global warming. America’s heartland is ready to lead our nation toward a smarter, cleaner energy future because Illinois and the Midwest can’t – and won’t – wait for federal action,” said Gov. Blagojevich. “We can have economic prosperity, energy security and a healthy environment at the same time – because innovation and investment in next-generation clean technologies will make us more competitive and create jobs, while saving energy and cutting greenhouse gases.”
* This is part of a national move to try to do something about an issue that has Washington, DC paralyzed…
The Midwestern governors expressed similar impatience with the slow pace in Washington on global warming and energy issues. They have banded together to set up a regional emissions control program, to expand production of biofuels and to cooperate on environmental and energy infrastructure projects, like an interstate pipeline for moving carbon emissions from power plants to underground storage vaults.
Gov. James E. Doyle of Wisconsin, a Democrat who is chairman of the Midwestern Governors Association, said that the individual states in his region were all moving independently toward greater energy efficiency and planned to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and that it made sense to work in concert.
“In the absence of a federal plan we have to move forward,” Mr. Doyle said, speaking from Milwaukee, where he was the chairman of an energy summit meeting of the Midwestern governors. “On top of that, this recognizes that, federal plan or no federal plan, the Midwest is uniquely positioned to be a major force in the developing new energy world.”
He predicted that sooner or later Washington would adopt a national cap-and-trade system for carbon emissions, but he was not optimistic that it would act before President Bush leaves office.
2 percent energy efficiency improvement in natural gas and electricity by 2015 and 2 percent annually thereafter. And the leaders pledge to have at least one commercial advanced coal gasification facility delivering power by 2012, capable of being fitted for carbon capture. Also by that year, they agree to site and permit a pipeline to transport that carbon dioxide for use in enhanced oil and gas recovery.
The city this year will collect more than a half-billion dollars in property taxes from little-understood but fast-growing tax-increment financing (TIF) districts — six times as much as the controversial tax hike that won narrow approval Wednesday in the City Council.
A report issued Thursday by Cook County Clerk David Orr said the take from Chicago’s TIFs for the tax year for which bills just went out is $500.4 million. That’s $114 million more than last year, a 29% increase, and represents more than a tripling compared with just five years ago.
* Just how big is this pile?
For instance, revenues from just the two largest of Chicago’s more than 100 TIF districts will exceed the $144 million in property taxes Cook County will spend on its network of public hospitals and health clinics.
After averaging $60 million in annual growth between 2001 and 2005, TIF revenues exploded by $114 million between 2005 and 2006, 57 times the roughly $2 million the entire program took in 20 years ago. The city’s total take since the first TIF was created in 1984? $2,534,701,105.72.
* The Civic Federation has one idea to help deal with this situation…
The federation wants TIF spending to be included in the annual city budget, rather than handled in isolation on a case-by-case basis.
What we have here is an off-budget account controlled almost soley by Mayor Daley. That money could go a long way towards solving a lot of problems, including the CTA and, in Cook County, the public hospital situation. Instead, it’s used for other stuff, like “creating jobs”…
(A)ccording to a recent article in Crain’s Chicago Business, city officials are proposing to fork over a $40 million TIF handout to CME Group Inc., the combine created when the Chicago Mercantile Exchange bought out the Chicago Board of Trade.
As part of the merger, CME plans to fire over 400 employees […]
In this case, the city’s effectively offering CME $100,000 property tax dollars for every job it eliminates.
* TIF districts, which allow municipalities to siphon off all income from property tax growth from schools and other governmental units into tightly controlled accounts, can do a lot of good. But they’ve obviously gotten way out of hand and need to be reined in. With a huge percentage of the city now within TIF districts, taxpayers can expect a whole lot more tax increases in the future and/or reduced services.
* Little Lip’s situation just gets more bizarre all the time. Kristen McQueary had an excellent column this week that we unfortunatley overlooked. The piece is about the all too convenient connections between Congressman Dan Lipinaksi and his father, former Congressman Bill Lipinski. Here’s a little background…
Dan and William Lipinski share office space at 5838 Archer Ave. for political purposes. The building serves as William Lipinski’s headquarters for his business, Blue Chip Consulting, and Dan Lipinski’s campaign office… The All-American Eagle Fund, which the elder Lipinski operates, also lists 5838 Archer Ave. as its headquarters along with the 23rd Ward political operation.
* According to McQueary, Bill Lipinski’s All-American Eagle Fund has made payments to both Dan Lipinski’s chief of staff, Jerry Hurckes and Dan’s former communication director, Chris Ganschow.
Little Lip’s response? “I don’t see how that is an issue.”
Strike one.
Why? Because Bill Lipinski, who runs the All-American Eagles Fund, is also a lobbyist…
You’ve got Dan Lipinski, a congressman, promising to bring a Central Avenue underpass to Bedford Park and serving on the House Transportation Committee, while his father, former U.S. Rep. William Lipinski, collected fees from Bedford Park as a paid consultant to lobby specifically for the underpass.
* Dan Lipinksi swears that he and his daddy don’t talk about official business like that project in Bedford Park, even though daddy’s lobbying firm is located in Danny’s campaign office and daddy is paying two of Danny’s advisers from his All-American Eagle Fund, which is supposed to be about helping children, but isn’t doing a lot of that, unless we’re talking about Bill Lipinski’s child.
Strike two.
* Ah, but it gets even better. Dan Lipinski’s campaign fund shows payments to his daddy’s lobbying firm…
“It was for advice I received from Bill Lipinski, just like anyone would pay a political consultant,” [Dan Lipinski] said. […]
The advice was not related to any Blue Chip clients but, rather, some pointers on how, after his election, to put together an office, Dan Lipinski said. He described the advice as “random issues that anyone goes to a political consultant for. I could not go to anyone to get better advice in my current job than to him.”
* OK, so let’s sum up, shall we? Bill Lipinski games the system to get his kid elected to Congress. The son keeps his dad’s cronies on the payroll, and two of them (includng one who remains on the payroll) are getting payments from his father’s childrens’ charity fund, which doesn’t appear to be doing a lot of charitable work except for Dan Lipinski’s benefit. Dan shares an office with his daddy’s lobbying firm and even pays that firm for advice, but he insists he never talked with daddy about a project that the elder Lipinski is working on.
Strike three.
* More congressional stories, compiled by Paul…
* Early departure for Hastert to trigger special election
* Hastert wraps up 20-year House career; more here
Schock showed the kind of swagger reminiscent of President George W. Bush standing beneath a banner reading, “Mission Accomplished,” when he said that “The Chinese will come around, I have no doubt.” Pardon us if we don’t share your confidence, Rep. Schock. We’ll be in the bomb shelter awaiting your all clear.
Two positives came out of this craziness. One, the criticism of Schock’s dangerously naïve foreign policy approach was so strong, that by this week he had acknowledged he was wrong to suggest the sale of nuclear weapons to Taiwan, saying he had gone “too far.” Like to Pluto.
* Confusion over job guarantee for 50 laid off ISAC workers
Walker said the layoffs announced earlier this month are not a result of the loan sale. Rather, he said there are several national factors, including the high cost of borrowing and federal legislation that cut funding.
Still, some lawmakers were skeptical.
“I don’t believe that, no,” said state Rep. Mike Bost, a Murphysboro Republican.
State Rep. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet, said initial guarantees of jobs were “misleading,” but that he remembered ISAC officials conceding that they couldn’t guarantee jobs at committee hearings this year.
“For once, I can’t say I’m surprised or shocked or anything,” Rose said.
The union representing most of the 11,500 Corrections employees points to the change as proof that state prisons need to hire more workers.
“There’s no debating IDOC’s rationale: The prisons are so desperately short of staff that they cannot afford to take employees off their posts for training,” said Anders Lindall, spokesman for the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees.
* Illinois Review: Democrats stand tall, two Republicans bow to Governor on JCAR
With billions of dollars in unpaid medial bills piling up, it’s hard to think of anything less appropriate than allowing the governor to massively increase state health expenditures without the approval of the General Assembly or the people of Illinois.
Representatives Mulligan and Hassert, members of a Republican Party that claims to stand for limited government, have no excuse. Their vote for the governor’s power grab looks like blatant pork-barrel politics at its worst.
* Bernie Schoenburg: Republican presidential delegates, Sen. Rutherford’s recall effort
In reading, where Daley ordered a huge push after his 1995 school takeover, CPS eighth-grade Hispanics topped Hispanics in every other city tested, and CPS low-income eighth-graders beat their peers in all but one other city.
But CPS white students produced the second-worst reading scores among whites, in both fourth and eighth grade. Their math scores weren’t much better.
CPS blacks scored near the bottom of the heap in most tests.
To the thousands of white supremacists who regularly visit Stormfront and its forum, Kelso is best known by his e-moniker, “Charles A Lindbergh.” He signs off all his posts with a quote from Lindbergh, a well-known racist and anti-Semite: “We can have peace and security only as long as we band together to preserve that most priceless possession, our inheritance of European blood.” […]
In the three years he’s been a senior moderator of the site, it has grown from fewer than 10,000 registered users to, as of mid-June, an astounding 52,566. And while many thousands of that ever-growing total probably haven’t visited in years, independent Web monitors recently ranked Stormfront the 338th largest electronic forum on the Internet, putting it easily into the top 1% of all sites on the World Wide Web.
