Capitol Fax.com - Your Illinois News Radar » 2010

Helmets for kids goes down in flames - Thomson will be sold regardless

Thursday, Mar 18, 2010 - Posted by Rich Miller

* The Senate just defeated a bill 19-32 that would require kids to wear helmets on motorcycles…

…every operator and passenger under the age of 18 on a motorcycle, motor driven cycle, or motorized pedalcycle to wear a helmet that meets federal safety standards and is properly fastened under the person’s chin with a chin strap.

Sen. Gary Forby (D-Benton), an avid motorcyclist rights defender, staunchly opposed the bill…

“I don’t want anybody in this audience telling me how to raise my kids.”

Sen. Bill Brady voted “No.” One wonders if we might hear something from the governor’s campaign operation (such as it is) soon.

* In other news that could relate to the campaign, I think we’ve pretty much known this all along, but it’s now been confirmed…

The Obama administration plans to buy a state prison in rural Thomson, Ill. regardless of whether Congress allows terrorist suspects to be transferred there, a Department of Justice official said today.

In a letter to a member of the Illinois delegation to Congress, Asst. Atty. Gen. Ronald Weich spelled out the administration’s intent to go ahead with plans to buy the near-empty Thomson prison, even if lawmakers refuse to approve it as a new home for detainees at the military-run prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

At the very least, Weich said, the federal Bureau of Prisons intends to use the facility for high-security federal inmates. The letter comes in response to questions from Rep. Donald Manzullo, the Republican who represents the area in Congress.

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Question of the day

Thursday, Mar 18, 2010 - Posted by Rich Miller

* The setup…

When he was lieutenant governor, Gov. Pat Quinn supported a beverage container deposit bill that would have imposed a 5-cent deposit on wine, alcoholic liquor and beer containers, along with bottles and cans holding soft drinks, tea, coffee, juice and water.

His argument was that such containers constitute 40 percent or more of roadside trash, largely because people drink bottled and canned beverages while away from home and are careless with their disposal.

With 8 billion beverage containers sold in Illinois in 2002, according to Quinn, a bottle bill could keep a lot more of them from winding up as environmental eyesores. He noted that states with such bills report a reduction of nearly three-fourths of beverage container litter. […]

Bottle bills are not without their critics. The Illinois Retail Merchants Association and other groups believe such laws are a burden to businesses and consumers, and they don’t like the fact that people would be returning dirty bottles and cans to grocery and convenience stores, which could introduce bugs and contamination and make it harder to pass health department inspections.

* The Question: Should the state pass a bill requiring a 5-cent deposit on bottles and cans? Explain.

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Supremes shoot down property tax exemption for hospital

Thursday, Mar 18, 2010 - Posted by Rich Miller

* A new opinion by the Illinois Supreme Court is very bad news for not-for-profit hospitals in Illinois who want to qualify for local tax exemptions.

Background…

The decision will be watched closely by hospitals and policymakers nationally, following years of debate over how best to quantify the charity care that non-profit medical providers dole out in exchange for tax exemptions.

It’s the most notable case nationally in the past two decades of a hospital losing its tax-exempt status over questions of its charitable commitment, says Elizabeth Mills, an attorney at Proskauer Rose LLP in Chicago who specializes in tax exemptions for health care organizations.

“Everywhere I go in the country, people ask me about the Provena case,” she says.

The case goes back to 2003, when Champaign County tax officials stripped the hospital of its exemption. Officials cited the 210-bed hospital’s $831,724 spent on “charitable activities” a year earlier, saying it fell short of the medical center’s $1.1 million in property taxes. The state’s Department of Revenue upheld that decision.

* The court ruled that Provena could not apply for a not-for-profit exemption from property taxes for a few reasons. Here’s one…

[The hospital’s income is] not derived mainly from private and public charity and held in trust for the purposes expressed in the charter. They are generated, overwhelmingly, by providing medicalservices for a fee.

The hospital failed additional tests…

Provena Hospitals likewise failed to show by clear and
convincing evidence that it satisfied factors three or five, namely, that it dispensed charity to all who needed it and applied for it and did not appear to place any obstacles in the way of those who needed and would have availed themselves of the charitable benefits it dispenses. […]

When the law says that property must be “exclusively used” for charitable or beneficent purposes, it means that charitable or beneficent purposes are the primary ones for which the property is utilized. […]

Further undermining Provena Hospitals’ claims of charity is that
even where it did offer discounted charges, the charity was often
illusory. As described earlier in this opinion, uninsured patients were charged PCMC’s “established” rates, which were more than double the actual costs of care. When patients were granted discounts at the 25% and 50% levels, the hospital was therefore still able to generate a surplus.

Provena also asked for a religious exemption. That, too, was denied…

To qualify for an exemption under that statute, the property in question must be used exclusively for religious purposes. There is no all-inclusive definition of religious purpose for tax cases. […]

If Provena Hospitals’ argument were valid, it would mean that the church rather than the judiciary is the ultimate arbiter of when and under what circumstances church property is exempt from taxation under the constitution and statutes of the State of Illinois.

The Illinois Hospital Association responds…

The Illinois Hospital Association is extremely disappointed by the court’s decision, which could do great harm to a hospital and its ability to serve its patients and community. Imposing new tax burdens on a hospital could force it to reduce services and increase health care costs – jeopardizing access to quality hospital services as well as the hospital’s financial viability.

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More on the Kirk-Obama kerfuffle

Thursday, Mar 18, 2010 - Posted by Rich Miller

* Congressman Mark Kirk said far more at that event earlier this week than previously reported.

As we’ve already discussed, media coverage has mostly focused on Kirk’s referring to President Obama as “this guy” when talking about how Obama could be made a one-termer and then his health insurance reform bill could be repealed…

“This is a good example of why Washington is broken. You have Congressmen like Mark Kirk who are more interested in disrespectful name calling than in going to work in Washington and getting things done like passing financial reform and healthcare reform.”

But as I wrote yesterday, the substance of his remarks are probably more important. Kirk began his presentation thusly…

“I’m Mark Kirk and I can’t wait to vote against the health care bill next week.”

That got some loud applause.

And he summed up this way…

“As your senator, I would lead the effort to repeal this bill.”

In between came the rationale…

“I will just say, if it goes through, there is one thing about the bill not commonly known, all of the pain of the bill is upfront, and all of the gain is later. The bill includes ten new federal taxes, and dramatic cuts for senior healthcare under Medicare between 2010 and 2014. The actual benefit of the bill doesn’t start until 2014.

“In between this time and then, is a presidential election. If we can win in the White House, and we’re on the way to making this guy a one termer.

“If we move to repeal this bill in 2013, all you’re doing is removing the pain and not a single American would have benefited from it yet.”

You can listen to the full audio by clicking here.

David Axelrod responded…

“As for health insurance reform, people across Illinois and the country will have greater security this year, once the President signs this law.

“Small businesses will receive tax credits to help them afford health coverage for their workers.

“People with pre-existing conditions will finally have access to coverage they can afford.

“The lifetime caps on coverage that insurance companies impose today will be banned, and they will no longer be allowed to throw people off their coverage, just because they become seriously ill.

“The gaps in Medicare prescription coverage will be filled in, saving seniors across our state hundreds of dollars our of pocket.

“So if Congressman Kirk wants to travel our state and explain why he wants to take all that away and put insurance company bureaucrats back in the driver’s seat, he should.

“It may titilate a roomful of partisans, but I don’t think it’s going to impress the people of Illinois,” Axelrod said.

* Kirk also provided yet another explanation for why he flip-flopped on the cap and trade issue…

“I am against the cap and trade bill because I am for increased employment in the state of Illinois.”

In the past, Kirk used national security and cost as reasons for voting for the bill…

Kirk was the only member of the GOP’s Midwest delegation to vote for the bill. He told the Daily Herald he backed the plan because he wants the U.S. to end its reliance on foreign oil, especially the fuel produced in unfriendly nations such as Iran.

“They are arming against us with money we send them,” Kirk said. “We (must) defund the terrorists and the unstable regimes.”

Kirk also said he discussed the proposal with officials from Midwest Generation, which operates a coal-burning power plant in Waukegan. To his surprise, they supported the legislation.

The energy- and building-code regulations included in the bill actually are less stringent than those already in place in Illinois, Kirk said.

But when he decided to run for Senate, he got such an earful that he changed his mind and came up with this excuse…

“I voted for it because it was in the narrow interest of my Congressional district. But as your representative… representing the entire state of Illinois, I would vote no on that bill coming up.”

Kirk also addressed the “flip-flop” charge the other day…

“If you’re going to change your view on an issue, do it up-front, do it in public, do it on YouTube.”

The problem with Kirk’s “openness” comment is that Kirk rarely allows reporters to cover his events. The YouTube video of the first instance of Kirk’s flip-flop was taken by somebody who fed it to the national Democrats. Reporters weren’t invited to the event. Lynn Sweet…

Kirk’s staffers refuse to release Kirk’s campaign or governmental schedules in order to discourage routine press coverage, so remarks Kirk makes on the stump are rare. During the primary campaign Kirk’s political operation declined–even after the fact–to release any details of where he went to speak or raise money.

You can listen to the full cap and trade Kirk audio by clicking here.

* In reply to all of this, Kirk is trying to change the subject back to Alexi Giannoulias. From a press release…

Kirk Campaign Launches “Giannis Watch”

Online clock will track how long it takes Alexi Giannoulias to explain $1.2 million loan to Nick Giannis in 2002 despite criminal record;

Giannis arrested last week for bank fraud, contributed nearly $115,000 to Giannoulias campaigns, convicted on gun charge in 1996

* Related…

* Obama Skirts Illinois Visits So Far as Democrats Battle Scandal: “He is going to get tarred with the outcome in Illinois whether he comes here or not,” [David Yepsen] said. “It is going to be portrayed as a referendum on him.”

* Illinois Senate Candidate Mines Health Care Opposition

* Kirk takes shot at health care legislation

* A tough stretch for Giannoulias

* Running for Obama’s Old Seat, and Set on Derailing His Plans

* Illinois GOP borrows Brown’s strategy in bid to grab Obama seat

* Charged Chicago Donor Also Gave to Obama’s Campaigns

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On the brink

Thursday, Mar 18, 2010 - Posted by Rich Miller

* There’s talk of bankruptcy in East St. Louis. With property tax revenues down and gaming proceeds from the local riverboat tanking, the city is facing a $5 million budget shortfall and is having a rough time meeting its payroll…

Two councilmen said the city may be looking at filing for bankruptcy after the fire and police pension boards rejected the city’s request to borrow about $1.5 million from the two boards, and the bargaining units within the police and fire departments are crying foul over contract violations. […]

“Our backs are against the wall,” [Councilmen Roy Mosley] said. “The police bargaining unit doesn’t want to negotiate with us. The firemen have worked with us and I thank them for doing that. We can’t pay what we don’t have. We’re not trying to take any money from anybody. We just don’t have any money to pay the union contracts that were negotiated when the city had money, and that’s the bottom line.”

Mosley said the city has had to pay out large chunks of money in lawsuits to, and because of, several police officers. […]

He said, however, that “Eighty percent of the city’s budget is the police and fire departments.”

Marion also said, “If you cut everybody out of the budget, it wouldn’t be nearly enough to close the $5 million budget gap the city has.”

I’ll have more on New Jersey’s budget situation next week because I just haven’t had much time to study it, but one of the proposals by the state’s new governor is to forbid all local governments from getting in over their heads by limiting their lee-way in future contract negotiations…

[Gov. Chris Christie] also is calling for new handcuffs on towns and school districts as they bargain with unions, to prohibit towns from awarding contracts with pay increases, including benefits, of more than 2.5 percent.

One seriously doubts that’ll happen here, and it probably won’t even happen in New Jersey. Still, it’s an idea that I don’t ever remember seeing before.

* Gov. Christie mentioned Illinois in his budget address, by the way. After I wrote a column about Christie, I ended up (temporarily, at least) on his press release list, so somebody out there apparently saw it. Here’s what Christie said in his address…

…Many of our fellow states are resorting to the techniques and tricks that have gotten New Jersey into so much trouble in the past.

In Illinois, they are raising income taxes and increasing borrowing to solve this problem. Sound familiar? Like New Jersey, they will see taxpayers leave and revenues fall. We have already been there and feel the sting of that failed policy today.

* As I reported to subscribers yesterday, the House Republicans submitted a long list of budget ideas to Gov. Quinn this week. The Southtown Star does a story today..

House Republican lawmakers have sent Gov. Pat Quinn recommendations on how state government might look to cut spending in the state’s current financial crisis.

The four-page letter, signed by 46 House Republicans, urges Quinn to look at fiscal reforms, Medicaid changes and job creation.

While there’s not an exact dollar amount specified in terms of proposed savings, the letter identifies how more than $5.3 billion could be used differently.

Sounds like a lot of money, right? There’s a big catch…

House GOP lawmakers proposed, among other things, that Quinn look to eliminate General Assembly scholarships, abolish the lieutenant governor’s office, impose a freeze on state hiring and salary increases and redirect $5 billion earmarked for capital projects for operations.

As I’ve already told subscribers, redirecting $5 billion of the capital plan to state operations simply cannot be done with the current revenue situation. Plus, lots of members didn’t even know that item was on the list. Oops.

OK, so now they’re down to about $300 million in savings. Much of that comes from postponing funding for high-speed rail.

Illinois Issues Statehouse bureau chief Jamey Dunn has a partial list over at Illinoize. Some of the ideas aren’t bad at all, but this is no real solution.

* Since the top item on this post deals with unions, let’s throw this one in here. As our videos showed yesterday, Republican gubernatorial nominee Bill Brady was bashed on the union issue…

Speaking at a gathering of the Illinois Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Quinn told the pro-union crowd that Brady owned a construction company that only hired non-union workers, and Madigan said the Republican senator from Bloomington would work “to spread that gospel all over the state of Illinois.”

“We’re not going to have a middle class if we allow a lot of anti-labor, anti-union operators to get in politics and tear to shreds fundamental things we all agree on,” Quinn said. “He doesn’t believe in the minimum wage. He wants to abolish it.”

The Brady campaign responded…

Jerry Clarke, campaign manager for Brady, issued a statement in response: “We’re not going to have a middle class if we continue the job-killing policies and insider politics of the Blagojevich-Quinn administration.”

* Related…

* A first step in cutting pensions: Finally, a bill to create a two-tier state pension system isn’t dead on arrival in the state Legislature. On Wednesday, a bill to provide significantly lower benefits for newly hired employees in two of five state pension systems, the ones covering legislators and judges, passed a House committee. The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Kevin McCarthy, expects the bill to pass the full House this week. No other major pension reform bill has gotten that far in the last two years.

* Measure advances to raise retirement age for lawmakers, judges

* Bill targets pensions of judges, legislators

* Illinois budget crisis sharpens

* Sen. Hutchinson: “We haven’t been doing that for the last 25-30 years”

* Herald-Review: Solid budget will do more than games

* Budget expert calls Quinn tax proposal ‘insufficient’

* Con-fer-ence: An excuse to spend lavishly?: Southland school administrators and board members - many who are running financially strapped districts - dropped a bundle on meals, hotels and travel to an annual fall conference they insist makes them better leaders. Their big destination: downtown Chicago.

* Sneed: Dart, who is no stranger to controversy, is going to force inmates to wash their own prison uniforms . . . and eat breakfast at 4:30 a.m.!

* Dispute over Downstate horse track leads House to oust board

* Illinois House moves to fire the Illinois Racing Board

* Ending employee discounts at Illinois universities unlikely this year

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Morning Shorts

Thursday, Mar 18, 2010 - Posted by Rich Miller

* Metro-east unemployment rate soars to 12.6 percent

* Unemployment hits 13 percent in the Peoria area

* Blagojevich Attorneys to Play Tapes When He Testifies

* Blagojevich request for trial delay is denied

* Judge refuses to delay Blago corruption trial

* Commissioners React to Cook County Bidding Process

* No Details on CPS Clout Admissions, But Tightened Controls

District officials admitted Wednesday that in the past, the highly competitive schools have let in students who didn’t even go through the normal application process, and there was no district oversight.

Now, principal picks will be reviewed by CPS and an outside auditor.

* New alderman to pay city for moving out early

The affordable-housing program that subsidized the cost of the house’s land required she live in the home for at least four years.

Graham said she was unaware of that requirement until she was asked about it Wednesday morning. Later in the day, she agreed to reimburse the city for a portion of the subsidy, as required under the program when someone moves out too soon.

* Trade show organizers meet with McCormick Place’s labor leaders

A representative from the National Restaurant Assn. told the Tribune that the meeting included a “hodgepodge” of McCormick Place clients and was a chance for labor leaders to hear directly from customers.

* Former PTA treasurer charged with theft in DuPage

* Kane wind turbine rules getting off the ground

* SXSW 2010: Night one, the showcases

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Protected: SUBSCRIBERS ONLY - Today’s edition of Capitol Fax (use all CAPS in password)

Thursday, Mar 18, 2010 - Posted by Rich Miller

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