* 5:29 pm - The Chicago Teachers Union is backing out of its agreement to support the school reform bill which passed the Senate last month on a unanimous roll call. From a press release…
“Our members have spoken clearly and decisively – they do not like this bill and demand changes to the language inserted during last-minute midnight maneuvers that restricted their collective bargaining rights,” said CTU President Karen Lewis.
CTU’s House of Delegates specifically called for the removal of Section 12(b) which states:
A dispute or impasse over any Section 4.5 subject shall not be resolved through the procedures set forth in this Act, and the Board, mediator, or fact-finder has no jurisdiction over any Section 4.5 subject. The changes made to this subsection (b) by this amendatory Act of the 97th General Assembly are declarative of existing law.
According to CTU attorney Robert Bloch, “The Section 12(b) amendment is a two-sentence atomic bomb that was slipped into the 110-page bill at the last minute. It sabotages union bargaining rights, blocks the Education Labor Board from enforcing the law, halts pending Labor Board trials, and allows Chicago Public Schools to tear up labor contracts it made on school issues found in Section 4.5 which pertain only to Chicago, such as class size, class schedules, pupil assessment policies and now the `length of the work and school day and length of the work and school year’.”
In addition to 12(b), the CTU House of Delegates called out Section 13(a)(2.10) requiring that 75% of all union members in the bargaining unit vote affirmatively to authorize a strike only in Chicago. According to Lewis, “For the rest of the state, that threshold is 51% of voters, not of members. A strike is the last option. It is a serious move. We’ll take the challenge of 75% versus 51%, but of members who participate in the voting process. Imagine if that was the requirement to win a seat in the State legislature?”
“Bargaining in good faith appears to be a bar set too high for these so-called education reformers – Advance Illinois, Stand for Children, Illinois Business Roundtable and their millionaire funders – who joined forces with the mayor-elect to steer the conversation, and the legislation, away from school improvement to an attack on unions and the children and families they serve. When you rob educators’ ability to bargain for true school improvement – safe schools with smaller class sizes, class offerings and how your school day is structured to meet your students’ needs – the quality of education available to all children is put at risk. CPS is an inequitable system. This bill does not change that basic travesty,” said Lewis.
As subscribers know, the unions didn’t know about a couple items in the bill, but everything else - including the provisions they are complaining about today - was well-known by the CTU when the bill passed.
Stand For Children’s chief, Jonah Edelman, has argued these restrictions are necessary because a strike by CTU could be used to block efforts to increase the length of CPS’s school day, an Emanuel administration priority. Recent statements from CTU President Karen Lewis, however, suggest this may be a non-issue — or at least one that can be bargained over the way employers and organized employees do when a contract is up. Lewis told the Tribune editorial board that “she is ‘very open’ to a longer day and year ‘if we’re talking about bringing a rich curriculum back to the public schools. We want art, music, PE, history, science, everything.’”
In a letter to CTU members, Lewis portrayed the deal as a victory over billionaire-backed education “reform” forces that initially pushed legislation which would have gutted tenure and effectively banned teacher strikes. “We successfully made the case that the right to strike, seniority, due process and a solid evaluation system all play an integral role to make possible the promise of democracy, equity and quality in public education,” she wrote to explain why she personally gave the CTU’s endorsement to the legislation. The Illinois Federation of Teachers (IFT) and Illinois Education Association (IEA) also backed the legislation, known as SB 7.
Although union leaders and school reformers made their deal late on the night of April 12, Lewis failed to inform delegates of that fact the following day when she addressed the regular monthly meeting of that body via Skype. Other CTU elected officers and members only learned of SB 7 a few hours later when Sen. Lightford entered it into the legislative record. Lewis’ first public statement on the bill came via a CTU press release the following morning.
Thursday, May 5, 2011 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement]
To Illinois legislators:
I would like to tell you my mother’s story. (A picture of us is above.) My mother, Cheryl Rose, was a mentor to all she came in contact with, always giving of herself. She was a hero to many and even in death she is helping others.
She worked in the Casino industry for over 20 years. She never smoked and worked out regularly. Yet she was diagnosed with inoperable Stage 4 Lung Cancer in 2008. We were shocked. The only cause we and the doctors could think of was the secondhand smoke at work. She lost her hair, suffered the indignity of terrible facial sores, the weight loss, the loss of her insurance and eventually the loss of her life.
Have you ever had to hold a parent in your arms as they take their last breath at the young age of 62? What would you do if your own children had to go through this with you? And all this could have been prevented through a comprehensive clean air law!
I am asking you to take a stand with me and my mother and to protect the citizens who elected you and trusted you with their lives.
* The Illinois Campaign for Political Reform has studied campaign finance disclosures for the 2011 campaign cycle and discovered that over 500 large campaign contributions to over 190 campaigns and party committees totaling more than $500,000 escaped public disclosure before election day. Campaigns avoided the disclosure laws by receiving multiple checks from donors at just below the $1,000 level which requires public disclosure within 5 days From the group…
State law requires candidates to reveal donations of $1,000 or more within 5 days on a rolling, year-round basis (two days if it’s within 30- days of an election the candidate is in). ICPR has identified nearly $500,000 in donations during the municipal elections that came from donors who gave $1,000 or more but which were not disclosed until after the elections.
The vast majority of these funds were received by candidates in the municipal elections, though some statewide officials and legislators also received donations from donors who gave more than $1,000 but which were not disclosed.
The problem is that single donations of amounts under $1,000 are not required to be disclosed. Many donors and candidates appear to have structured their donations to ensure that their giving would be under the $1,000 disclosure threshold. Indeed, one candidate has acknowledged structuring his own giving to his campaign in this way, and to counseling his supporters to give in amounts under $1,000 so that he would not have to disclose the donations.
Twenty-one candidate and party committees reported getting two or more donations on the same day from the same donor that were each under the disclosure threshold but would have been subject to disclosure if the money came in a single check. These include Gov. Pat Quinn, Lt. Gov. Sheila Simon, the Senate Democratic Victory Fund, House Republican Leader Tom Cross, and the campaign fund of Chicago Mayor-elect Rahm Emanuel.
Chicago for Rahm, the campaign fund of Rahm Emanuel, shielded the most donations with the loophole. He avoided disclosure of $26,000 until after the February 22 election, including $15,375 received from eight donors each of whom gave multiple checks on the same day. […]
Gov. Pat Quinn reported six donations from three different donors, all of them lawyers or law firms, on January 31. Each donor wrote two checks, each for $500. Because the money came in two checks rather than one, Quinn did not need to report the receipts for another two and a half months. [Emphasis added.]
The loophole was placed into state regulations at the last minute by the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR), which reviews all regulations before they become effective. The State Board of Elections proposed rules that would have required political committees to aggregate donations for the purpose of supplemental disclosure. JCAR objected, instead reading the statute to require disclosure only of individual checks that were over the threshold. Faced with the prospect of having no regulations in place during the 2011 municipal elections if it insisted on their initial proposed regulations, the State Board of Elections agreed to the change.
* The full analysis is here. A spreadsheet is here.
It turns out that McMenamin brought in $4,500 from the federal campaign fund he used when he made an unsuccessful run for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. House in the 19th Congressional District in 2008. But as a commenter on SJ-R.com pointed out under a story Monday about aldermanic fundraising, McMenamin took the cash in $900 increments. And because new campaign finance reforms have been interpreted to no longer require quick reporting of big donations in their aggregate amount, the public never got word until later. […]
“I didn’t want our opponents to know what sources of funding and what amounts might be there at the outset because that could encourage them to ramp up their own campaigns to a greater extent,” McMenamin said.
He volunteered that the $6,920 he and his wife, LYNN, combined to loan the campaign also came in the same way. Each of them provided two $900 loans, one of $700 and another of $960. He also said that as part of “respecting donors,” he told some contributors they could give in less than $1,000 amounts to avoid quick reporting.
McMenamin said part of the reason for incremental donations was because it was uncertain how much the campaign would cost. He also said filing fewer reports is less complex, and “part of being a good manager is to avoid complexity.”
Illinois charges sales tax and a road infrastructure tax on gas. So Representative Wayne Rosenthal is proposing cutting the sales tax park. He says it will save drivers 20 cents a gallon at the pump. […]
Illinois made a similar move back in 2000. It’s estimated the state lost out on $175 million in revenue back then. Illinois is one of only 7 states that charges a sales tax on gas.
Gasoline sales tax proceeds go into the General Revenue Fund, not the Road Fund.
* The Question: Do you support a temporary (say, 12 months) gasoline sales tax holiday? Take the poll and then explain your answer in comments, please.
*** UPDATE *** An e-mail the Illinois Chamber of Commerce…
Rich,
We got a glance at the governor’s [workers’ comp] proposal yesterday afternoon. The Chamber will NOT support it. It was terribly disappointing, a lot of soft mush where the details are concerned, especially on medical. We intend to tell them today that they have not been listening closely enough. Frankly, we truly expected a lot more from them. They had better go back to the drawing board and find some backbone. They are hanging almost everything on the 30% fee cut for savings. Most of the other stuff has too much wiggle room and we’ll end up like ‘05. We’re not on their program at all. There are only a couple of items where the business plans are accepted outright as offered.
Also, the governor’s plan has a lot invested in addressing commission issues. Clearly they are deeply invested in trying to get ahead of the scandal so they can claim they’ve addressed the problems when the dust settles. I think they are losing sight of the real issue of WC reforms and too invested in the Commission issues.
Illinois senators Wednesday approved some portions of a new state budget, the opening salvo in what probably will be a protracted struggle to craft a new spending plan for the state.
The Senate didn’t tackle some of the biggest and probably most contentious parts of a budget, like education and human services. […]
One budget bill – Senate Bill 2472 – was defeated. The bill contained budgets for a variety of agencies, including the Historic Preservation Agnecy and Military Affairs. Several Democrats opposed cuts to the Violence Prevention Authority that were also part of the bill.
What will happen to the Senate’s budget bills in the House is anyone’s guess. The House is preparing its own budget that is supposed to be more austere than the one prepared by the Senate. None of that budget has yet been made public.
We’ll see what happens today, but yesterday’s actions were definitely not a good sign.
Republicans complained that the proposal wouldn’t cut spending nearly enough. But they didn’t bother introducing their own legislation for deeper cuts. […]
A hurried review by Senate Republicans concluded the Democratic plan would spend about $360 million less than Quinn has proposed. Republicans said that’s not good enough.
“If we’re going to get to a point where the tax increase is truly temporary, if we’re going to be at a point where we can pay our bills without more borrowing, if we’re going to get on the path to fiscal sanity, we need to do more budget-cutting than this,” said Sen. Matt Murphy, R-Palatine.
* Related and a roundup…
* Advertising against human services cuts may boomerang
* In this corner: Murphy responded the list of GOP cuts offered through press conferences and published for lawmakers was a specific and sufficient guide. Republicans have resisted filing budget legislation.
* Businesses wait while lawmakers talk about workers’ comp
Why did you oppose it before? Why did you switch your position?
You’ll notice that I work on a lot of criminal justice legislation. I used to be a prosecutor [in the Kendall County State’s Attorney’s Office], and my background was in law enforcement, and my initial inclination was that it wasn’t the right thing to do. I also thought the bill was initially written in a broad way. I expressed my concerns to Lou Lang. Now it lists specific illnesses—such as cancer, lupus, and Crone Crohn’s disease—and there are some limits on how the marijuana can be grown and produced. So I think it’s a better bill.
And the more I talked to people and heard their stories, it seemed to me to be an issue of compassion. I talked to people in the medical field, and doctors have told me that in some cases this is really the only thing that works as a pain killer. I didn’t know how we could deny it to people who are suffering. […]
What’s the reaction been like? What have you heard from other Republicans?
I think four or five have said they’re going to vote for it since the changes to the original bill. Overall, people have been pretty positive. Some people have been nasty—like the Illinois Family Institute. But that’s to be expected.
Those four or five new GOP votes could be crucial. We’ll see soon enough.
* Rep. Lou Lang’s changes to his bill also put some former organizational opponents on the sidelines…
The Illinois State Police, Fraternal Order of Police and the Illinois Chamber of Commerce are among recent groups that have now taken a neutral position, a change from their previous opposition to the bill.
Also contributing to our support for this bill is our hope that efforts like this across the country will help push the U.S. Food and Drug and Administration to rethink its policy on the medicinal value of marijuana and push for more research. There currently is a licensed drug on the market, Marinol, which contains a synthetic version of THC, the main therapeutic component of marijuana. But it is regarded as substantially less effective for pain and nausea than natural cannabis and its capsule form is difficult for patients with severe nausea to ingest.
We don’t think smoking is a healthy or precise delivery system for any form of medicine, but until the FDA encourages development of better alternatives, it’s all that is available.
We support this bill while acknowledging that California’s lax and haphazard medical marijuana program has become a joke, allowing just about anyone who wants marijuana to get it. The bill currently in the General Assembly uses the California example as a cautionary tale and carefully avoids its many failures. It’s a mix of compassion and caution that the House and Senate should approve.
Gov. Pat Quinn says it would be “ironic” if the Illinois House legalized concealed carry of firearms on the same day the state honors fallen police officers.
The Chicago Democrat spoke Thursday at a ceremony for police officers killed in the line of duty.
Afterward, he told reporters that letting people carry concealed guns would reduce public safety and make life more difficult for police.
*** UPDATE 2 - 2:40 pm *** This Tweet by a Chicago reporter didn’t check out when I ran it down a couple minutes ago…
Veteran vote counters in IL House: Concealed Carry HB148 unlikely to pass. Sponsor Rep. Phelps now “maybe” on calling it.
Rep. David Phelps just told me that he’s waiting for the bill to be put on the board. “I’m running it today,” he insisted.
Yesterday, opponents claimed that the bill had between 65 and 68 votes or so. Proponents claimed they had the minimum three-fifths majority of 71 lined up. We’ll know who’s right soon enough.
*** UPDATE 5 *** 65-52-1. The bill needed 71 votes. It’s on postponed consideration.
*** UPDATE 6 *** I just got off the phone with an NRA member who spoke to Rep. Monique Davis a couple of months ago in her Springfield office. He says she supported the bill at that time. I’ll have more for subscribers tomorrow.
[Gov. Pat Quinn] told reporters his opposition to the bill goes beyond the veto threat. He said he has called some House Democrats and urged them to vote “no,” setting up a potentially embarrassing defeat for either the governor or the bill’s Democratic sponsors, depending on the result of the vote.
Rep. John Bradley, D-Marion, said the governor did not notify Democrats who support concealed carry before issuing his veto threat at a news conference in Chicago on Tuesday.
Asked whether Quinn’s position would affect whether Democrats back the governor on other key issues, Bradley said, “I hear that a lot in the downstate caucus.
“I am not happy about it,” Bradley said, although he said his vote personally is based on the merits of each issue. “I think a lot of us in the downstate caucus would at least have liked to have had the courtesy to know he was going to do it.”
As I told subscribers earlier this week, whatever happens, the governor may very well end up damaged. Either the bill passes and he’s seen as a loser, or the bill fails and conservative Dems become even more furious at him than they are now.
Bottom line: Concealed-carry laws don’t seem to have a significant impact on violence one way or the other. The odds aren’t much greater that you’re going to wind up successfully defending yourself with a gun on the street, or that you’re going to mistakenly or intentionally plug somebody with a bullet. There are cases, though, where licensed holders do commit violence.
Even those who have drafted this bill seem to recognize the potential for mayhem. The bill would not allow people to carry a gun in a school, a college campus, a church, a casino, a racetrack, a stadium, a gated amusement park or, ahem, the General Assembly.
If there is such concern about keeping schools and churches and the House and Senate as gun-free zones … why not playgrounds, malls, hospitals, banks, gas stations, bowling alleys and street festivals? They’re not mentioned in the bill. Headed to the hospital? Strap up and go forth.
Employers could prohibit guns at their workplaces, if they posted signs to that effect, like an old-time saloon warning cowboys to check their six-shooters at the door. Permit-holders still could keep weapons in their cars parked at their workplace, though. How convenient for performance-review time.
Thoughts?
* Related…
* IL business groups taking no position in debate on law to allowed carrying of concealed weapons
* Illinois the epicenter of national debate about gun control
