* Was this really necessary?…
This summer, the office of Illinois Treasurer Dan Rutherford sent a glossy summary of “successes” to a select 850 state residents — a majority of whom happen to be major campaign donors to the Pontiac Republican.
Rutherford, who party insiders say is strongly mulling a bid for governor, says it is “merely a coincidence” that nearly two-thirds of the recipients of the slick mailer are also donors to his political campaign.
Rutherford sent out the 11-page full-color booklet titled “No More Debt” on June 1. “Paid for by the state of Illinois. 850 copies,” it reads in small print on the back. […]
According to information obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and cross-checked against campaign disclosure data filed with the State Board of Elections, 566 of the original 850 recipients were Rutherford campaign donors, contributing a total of $1.6 million to the former lawmaker’s war chest over the last 16 years.
You do a mailer to a tiny list of bigtime honchos? It makes zero governmental sense, but lots of political sense.
*** UPDATE *** Sorry, Dan, but I’m not quite buying this explanation yet about the Daily Herald story...
State Treasurer Dan Rutherford said Tuesday that he did nothing wrong when he used treasurer’s office funds to pay for a brochure that went largely to campaign contributors and other supporters of the Republican Party.
Rutherford called it a coincidence and said the 11-page mailer was targeted to people who had request more information about state pensions, borrowing and debt.
“I get a smile out of it because the suggestion is (the recipients) were largely Republicans. Well, that happens to be the larger number of people who expressed interest in the concern of where we are on state debt and where we need to change the state public pension system,” Rutherford said.
So, Jim Thompson, Craig Duchossois, Goldman Sachs investment banker Muneer Satter and Jimmy Johns founder James Liautaud had “requested more information about state pensions, borrowing and debt”? Huh.
[ *** End Of Update *** ]
* And we most certainly know that this isn’t necessary…
Illinois may be swimming in red ink, but that hasn’t stopped lawmakers and other public officials from using state tax dollars to print and distribute coloring books.
Along with offering kids the opportunity to color things like the official state snack - popcorn - and the official state prairie grass - Big Bluestem - the booklets also prominently feature the name, contact information and picture of the lawmaker or state official.
In some instances, children can even color in a likeness of their local legislator.
Lawmakers defend the coloring books, saying they help familiarize young people with state government.
“It’s not to raise the name awareness of the legislators. There is educational value and governmental value to providing constituents helpful information about state programs and educate our kids about state government,” said state Rep. Chris Nybo, R-Elmhurst, who co-sponsored a law last spring barring politicians from promoting themselves by placing their names on state highway signs or taxpayer-financed billboards.
* As with the Rutherford mailer, the tiny cost is beside the point…
State Sen. Mike Jacobs called Thursday to register his disappointment about a story I wrote last week highlighting the little-known practice that allows lawmakers to hand out coloring books featuring their names and pictures.
Jacobs, D-East Moline, is among those who say the coloring books are educational and can help kids learn about Illinois. Plus, he said, they only cost about 19-cents apiece to print.
“I print a thousand a year. That’s $190 a year,” Jacobs said.
If every lawmaker printed and distributed 1,000 coloring books that would come to about $33,600 annually. Given the fact the state spends more than $33 billion annually, that’s not a lot of money.
But it’s not just about the cash.
It’s about whether it’s proper for lawmakers to use taxpayer dollars to promote themselves. If these were just straight up Illinois coloring books, that would be one thing. But these are emblazoned with the name, picture and address of the legislator.
- Wensicia - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 7:07 am:
Coloring books are important, but school textbooks aren’t? We’ve been forced to make do with classroom sets of books in my district, due to budget cuts. Students no longer have the ‘luxury’ of individually assigned textbooks.
- Robert M Roman - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 7:47 am:
Wait a minute. Where can ANYONE get a — how many pages? — coloring book printed, ONLY one thousand copies, for $190?
- Lil Enchilada - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 8:28 am:
Go to the DMV and you see Jesse White’s name everywhere he can possibly print it.
- Bonsaso - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 8:30 am:
You have your name on it, you pay for it.
- wordslinger - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 8:49 am:
–Rutherford, who party insiders say is strongly mulling a bid for governor, says it is “merely a coincidence” that nearly two-thirds of the recipients of the slick mailer are also donors to his political campaign.–
It’s amazing sometimes what politicians can say with a straight face.
Since he put it out there, Rutherford is now obligated to answer the questions: How exactly was the select 850 mailing list put together, by whom and for what governmental purpose?
- Spliff - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 8:51 am:
If Quinn had done that mailing Rutherford would be having kittens in the media over how unethical it is and typical of democrats in this state … well danny boy ….?????
- Shore - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 9:09 am:
Never like Rutherford to begin with. This kind of stunt shows he’s just another springfield gop phony. Next.
- Anonny - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 9:25 am:
Lil Enchilada - The difference is Jesse White makes *YOU* pay to have his name on your driver’s license via the driver’s license renewal fee.
That’s different than having tax dollars spent to have his name put on your drivers license.
- Colossus - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 9:26 am:
Word nails it, as per usual. I’ve been involved in lots of mailings like this, and all those names come from somewhere. There is no “coincidence” here. Few things boil my blood like self-serving mailers (or coloring books, now that I know they exist) that are produced with public money for private benefit. This needs to be investigated, this kind of behavior can’t be tolerated.
- Skeeter - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 9:39 am:
This may really hurt Rutherford since it attacks the perception of clean government. When JBT ran against Blago, I thought both were “typical politicians” so the decision did not really matter. Hopefully we won’t have the same sort of choice in three years. I would hate to have to vote for incompetent Dem again just because the GOP ran a hack.
- just sayin' - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 9:39 am:
If Rutherford had a Dem opponent who did the same thing, Dan would be screaming bloody murder.
- Ahoy - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 9:47 am:
I doubt the STate of Illinois can print coloring books for 19-cents a piece. I wonder how accurate that is. If it’s so important, pay for it with your campaign fund or take the names of legislators out of it.
As for Rutherford, he needs to focus on the job he has, not the job he wants. He should have paid for that mailer with his campaign fund. This should be investigated.
- Both Sides Now - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 9:51 am:
I personally don’t have a problem with providing coloring books that actually teach the children how government works (instead of what the state snack is) and are not emblazened with a legislator’s name or likeness. However, this seems to be a direct violation of legislation (PA096-1456)passed to cut costs of extraneous items and enacted on 8/20/10. See below:
Public Act 096-1456
HB5571 Enrolled LRB096 17388 RCE 32741 b
AN ACT concerning finance.
Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois,
represented in the General Assembly:
Section 5. The State Finance Act is amended by adding
Section 9.07 as follows:
(30 ILCS 105/9.07 new)
Sec. 9.07. Freeze; promotional expenditures. For a period of 2 years beginning on the effective date of this amendatory Act of the 96th General Assembly, no amounts from the General Revenue Fund may be expended for the following promotional items: calendars, pens, buttons, pins, magnets, and any other similar promotional items. This prohibition applies to expenditures by State agencies and also to expenditures by State grant recipients from grant moneys. Contracts entered into by the State before the effective date of this amendatory Act of the 96th General Assembly are exempt from the provisions of this Section.
Section 99. Effective date. This Act takes effect upon becoming law.
Effective Date: 8/20/2010
- OneMan - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 10:01 am:
Funny, my wife gets stuff from our state rep (targeted to her obviously) about nursing issues and I don’t think it is campaign stuff.
- Rich Miller - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 10:02 am:
===This prohibition applies to expenditures by State agencies and also to expenditures by State grant recipients from grant moneys.===
The GA is not a state agency.
- Aldyth - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 10:10 am:
Gee. Do those printers get paid for doing that printing any faster than the agencies that provide human services are getting paid?
- Rich Miller - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 10:12 am:
===This should be investigated. ===
Please.
It’s one thing to call a guy out on something. It’s quite another to call the coppers. Take a breath.
- mokenavince - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 10:16 am:
Politicans and coloring books thank goodness the
kids can’t vote. Still better than Blago’s name
defacing signs on the toll road.Some of this stuff
really gets funny.Regardless of their stripe the
pols will always be scheming about something.
- reformer - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 10:22 am:
when the Governor hired former reps who voted for the tax hike,critics dubbed it a Quinncidence.” What should we call this Danny coincidence, which doesn’t pass the smell test either.?
Kids can learn about IL from coloring books that don’t have their legislator’s name emblazoned across it.
- Both Sides Now - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 10:49 am:
“===This prohibition applies to expenditures by State agencies and also to expenditures by State grant recipients from grant moneys.===
The GA is not a state agency.” I understand that the General Assembly is not a state agency but it seems to me that what is good for the Agencies should also be good for the General Assembly and Executive Offices. After all, they are the ones that created the law.
- Joe from Joliet - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 10:50 am:
As an ex-legislator, Rutherford is finding out how hard it is to give up taxpayer financing of his promotional materials.
- Realist - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 11:12 am:
Both Sides, Unless I’m mistaken, this probably isn’t technically coming out of the General Revenue Fund, it would be coming out of the District Office Allotment funds.
- Both Sides Now - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 11:40 am:
@Realist - May be. But my point here is by legislating a freeze on promotional materials for Agencies, they recognized that in this day and time such items were simply not necessary, and perhaps even frivolous. So why should they continue to give away similar items? What fund the money comes from really doesn’t matter - it all could be better spent.
- Just Observing - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 11:43 am:
Hmm… if it was just a coincidence that a majority of the 850 people receiving the Rutherford mailer were big donors, than what is the rationale for choosing those 850 people? It seems quite strange to produce a mailer for a statewide office and then send it only to 850 people out of the state’s 13 million people?
The coloring books are equally ridiculous. Both show a tremendous lack in judgment.
- Robert - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 11:44 am:
==Wait a minute. Where can ANYONE get a — how many pages? — coloring book printed, ONLY one thousand copies, for $190?==
I agree, $0.19/copy sounds way too cheap and I bet he’s wrong on the price tag. At that small quantity, I’d think it’d be twice that. Especially if democrat is sending it, since Dems use the more expensive union printers.
- Realist - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 11:44 am:
I completely agree, I was just pointing out that it probably isn’t in violation of any statue. But the “do as I say, not as I do” mentality in this State needs to end.
- JustMe - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 2:15 pm:
==Wait a minute. Where can ANYONE get a — how many pages? — coloring book printed, ONLY one thousand copies, for $190?==
Well, you see, the printer actually belongs to DCEO, but CMS’ shared services charges DCEO for its use rather than the GA. The typesetters and graphic artists are from DCFS, and CMS charges DCFS for their services. The ink and paper comes from some supply cabinet that someone forgets to lock. So our only cost is the amount CMS skims for assessing the costs. If we printed 10,000, we’d actually make a profit off it.
- wordslinger - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 2:21 pm:
–Well, that happens to be the larger number of people who expressed interest in the concern of where we are on state debt and where we need to change the state public pension system,” Rutherford said.–
Careful, there. The more complicated the explanation gets, the more questions it raises and keeps the story alive. That’s P.R. 101.
For example, you wouldn’t mind producing copies of the letters and emails in which the requests were made, right? It’s official state business, after all.
- walkinfool - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 2:44 pm:
One of the things I most resented about Alexi was that his official state reports were also obviously campaign promotional pieces, in design and content. This practice should be stopped, especially as compounded by distribution to campaign donors by Rutherford. If Rutherford had simply sent the reports to all big organizations in Illinois, he might have an argument for this practice — (though it wouldn’t hold water with me).
- soccermom - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 3:09 pm:
I am keenly interested in where we are on state debt. Treasurer Rutherford never asked me if I wanted to be kept in the loop. (I also would like a coloring book.)
- Cincinnatus - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 3:14 pm:
My only question is if Nybo can color inside the lines…
- Team Sleep - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 3:30 pm:
As an adult male with a young child and another on the way, I cannot color inside the lines.
- Gregor - Tuesday, Sep 20, 11 @ 5:51 pm:
Pat Quinn: “These coloring books should be printed with soybean ink, which is a renewable ink that’s made from soybeans we grow right here in Illinois….”