* The story about Montgomery County Republican Party Chairman Jim Allen’s racist, sexist, etc. e-mail about Erika Harold has gone national. From a press release…
RNC Chairman Reince Priebus released the following statement in response to comments made by Jim Allen, Chairman of the Montgomery County, Illinois, Republican Party:
“The astonishingly offensive views expressed by Chairman Allen have absolutely no place among the leaders of our party at any level. His behavior is inexcusable and must not be tolerated. He should apologize to Erika Harold and resign immediately.”
Illinois Review has learned that Montgomery County GOP chairman Jim Allen has resigned his position following a controversial email he sent regarding GOP candidate Erika Harold.
*** UPDATE 2 *** Resignation confirmed. From IL GOP Chairman Jack Dorgan…
Today, I accepted the resignation of Jim Allen as Montgomery County Chairman. These types of offensive and inappropriate remarks have no place in our Republican Party.
“I was encouraged by the fact that [House Speaker Michael Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton] agreed to have a conference committee,” said Quinn, who met with legislative leaders Wednesday morning.
“I don’t think there’s any doubt that the members of the Legislature understand that this is not going away. If on the 9th of July they haven’t done their job, they’re really letting the people of Illinois down.”
It’s a tall order, considering members of the 10-member, bipartisan committee will be starting fresh on a compromise never reached during the Legislature’s regular session that ended with Madigan’s savings-focused plan being trounced in the Senate and his refusal to call Cullerton’s rival, union-backed plan.
Let’s see… the end of January’s lame duck session was a hard deadline. The end of spring session was probably also a hard deadline for Quinn. Maybe even before spring break. It’s just too nice of a day today to bother looking up the links.
Legislative leaders named the members to the committee. For the most part, the appointees reflect the views of those who appointed them. House Speaker Michael Madigan named Chicago Rep. Arthur Turner, Riverside Rep. Michael Zalewski and Northbrook Democrat Elaine Nekritz, who has been a key player in pension talks thus far. “I think it has the potential to be different because we’re just in a different position than we’ve been in throughout this long journey, this arduous journey,” Nekritz said. “We’re a lot further down the road than we have been in the past, and I think that there is a … desire to come together to get a compromise. I can say that from the House’s perspective, and I believe that to be true of the Senate, as well.” House Minority Leader Tom Cross tapped Naperville Rep. Darlene Senger and Quincy Rep. Jil Tracy.
Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno chose Palatine Sen. Matt Murphy and Bloomington Sen. Bill Brady. Senate President John Cullerton appointed Evanston Sen. Daniel Biss, Chicago Sen. Kwame Raoul and Aurora Sen. Linda Holmes. Biss, who sponsored Senate Bill 1, is the only choice that stands out as not sharing similar views on the issue as the leader who appointed him.
However, Biss acknowledged today that compromise is needed, calling SB 1 “dead” and “gone.” “I think everything has to be on the table. I think we need to walk into this with the openness and flexibility that comes with not having bright red lines and not having nonstarters,” Biss said. [Emphasis added.]
Hopefully, the train is finally starting to move faster than one mile a year.
Cullerton, who had been at loggerheads with Madigan over competing pension proposals, gave a backhanded compliment to the speaker — a longtime friend and colleague — for agreeing to form the conference committee after initially dismissing it out of hand on Friday.
“Now we have a conference committee that the speaker’s agreed to do rather than just insist that we keep on voting on his bill, and that’s a very positive step,” Cullerton said, adding that the process opens the door to “new ideas.”
In an exclusive interview in his expansive Springfield office, House Speaker Michael Madigan also seemed to indicate that this might be the time for compromise.
“We both resolve that there must be a bill. That is a significant first step. Having done that, now we move to where the compromises will occur, what kind of concessions can be taken from each side,” said Madigan.
* I asked Jay Levine at CBS2 to post the full interview with Madigan. He did. Many thanks. Have a look…
“The initial reaction [in the legislature] when Quinn suggested it was kind of eye-roll, ‘are-you-kidding’ sort of thing,” said Kent Redfield, an emeritus political science professor at the University of Illinois Springfield. “But then, I think the reason it got done was that people looked at it and said, ‘If we do this, then it looks like we’re doing something. And we can present it as we came to town and we did something.’ It’s very symbolic. I think that it is basically a way to buy time and to play to the external audiences, which are editorial boards, average citizens and the bond [rating] houses.” Illinois’ credit rating was downgraded twice in the first week of June after lawmakers failed to pass pension changes in the regular session.
Cullerton says he thinks the committee is a step in the right direction, but will it be the final push needed to pass a comprehensive pension fix?
CULLERTON: “No, not the fact that we have a conference committee. That was the governor’s request and just another way of getting to a vote for a bill.”
* It also takes about two weeks to do an actuarial analysis. So, if they want to vote on a bill and know what they’ll be getting, they’ll need to wrap things up in less than a week. Doubtful, to say the least…
Rep. Elaine Nekritz of Northbrook, a conference committee member and the leading House Democrat on pension matters, cautioned that if any agreement is reached, it could take weeks to run the numbers on potential savings to the state.
“Part of reaching a compromise is knowing what (a proposal) does,” Nekritz said. “I would hesitate to go to (Madigan) and say, ‘This is the deal but I don’t really know what it saves, I have a guess.’ And I don’t want to go to the people of the state of Illinois and say that. So, it’ll take some time.”
* And here’s where we finally get to the question. From WBEZ…
The pension crisis in Illinois is dire. Politicians routinely use strong language when they talk about it. Consider the following:
“We all look like idiots.” - Rep. Daniel Biss, D-Skokie.
“Finances in the state of Illinois are a train wreck.” - Dick Ingram of the Teachers Retirement System
“It’s a catastrophic failure of leadership.” - Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno, R-Lemont […]
All this talk has us wondering: Are there any adjectives left we can use to describe how bad this pension situation is that we aren’t already desensitized to? Any fear-inspiring idioms or cliches left out?
That’s where you come in. Fill out the Mad Lib-inspired form below to tell us how you’re feeling about the Illinois pension crisis. We’ll do a dramatic reading of some of your responses on-air.
* I touched up one of their Mad Libs for our purposes…
Without a compromise, I’m __(emotion)___ that Illinois will be worse off than a __(noun)__ in a __(location)__. If lawmakers don’t agree on a plan by July 8th, then I will __(verb)__.
* The Question: Fill in the blanks? And please, please, please keep it super-clean. Thanks!
* Will County Auditor Duffy Blackburn is kicking off his campaign for comptroller. The Democrat eventually hopes to challenge incumbent Judy Baar Topinka…
Blackburn, who is in his second term as Will County Auditor, plans to jump in with the help of U.S. Rep. Bill Foster, who is to serve as a co-chair on his campaign.
Blackburn, 35, of Joliet plans to officially announce on Thursday.
“I’m running for State Comptroller because I saw the need for a professional accounting watchdog to lead the state’s accounting office instead of a career politician,” Blackburn said in a statement released to the Sun-Times. “Illinois needs an accountant to manage its checkbook, clean up operations, and advocate fresh ideas for solving our state’s continuous financial problems—not pass the blame on to others. I look forward to traveling the state to discuss with voters how we can solve our financial crisis and move Illinois forward.”
For her part, Topinka is definitely in for another run.
* Blackburn’s campaign was eager last night to let y’all have the first look at his announcement video. I forgot about it earlier this morning. Oops. But here it is…
Illinois’ one-dollar-per-pack cigarette tax increase that took effect a year ago this month is expected to fall $130 million short of initial estimates, meaning it won’t raise quite as much as projected for school capital projects because of the way the funding formula is set up.
The increase, which hiked the state’s 98-cents-per-pack tax to $1.98 last June, is expected to bring in about $212 million in additional revenue for the current fiscal year, which ends June 30.
That’s well short of the $350 million in additional revenue originally projected, according to a monthly report released at the end of May by the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability.
A decline in sales that typically follows a significant tax increase is partially why the revenue is falling short, the report states.
Significant stockpiling of cigarettes with older tax stamps is another reason for the shortfall.
OfficeMax Inc. is asking the state of Illinois for tax breaks to keep the company’s headquarters in-state after the office supply chain’s merger with Office Depot Inc. is complete.
OfficeMax CEO Ravi Saligram and state Sen. Tom Cullerton made their pitch yesterday during a hearing on the state’s pension crisis. Cullerton is a Democrat from west suburban Villa Park sponsoring legislation to provide incentives if the company keeps at least 2,000 full-time jobs at its headquarters and other non-retail locations.
Naperville-based OfficeMax and Boca Raton, Fla.-based Office Depot in February announced plans to merge. The companies are trying to decide where to locate their combined headquarters.
Gov. Pat Quinn’s administration on July 1 will start paying the wage rate that was promised to thousands of unionized government workers in 2011 and 2012, although Illinois lawmakers didn’t approve extra funding for back wages owed, officials said Wednesday.
Employees in six state agencies will get raises of at least 7.25 percent going forward, starting with the new fiscal year, according to an email sent to the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees’ 35,000 members and obtained by The Associated Press.
That includes a 2 percent raise owed in the current contract and the 5.25 percent increase offered in 2011 and 2012 that Quinn reneged on. There will also be some back-money paid, but for the most part, only that which a court ordered set aside in 2012 or leftover funds from this budget year that Quinn officials have promised to put toward the overdue wages.
Not all employees will get what they’re owed for the past two years because lawmakers didn’t act on a supplemental appropriation to cover the $140 million to $160 million price tag, AFSCME director Henry Bayer said in the email.
Bruce Rauner reacts on Facebook…
* In other news…
The state agency charged with investigating child abuse claims continues to flounder when it comes to meeting deadlines for initiating and completing investigations, a new audit notes.
In a report released Wednesday, Illinois Auditor General Bill Holland said the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services saw a significant jump in the number of abuse cases that weren’t determined to be unfounded or credible within a required 60-day timeframe.
The audit found that 884 of nearly 65,000 allegations missed the deadline, compared to 115 of 63,000 the previous year. It was the biggest backlog since 2006, when more than 1,000 cases missed the deadline.
Bookkeeping is sloppy at the Illinois Department of Transportation, where contracts have been hastily awarded for “emergencies” such as trash collection and overtime claims have gone unchecked, according to a state audit released Wednesday.
Other problems in fiscal years 2011 and 2012 included shoddy inventory records and duplicated payments to vendors, according to the Illinois auditor general’s report, which said some problems have festered since 1994.
IDOT officials said they agreed with the findings and promised to improve. The department is led by Transportation Secretary Ann Schneider, who took over in late 2011. She was preceded by Gary Hannig.
In March, Gov. Pat Quinn issued an executive order to eliminate or consolidate 75 government panels after the Better Government Association highlighted the waste and perks that accompany many taxpayer-supported boards and commissions.
The aim: trim the bureaucracy and save money.
But on the final day of the just-completed Illinois General Assembly session, the state Senate quietly blocked Quinn’s order, claiming he didn’t have the authority to eliminate 37 — or nearly half — of those panels.
Quinn’s press secretary said the governor was “surprised” by the Senate’s action, which she called “disappointing.”
A spokesman for Senate President John Cullerton, D-Chicago, said his boss is committed to streamlining the numbed of boards and commissions, but it needs to be done through legislation. In other words, it’s the legislature’s call, not the governor’s.
So one night the princess went to sleep, as she had on all the other nights, atop those 28 mattresses and 28 feather beds.
Yet so sensitive was she that she felt something bothering her. She just couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned. She could feel a bothersome itch right in the middle of her back.
The servants ran to help and removed the 28 mattresses and the 28 feather beds, but found nothing.
“Wait!” said Princess Lisa. “What’s this?”
There, at the bottom of the pile, on the ground, was a tiny, dry, little pea.
She had felt it through all the mattresses and all the feather beds representing the years of her father’s reign. She placed it in her flawless palm, and like magic, it opened. Inside was a mysterious note with many numbers. The servants ran to inform Mike of Madiganistan.
“This is nothing,” said the terrible Mike. “All it says is that the peasants owe $100 billion in unfunded state pension liabilities. Don’t worry, they’ll pay and they’ll like it. Go to sleep, honey.”
So the servants reassembled the bed, the 28 mattresses and the 28 feather beds, and soon Princess Lisa was fast asleep.
And the next morning, after a night of uneasy dreams, she felt as if she’d been transformed.
All was right with the world. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, the peasants were shrieking their piteous cries of woe. The princess climbed down for breakfast with her father.
And just before a servant brought her a silver bowl of Lucky Charms, she asked Mike of Madiganistan a question:
Darin LaHood, State Senator (R-Peoria) and Dan Rutherford for Illinois Treasurer campaign staffer, may be looking to fill the seat of his former boss.
Appointed to serve the 37th District in the Illinois Senate in February of 2011, he was elected to a four year term in the senate on November 6, 2012. He may have his sights set on running for State Treasurer.
Two other perspective GOP nominees, Bob Schillerstrom, former DuPage Chairman and Bob Grogan, DuPage County Auditor.
* Bruce Rauner was in Springfield yesterday spreading the word about his gubernatorial candidacy. But he stuck closely to his script and wouldn’t offer up any real details. For instance, here’s Rauner on limiting the power of public employee unions…
Asked by a reporter if he was saying government unions should be eliminated in Illinois, Rauner said, “We need to modify their power.” Asked how, he said, “I won’t go into it today. We’ve got a detailed plan.”
“We should put vouchers into our worst school districts so parents can get out of those broken systems and go elsewhere for their kids’ education,” he said. He didn’t say, when asked, if such vouchers would be allowed to pay for education at parochial schools.
“We’ll get to that plan later,” he said.
He also apparently didn’t say if Chicago kids would be offered vouchers to attend school in Winnetka.
Rauner said he thinks for a Republican to win for governor, a candidate would need 25 percent of the vote in Cook County, and he said he has a “very specific plan” to get support there.
“I built businesses in Cook County,” he said. “I’m known in the African-American community in Cook County and the Latino community in Cook County because my wife and I have funded many, many of their charter schools in their communities, and … we’ve been doing that for 25 years. … They know it’s not about politics. They know it’s because I care passionately about quality education for everybody.”
Asked if term limits would require a constitutional amendment, he said, “or a referendum; we’ve got a plan.”
* He said something odd to a Springfield TV reporter yesterday. Rauner said the problem with the pension reform conference committee is that the public employee unions are “not at the table.” But why bring the unions to the table if you want to break them? Usually, you only bring somebody to the table if you want to negotiate. So, I don’t get it. Watch…
* Meanwhile, Rauner said something in Rockford that kinda/sorta reminded me of the parody movie “The Campaign”…
“Rockford is a core, one of the most important communities in Illinois. How Rockford goes is how the state goes.”
* Montgomery County Republican Party Chairman Jim Allen fired off a racist, misogynistic, xenophobic and disgustingly hateful e-mail to conservative blogger and GOP activist Doug Ibendahl this week. Allen supports Congressman Rodney Davis against Erika Harold in the Republican primary. Harold, who is black, lost out to Davis last year when county party chairmen picked retired Congressman Tim Johnson’s ballot replacement. Ibendahl backs Harold and he posted Chairman Allen’s e-mail on his blog. I’ve edited one word by blocking out a letter…
From: Jim Allen
Sent: 06/18/13 10:59 PM
To: dibendahl@mail.com
Subject: 13th Congressional District reply
Rodney Davis will win and the love child of the D.N.C. will be back in Sh*tcago by May of 2014 working for some law firm that needs to meet their quota for minority hires.
The truth is Nancy Pelosi and the DEMOCRAT party want this seat. So they called RINO Timmy Johnson to be their pack mule and get little queen to run.
Ann Callis gets a free ride through a primary and Rodney Davis has a battle.
The little queen touts her abstinence and she won the crown because she got bullied in school,,,boohoo..kids are cruel, life sucks and you move on..Now, miss queen is being used like a street walker and her pimps are the DEMOCRAT PARTY and RINO REPUBLICANS…These pimps want something they can’t get,,, the seat held by a conservative REPUBLICAN Rodney Davis and Nancy Pelosi can’t stand it..
Little Queenie and Nancy Pelosi have so much in common but the one thing that stands out the most.. both are FORMER QUEENS, their crowns are tarnished and time has run out on the both of them..
And the Republican Party wonders why they have problems with women and minorities?
Sheesh.
They have far too many yahoos like this clown in power.
* Davis pulled Chairman Allen’s name off a list of supporters on his campaign website. And Allen apologized. From the Champaign News-Gazette…
“The words in the commentary I wrote were completely wrong,” said Jim Allen, the Republican Party chairman in Montgomery County. “I apologize to Erika Harold, her staff and her supporters.”
With that, Allen hung up.
OK, not a bad apology, but have the stones to at least answer a question before hanging up on the reporter.
“Mr. Allen’s comments are misguided and wrong and certainly do not reflect the views of Congressman Davis or his campaign. Our hope is that supporters for all of the candidates conduct themselves in a positive manner and focus on the issues facing our country as the campaign moves forward,” said Andrew Flach, a spokesman for the Republican congressman.
* Congressman Davis said on a conference call with reporters this morning that Allen should resign his party position.
Davis said Allen made “inane and asinine comments,” but said he hasn’t yet talked to him about the e-mail.
