* Center Square…

A new proposal in Springfield would open up a whole new market of direct-to-consumer wine delivery.

Currently, only the producer of wine can ship bottles into Illinois and deliver them to a customer. A vineyard sending their wine club shipment, for instance. If Senate Bill 3830, sponsored by state Sen. Sara Feigenholtz, D-Chicago, is enacted, Illinois residents could have wine shipped to them from retailers or wine clubs from all over the world.

The bill is a response to the protectionist and anti-consumer ban on consumers receiving wine shipments from out-of-state retailers and wine clubs, said Tom Wark, executive director of the National Association of Wine Retailers.

“When you have an entire group from the middleman wholesaler to the Illinois retailer who don’t have to deal with competition from around the country, what you’ve got is protectionism,” he said.

Should the ban be lifted, Wark said the state’s tax revenue would increase immediately.

“In the first year, the state of Illinois would reap somewhere in the neighborhood of $5 million to $6 million in tax revenue,” he said.

It would also put an end to an ongoing lawsuit challenging the ban’s constitutionality.

* SJ-R…

The team name “Indians” is labeled across Pawnee High School’s football and basketball jerseys and a Native American is depicted on the football scoreboard and on the matted walls in its gymnasium.

But the high school doesn’t offer specific classes geared toward Native American history or culture. It is instead tied into subjects within U.S. history courses.

Rep. Maurice West, D-Rockford, wants high schools with Native American imagery to provide classes and school-wide programs teaching Native American culture and societal contributions in order to keep its team name and imagery.

West said there are 52 high schools in Illinois that have Native American imagery, with the Pawnee Indians, about 20 miles south of Springfield, being one of them. Under his proposal (House Bill 4783), the schools would also have to receive written consent from a Native American tribe based within 500 miles and renew the consent every five years.

* Capitol News Illinois…

Certain chemicals that are commonly used as sealants on asphalt driveways, parking lots and playgrounds could soon come under state regulation over concerns about their impact on human health and the environment.

A state Senate committee advanced a bill Thursday that would require public entities, including schools and state agencies, to publicly disclose their use of coal tar-based sealants or any other sealants with high concentrations of a substance called “polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon,” or PAH, a compound that federal officials say poses risk to both human health and the environment.

“According to the American Medical Association, it increases your chances of developing certain kinds of cancers by 38 times,” said Sen. Laura Fine, D-Glenview, the lead sponsor of Senate Bill 2954. “And so with this legislation, we’re just educating parents of what may or may not be on their child’s playground so they can make that decision for their health.”

The bill requires public schools to inform the public at least 90 days before the signing of a contract to use the chemical. Those entities also must post, for a minimum of 10 years after application, signage on the school’s grounds regarding the dangers the use of the chemical poses.

* Other bills…

* State lawmakers introduce bills to reform DCFS

* New proposal could change how schools report data to state

* Municipal group critical of bill to require all Illinois fire districts to levy foreign fire insurance fees