It’s just a bill
Thursday, May 20, 2021 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Sun-Times…
Schools would be required to report incidents of sexual assault to state education officials, witnesses would not be required when seriously ill patients make decisions about life-sustaining medical treatments, and gender-neutral language would be allowed on marriage certificates under bills passed by the General Assembly Wednesday. […]
The House passed a Senate bill dealing with medical procedures sought or declined by the seriously ill.
The bill makes changes to the Practitioner Order for Life-Sustaining Treatment law, including removing a requirement that a witness be present to sign the forms reflecting the decisions the patients make. […]
Another Senate bill that allows for the hiring of security officers for the state’s appellate court system passed, 116 to one. The measure also heads for the governor’s desk.
* SJ-R…
A bill creating more elected positions in Capital Township is set for a final vote in the Illinois House even as one local representative fights against it.
“Our predecessors in the General Assembly were very thoughtful on consolidation. (Current law) calls for any township that’s wholly contained within a municipality of 50,000 that the county clerk should be the assessor and the clerk of the township, and the treasurer of the county shall be the supervisor of the township,” said state Rep. Tim Butler, R-Springfield.
Senate Bill 826 would change this to allow the voters of Capital Township to elect those positions exclusively to a township position rather than having the county officer in those roles also carry out the duties for the township. The measure was introduced by state Sen. Doris Turner, D-Springfield.
“This bill addresses an electorate’s right to choose their own representatives. Under state law, the current Sangamon County clerk and treasurer are automatically officers of Capital Township, and that’s not fair,” Turner said.
* WGN…
Adding to his frustration are two dispensaries across the street from one another on West Randolph, in one of the city’s trendiest neighborhoods. […]
State law says pot shops are not to be within 1,500 feet of each other.
But a state spokesman says the shops were allowed there because the license for each was approved on the same day. So, at the time, “there were no such dispensaries within 1,500 feet of either applicant,” the spokesman wrote in an email. […]
There is concern that because of the 1,500-foot rule, minority groups, once they do obtain licenses, will be shut out of the best locations.
“Illinois with the greatest intentions had the biggest, I would say failure in the rollout of the cannabis industry,” says state Rep. La Shawn Ford (D-Chicago).
Ford recently introduced legislation to eliminate the 1,500-foot rule for minority-owned dispensaries.
* Related…
* Statue task force considers adding, removing state monuments
- DuPage Saint - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 12:13 pm:
If two pot licenses were okayed on same day was it done at same instance? Otherwise one would be first and then other one could not be there. Typical games by connected people. Treat pot stores like liquor stores.
- Third reading - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 12:33 pm:
I believe this is a classic interpretation of the “Schrodinger’s pot shops” theory.
- Merica - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 12:52 pm:
RE Townships. Let’s look at the numbers. There are 1,429 townships.
Let’s look at the Capitol Township in Springfield. It has an annual budget of $2M. It has pension liabilities of $2M. 75% of people in Sangamon County voted that it should be consolidated into something else. 99% of the people in Sangamon County have no idea what the Capitol Township does or why it exists.
- Siualum - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 12:55 pm:
Closest one to me is an hour drive away. And I don’t exactly live in the sticks.
- Anyone Remember - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 1:39 pm:
===Our predecessors in the General Assembly were very thoughtful on consolidation.===
Tantrum Tim’s assessment of subjecting Springfield / Capital Township voters to the “West Lothian Question” …
- n-t-c2 - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 1:59 pm:
If one’s goal is to remedy the effects of six decades of bad drug laws and their disparate enforcement, it would be much more effective to tax cannibis a little more and use the money to, say, fund scholarships for college and vocational training to prepare many people for high-quality, better-than-living-wage jobs, than to hand out millionaire licenses to a lucky handful of lottery winners. But I guess improving the lives of thousands doesn’t lend itself to political entrepreneurship in the social media age.
- EssentialStateEmployeeFromChatham - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 2:16 pm:
If I remember correctly, wasn’t Langfelder actually wanting a Capital Township/City of Springfield merger a few years ago? As opposed to both the Turner and Butler bills.
- Downstate - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 2:54 pm:
The capital township issue seems kinda obvious to me. Residents of the township pay taxes that get spent by officials who were elected county-wide. Turner/Hoffman/Scherer are right try to remedy that issue. Butler is as well, but the fact is that the township is co-terminus with the city of Springfield. If it should be consolidated with any other unit of government, it obviously should be the city. As for the ballot initiative, voters weren’t given the option to say if they’d prefer to have it consolidated with the city. I’m sure 75% of them would have been fine with that too.
- Anyone Remember - Thursday, May 20, 21 @ 2:55 pm:
EssentialStateEmployeeFromChatham-
While Springfield tends Democratic at the mayoral level, at the aldermanic level it tends to be an annex of the Sangamon County GOP. Langfelder introduced a resolution, which lost 3-7 due to the votes of the GOPers / alderman whose day job is a statewide township association.