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Isabel’s morning briefing
Tuesday, Feb 27, 2024 - Posted by Isabel Miller * ICYMI: Gov. J.B. Pritzker pushes maternal health funding at planned South Side birthing center. Tribune…
-In Illinois, Black women are three times as likely to die from pregnancy-related medical conditions as white women. - That funding includes $12 million for a child tax credit for low- and moderate-income families with children under age 3, plus greater investments in community health care providers, the state’s home visitation program and a pilot program for free diapers. * Related… * Isabel’s top picks… * SJ-R | Pritzker says Republicans are limiting women’s choice of freedom after ruling in Alabama: Former President Donald Trump and some Republicans in Washington, however, have called for IVF to be protected. Despite these claims, U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., said any real support for federal protections from GOP is legislators lacking. * WTAX | Senator, IVF mom: Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) is not only a U.S. senator. She is a mother of two, both children conceived through in vitro fertilization (IVF). A decision by the Alabama Supreme Court complicates the process by declaring a fertilized egg – including a frozen embryo – has the same rights as a live human being. “For example, in my case, when we have five fertilized eggs, and three were non-viable,” Duckworth told ABC This Week Sunday morning, “when my doctor discarded those with my consent, that could be considered potentially manslaughter or murder. * Windy City Times | State Rep. Kelly Cassidy attacked on social media, allegedly by backers of Burke: As for the responses to her post—specifically, one that stated the state rep needed to grow a thicker skin—Cassidy said, “To the folks who say that, this isn’t about my feelings, frankly. I didn’t tweet that because they hurt my feelings. I put that out there because people need to know the kinds of people who are supporting this woman. And I have incredibly thick skin; I’ve been called worse things by better people.” * United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America…
Governor Pritzker will be at Heartland Community college at 10 am to celebrate the opening of its EV manufacturing training academy. Click here to watch. * Here’s the rest of your morning roundup… * WLS | Reyes facing off against Justice Joy Cunningham, selected by former Chief Justice Ann Burke to replace her: Releasing her first TV ad last week, Cunningham has raised almost twice as much money as Reyes, but he said his campaign is gaining steam. Besides the need for Latino representation, Reyes said he has more judicial experience than his opponent, including 26 years on the bench, 11 of which have been on the Appellate Court. * Center Square | Behavioral health advocates ’shocked and dismayed’ drug program being cut: Aside from concerns raised by employer groups and municipalities, another proposal affects funding for opioid overdose initiatives. Jud DeLoss from the Illinois Association for Behavioral Health said there are proposed cuts to the Substance Use Prevention and Recovery program. “We were shocked and dismayed to see that Gov. Pritzker has proposed a cut to SUPR of over $45 million,” DeLoss said Friday during a joint House and Senate committee hearing on the workforce limitations for behavioral health. “At a time when we’re seeing opioid deaths and suicides [rise], a cut of that dramatic amount is simply devastating and it is going to cause even further damage to the field.” * Sun-Times | Another legal cloud hangs over ShotSpotter contract: Because of the way the contract was secured, the city isn’t allowed to extend it at less favorable terms. Instead, the 2018 contract that got the ball rolling on the first of $57.5 million in payments to the company was a “reference” contract, piggybacked onto a similar agreement in Louisville, Kentucky. * ABC Chicago | Battle over Chicago real estate transfer tax referendum heads to higher court: A judge’s written ruling issued Monday sided with BOMA, and also ordered the Board of Elections not to count the votes or publish any vote totals. The city quickly moved to intervene and appealed the case. It also filed a motion to stay the judge’s ruling Friday. * Sun-Times | Mayor Johnson’s team asks judge to pause ruling invalidating Bring Chicago Home referendum: The city argues the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners “could not and did not adequately represent the city’s interests,” and in fact, “failed to raise any substantive arguments in response” to the legal arguments made by the real estate industry that the referendum violated state law. * WTTW | Final Tally: Chicago Taxpayers Spent At Least $74M to Resolve Police Misconduct Lawsuits in 2023, Analysis Finds: That number is significantly less than the totals in 2022 and 2021, when taxpayers spent an average of $95 million in each year to resolve more than 120 lawsuits alleging police misconduct, but on par with what the city has spent to resolve police misconduct lawsuits on average during the past four years, according to WTTW News’ analysis of reports released by the Chicago Department of Law. * Crain’s | It’s getting harder for towns to ignore their lack of affordable housing: At the top, the town with the smallest supply of affordable housing is Kildeer, a village in southwest Lake County where, according to IHDA, 0.4% of the 1,317 residential units are affordable. In the past year, 115 homes have sold in Kildeer, averaging $683,740, according to Redfin, an online real estate marketplace. * Block Club | Puerto Rico Town, Other Chicago Cultural Districts Can Get Millions For Preservation Efforts: The money is intended for economic development, tourism and local entrepreneurship; the preservation of historic buildings, traditions and languages; and the promotion of culturally informed education, officials said. Each can now apply for a portion of $3 million in state funding, which will be made available later this year. * Evanston Now | City to ‘explore legal options’ against hate speech: The state attorney general’s office, in a case involving Evanston Township High School, has upheld a time limit on public comment, like the one used Thursday to cut off comments after 45 minutes. But in a case from Urbana, the same office said that without evidence of disruption, a public body cannot prohibit expression of opinions or criticism of public officials during public comment. * WLS | Site of former Tinley Park mental health center to be redesigned into a massive sports complex: “Time to tear it down. It’s time to redevelop the property and make it into something our community can be proud of,” said 19th District State Sen. Michael Hastings. Hastings led the effort to sell the land to the park district. Local officials fought over its future use for years. * SJ-R | Here’s why construction of the new Illinois Youth Center has been postponed: However, the construction has been postponed since it has been announced that the Illinois Department of Juvenile Justice is receiving $151.4 million dollars; the project could receive $5.9 million to complete its construction as part of Gov. JB Pritzker’s budget proposal. * Rockford Register Star | Long-awaited COVID relief arrives for Rockford-area restaurants: The Rockford Area Convention & Visitors Bureau and State Rep. Maurice West, D-Rockford, announced at a press conference Monday that they’ve finalized plans to distribute a $1.5 million grant to help local restaurants that followed COVID protocols and are now underwater with the Illinois Department of Employment Security. * Crain’s | Cubs want $30 million to boost security outside Wrigley Field, and maybe secure an All-Star Game: Team officials and MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred have expressed a need from the city to help with security around the stadium, but the costs had not previously been disclosed. While discussing the possibility of the Cubs being awarded an All-Star Game before he steps down as commissioner in 2029, Manfred recently said “the city being willing to step up on (security) issues is the other big variable,” according to the Chicago Tribune. The next available All-Star Game to be awarded would be in 2027. * WGEM | Organization files federal civil rights complaint against WIU, alleging discriminatory scholarships: After reviewing the complaint, WIU Professor of Sociology Robert Hironimus-Wendt told WGEM News that most of these scholarships are endowed by individuals, not the university. * Tribune | Skokie Village Board reveals closed discussion topic to public after Attorney General ruling: According to the letter, Skokie Trustee James Johnson, a political independent, submitted a Request for Review to the Attorney General’s Public Access Bureau alleging that the Skokie Board of Trustees violated the Open Meetings Act when it discussed the prospect of $4.5 million loan from the village to the Hilton Hotel development at 4930 Oakton Street and whether the village’s Economic Development Fund could be used to authorize the loan.
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- Dog bites man - Tuesday, Feb 27, 24 @ 9:35 am:
The attacks on Rep Cassidy are vile. But wouldn’t it be almost more news worthy if there were no vile attacks posted on X? That seems to be the reason the platform exists…someone posts a thought and then the X “community” jumps in with racist, homophobic, or in some other way hateful comments. That describes the overwhelmingly majority of the discourse there. Why feed the trolls?
- Drury's Missing Clock - Tuesday, Feb 27, 24 @ 9:52 am:
Terrible what was tweeted (posted?) at her, but for the last three weeks Cassidy/Harris/etc need to focus on defining Burke as a tough-on-crime right winger rather than personal grievances.
- H-W - Tuesday, Feb 27, 24 @ 9:55 am:
Well, I’ ll start.
Re: WGEM Story at the bottom
When the anti-diversity people work desperately at the state and federal level to rip a handful of small scholarships away from people of color and LGBTQ people, we have to question their motives.
Their efforts do not empower white people, though that message is behind their works - white oppression, straight people being denied.
Their efforts clearly target people who are of less power in society. It is the same as saying, Black lives do not matter, all lives matter.
Not ironically, the spokesperson for this effort to eliminate a handful of scholarships at a small, Midwestern university in a place they could not find on a map, that spokesperson writes “Universities need to adopt the approach of EqualProtect.org, which is that there is no ‘good’ form of racism, and the remedy for racism is not more racism.”
Were Mrs. Jacobson and Finnegan to actually believe those words that proceed from their mouths, they would work to remedy the first sin - unequal funding of schools, inadequate education in rural and urban American, access to jobs, affordable housing and free access to health care.
But they do not. They simply work to deny children of color and LGBTQ children a handful of small scholarships, in the name of equalizing white people’s access to those morsels.
- Amalia - Tuesday, Feb 27, 24 @ 10:10 am:
I’m surprised that Cassidy is supporting a candidate…Harris… who personally donated to an anti choice congressional candidate, Hastert, and who directed corporate dollars to anti choice gov candidate Brady. O’Neill Burke wants to create a Choice Protection unit because of the many threats to reproductive freedom, including preparing for violent events. Big difference on this issue.
- Hannibal Lecter - Tuesday, Feb 27, 24 @ 11:47 am:
It is amazing on how the State’s Attorney’s race has gone so far. Harris seems to be Kim Foxx II, so I would think that there would be many questions about whether he would continue certain policies, like understaffing the Civil Actions Bureau to the point that they are operating at borderline malpractice levels — and then outsourcing the work to their friends. Or why they forced out some of their best talent just to have new folks in place that don’t really cut the mustard.
- Amalia - Tuesday, Feb 27, 24 @ 12:36 pm:
@Hannibal Lecter wow that sounds terrible. perhaps because the criminal policies…retail theft and gun charges especially…of Foxx are so awful & Harris says he will continue those there is much public interest in that side so not as much interest in the civil side. Outsourcing work to friends, so lucrative for the friends.