* WTTW…

In August, a federal judge ordered that most of Stateville Correctional Center’s population be transferred to other prisons due to derelict conditions.

But one section was excluded because it “does not exhibit the risks of falling concrete that exists in the general housing units”: the health care unit. […]

Disability rights group Equip for Equality filed a lawsuit against Latoya Hughes, acting director of the Illinois Department of Corrections, alleging that she violated the Americans With Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act by holding the men inside in “unduly restrictive and isolating conditions compared to prisoners without disabilities, because of their disabilities.” The lawsuit also alleges she deprived the men inside of programs otherwise available because of their disabilities. […]

The lawsuit alleges one man died since these men were left in the facility after Stateville was otherwise closed. Witnesses said they saw staff disregard his urgent medical needs for the hours leading to his death, according to the lawsuit. A week later, two individuals heard staff laughing about the man’s absence, joking that he was “on a permanent writ,” the lawsuit continues.

* Ready Nation Illinois…

As our state and nation grapple over where best to invest public resources, ReadyNation commissioned the national polling firm of Zogby Analytics to survey 400 Illinois business leaders concerning these early learning priorities. Results of this online poll — conducted between Dec. 9, 2024 and Jan. 9, 2025 — reveal overwhelming support for early childhood services and their role in maintaining a stable and productive workforce. Here is an overview of key survey findings.

Employers and managers continue to see costly fallout from child care challenges, both for working parents and for employers’ own bottom line.

• 81.1% of surveyed business leaders agree that their employees “struggle with finding and retaining stable, affordable child care and early childhood programs” (24.3% strongly agree).

• As a result of these challenges, 66.4% of respondents say they’ve seen their employees losing
work hours. Other consequences they’ve witnessed among employees lacking stable child care:
o Lost wages – 58.3%
o Lost jobs/positions – 48.8%
o Lost promotions – 37.3%

• Executives have also experienced these business problems resulting from child care struggles:
o Reduced productivity – 66.8% of respondents
o The need to replace displaced workers (63.3%) and train/retrain new hires (49.5%)

• Overall, 92.8% of surveyed executives concur that high-quality child care and early education
are important to “workforce stability and productivity” (59.3% strongly agree). […]

An economic priority: Business leaders overwhelmingly want to increase public investments in young children’s learning and development.

• 91.5% of poll respondents support “greater public investments in high-quality child care and early childhood education,” with 51% expressing strong support.

• 97.1% of business leaders say investing to improve the quality and stability of early childhood teachers and staff is “beneficial for the state’s economic development.”

• 95.3% concur that public investments in early childhood facilities’ construction and renovation would “enhance the availability and quality” of such programs statewide.

• Regarding the new Illinois Department of Early Childhood that’s being developed, to consolidate oversight of core birth-to-5 programs spread across three agencies:
o 85.8% of business leaders express con1idence this unfolding effort will improve services’
access and quality
o 92.8% agree “streamlining and simplifying” these early care and education programs will
benefit kids, families, service providers and local communities

• Looking to the future, 93.1% of executives agree that Illinois’ current, multiyear approach to improve early childhood services — based on the research and recommendations of a bipartisan commission in 2021 — will “positively impact the workforce in Illinois.”

*** Statehouse News ***

* Baptist News Global | Be ‘hopeful doom-scrollers,’ Pritzker urges: “I want to thank you for the late nights and for your early mornings and for leaving your family functions to formulate legal strategy over Zoom calls,” he said. “And I want to thank you for canceling Friday night drinks with friends so you could file briefs and battle executive orders. Boy, do we need you. I know what the last six weeks have asked of you. You’ve had to be hopeful doom-scrollers. “You’ve had to wake up every single day and be your smartest and be your sharpest because you live well with the worry that anything less will mean the constitutional republic you love so much may slip away,” he continued. “You’ve been stepping up when it seems like everyone else is stepping back.”

*** Statewide ***

* WIFR | Free test prep courses offered at all public universities in Illinois: The Illinois Student Assistance Commission is working with Kaplan to provide more than 40 free courses through the Prepare for Illinois’ Future Program. Students will have access to Kaplan’s preparation for professional licensing exams, graduate-level exams and credential exams including the GRE, GMAT, LSAT, MCAT, NCLEX-RN, USMLE, Illinois State bar exam, real estate and securities exam and more.

*** Chicago ***

* Crain’s | Brandon Johnson’s $830 million borrowing plan narrowly approved in City Council: The plan, passed 26-to-23, had been blocked from a vote at a previous City Council meeting as opponents criticized a lack of clarity on the projects that would be funded by the bonds and worried the backloaded debt payments risked a further downgrade of the city’s credit rating. Johnson’s team tweaked the proposal to clarify the funding would not be used for operations expenses at Chicago Public Schools as some have claimed. Any capital spending for CPS would need to be approved by the local alderman.

* Tribune | Park District boss stepping down after Mayor Brandon Johnson vow to purge holdovers: Chicago Park District Supt. Rosa Escareno is stepping down, the latest shakeup in Mayor Brandon Johnson’s administration after he vowed to purge officials who aren’t loyal to him. Escareno, a longtime City Hall veteran, submitted her letter of resignation on Wednesday after four years of helming the top job at the Park District, according to sources who are familiar with her decision. […] Her replacement was not immediately clear, but the Johnson administration is considering longtime ally Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa, 35th. If confirmed, Ramirez-Rosa’s appointment would further increase progressive representation within Johnson’s leadership team, as the mayor hinted was the goal in his explosive Feb. 10 remarks.

* Chalkbeat Chicago | Chicago school board to consider saving 4 of 7 Acero charter schools slated for closure: According to Chicago Public Schools officials, the funding needs for all seven Acero campuses on the chopping block exceed a legal state limit on how much money the district can provide to charter schools. A resolution included on the board’s agenda for its Thursday meeting calls for CPS to provide financial help to Acero in order to keep the Casas, Fuentes, Tamayo, and Santiago campuses open next school year. It then calls for CPS to figure out “the viability” of absorbing those campuses and turning them into district-run schools after next year.

* Crain’s | Convention agency bringing McCormick Place management back in-house: It’s a notable shift by an agency that has lauded the privatization of McCormick Place management for giving the city a competitive lift. The convention center — one of the region’s most important economic engines — was publicly managed from 1960 until 2011, when a slate of labor reforms enacted by the Illinois General Assembly prompted the hiring of a private operator to streamline campus operations and lower costs for trade shows, conventions and other meeting-organizer customers.

*** Cook County and Suburbs ***

* Lake County News-Sun | Waukegan, North Chicago primaries set stage for mayoral elections: Claiming victory in the Waukegan Democratic primary, former Mayor Sam Cunningham enters a four-way race for the city’s top job against incumbent Mayor Ann Taylor — who unseated him four years ago — Ald. Keith Turner, 6th Ward, and former Ald. Harold Beadling, 4th Ward. Cunningham’s performance was one of four contests for Democratic nominations in Waukegan and North Chicago, with two setting the stage for the April 1 general election for mayor in both cities, and two others putting unopposed candidates on the April ballot.

* Daily Herald | Complaint claims Arlington Heights trustee candidate violated donation limits: The campaign committee for Michele Hunter received in-kind contributions of $6,353.86 and $1,406.22 on Jan. 17 from the Illinois Republican Party for mailing and printing, according to disclosures filed with the Illinois State Board of Elections. Arlington Heights bars candidates for village trustee or mayor from accepting more than $1,000 from any single organization.

* Daily Herald | Schaumburg, Zurich settle suit over public payments for workforce size: The settlement resulted in Schaumburg immediately paying Zurich $20 million in withheld reimbursement funds from the redevelopment area’s tax increment financing (TIF) district. Meanwhile, the maximum amount Zurich can receive over the life of the district was lowered from $100 million to $80 million. TIF funding generally pays for infrastructure improvements within the district for up to 23 years of the district’s existence.

* Lake County News-Sun | Hundreds protest Musk at Libertyville Tesla dealership: ‘What Elon has done to the brand is just make it feel dirty’: “Elon Musk paid to own Donald Trump, who promised to bring down prices on day one, and now people are paying even more,” said Lauren Beth Gash, chair of the Lake County Democratic Party, who was helping run the protest. During Saturday’s protest, a small group of conservative counter-protesters were stationed just a dozen yards away, and the two groups traded barbs and insults. The word “traitor” was thrown back and forth. In the background of the politically charged confrontation was the Libertyville Tesla dealership.

* WBEZ | The first Black-owned airport in the U.S. was in Robbins, Illinois: The Black men and women pilots who came after Coleman all attributed their work to her, explaining that they wanted to continue what she started. Two of these pilots, Cornelius Coffey and John Robinson, were highly skilled mechanics who were able to use their own knowledge of technology to teach, train, and further innovate the field of aviation. Coffey and Robinson met in Detroit and connected over their passion for aviation. After reading about the death of Bessie Coleman, the two were inspired to move to Chicago and apply to attend the Curtiss-Wright School of Aviation. They were the masterminds who built their own airport in south suburban Robbins with the help of Janet Harmon Bragg, the first Black woman to earn a commercial pilot’s license, and Willa Brown, the first Black woman to get both a pilot’s and commercial license. Both Bragg and Brown were trained by Coffey and Robinson, and became their colleagues.

*** Downstate ***

* Illinois Times | Sean Grayson’s attorneys seek change of venue: The trial of Sean Grayson, who is charged with first-degree murder in the July 6 death of Sonya Massey, needs to be moved outside Sangamon County because pretrial publicity would bias potential jurors, Grayson’s attorneys argued in court documents filed Feb. 26. “The print and electronic news media coverage relating to the death of Sonya Massey has been extensive nationally and worldwide, but especially in the local community,” Springfield defense attorneys Daniel Fultz and Mark Wykoff wrote in the request to Circuit Judge Ryan Cadagin.

* Pantagraph | Bloomington to acquire Commerce Bank building, see other downtown sites torn down: On Monday, the Bloomington City Council approved two agreements: one with Consolidated Properties LLC to accept the former Commerce Bank building at 120 N. Center St. as a donation to the city, and one with Catalyst Construction to demolish three vacant properties south and west of the former bank to add surface parking at a cost of about $3.9 million.

* BND | O’Fallon’s new emergency alert system wakes up only those who are needed, not everyone: The alert systems went in separately to the public safety building 20 years ago, fire station no. 3 15 years ago, and fire station no. 4 12 years ago. “They were built by three different companies,” Brueggeman said. “If we receive a lift assistance call at 1 a.m. and only need two paramedics, every single paramedic gets a call.”

* Illinois Times | Manufacturing operations moving to Clinton: A manufacturer with more than 100 workers is closing two of its Springfield facilities and moving operations to Clinton after a dispute with the city over building-code violations. Mike Hoyle has owned Kwik-Wall for 19 years, a company that makes movable partitions for conference and convention facilities. Hoyle used an LLC to purchase the former Farm and Home building on North Dirksen Parkway for $2 million in April 2024, according to Sangamon County tax records, but soon found himself at loggerheads with city officials over changes made to the building.

*** National ***

* WaPo | Elon Musk’s business empire is built on $38 billion in government funding: Over the years, Musk and his businesses have received at least $38 billion in government contracts, loans, subsidies and tax credits, often at critical moments, a Washington Post analysis has found, helping seed the growth that has made him the world’s richest person. The payments stretch back more than 20 years. Shortly after becoming CEO of a cash-strapped Tesla in 2008, Musk fought hard to secure a low-interest loan from the Energy Department, according to two people directly involved with the process, holding daily briefings with company executives about the paperwork and spending hours with a government loan officer.