* The Chicago Tribune published yet another series of stories about House Speaker Michael Madigan’s power. But like past investigation, some of this series is a bit of a stretch.

For instance…

Chicago’s largest operator of assisted living homes for the poor was looking to grow its business when it decided to add a new member to its legal team: the law firm of House Speaker Michael Madigan.

Within months of that decision, the most powerful lawmaker in Illinois and the chamber he controls voted in 2005 to create a state program that would send tens of millions of dollars to his new client. […]

There are other tax lawyers to see in Chicago. But nothing gets done in Springfield without Madigan, who wields unilateral control over the movement of every bill in the House.

That was true in 2005, when a coalition came to the state Legislature seeking to turn a pilot project on assisted living homes for the poor into what is now the permanent Supportive Living Program.

A founding member of that coalition was Pathway Senior Living LLC, Chicago’s largest developer of such homes.

The idea was to save money by moving the most able-bodied nursing home patients into these less expensive facilities where they could get the help they need at 60 percent of the Medicaid cost to taxpayers. It was supported by advocates for the poor and politicians from both parties.

Pathway and other companies wanted to expand, but investment money and state incentives were hard to come by because of the tenuous nature of the pilot program.

At about the same time, Pathway, which has long used another law firm for all its property tax business, hired Madigan’s firm for a single Chicago property. Public records show Madigan’s firm filed its first paperwork on behalf of the company on April 12, 2005.

On May 20, Madigan and the House voted 113-0 to create the permanent program.

* OK, to the bill in question. The legislation was introduced in the Senate on February 24, 2005 by Sen. Kwame Raoul (D-Chicago). Raoul is not exactly known as a tool of the Madigan machine. The bill passed the Senate on April 8th, four days before that paperwork was filed. Then the House voted unanimously in favor of it.

Too often in journalism, particularly at the Tribune, correlation is causation. But that bill was a measure supported by Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s administration, and RRB was never an MJM fan.

* Back to the Tribune…

Pharmacies face cuts in drug reimbursements under the legislation, but lawmakers largely went with the industry’s own suggestions for trimming rather than harsher proposals.

Supportive living homes and nursing homes face rate cuts, but they are lower than first proposed. The supportive living industry got some protection against potentially damaging changes in eligibility rules. And nursing homes won concessions on new rules to increase staffing.

As subscribers already know, pharmacies negotiated their own cuts months ago, but then got whacked again by the new bill. They are hardly winners here.

And pretty much every provider ended up with cuts that were lower than first proposed by Gov. Pat Quinn. Physicians have no cuts at all, and that’s mainly because the House Republicans (who get tons of campaign cash from the docs) stood up for them. Hospitals avoided huge cuts. And the AP claimed nursing homes were a big session loser.

* Now, on to the banks. Madigan’s property tax law firm represents Bank of America, which would’ve taken a very big hit if this bill had passed…

In addition to stopping that legislation, the other priority for the banking industry this legislative session was to pass a measure that would allow them to much more quickly foreclose on and dump abandoned properties from their books. In an effort to win over critics, the banks offered to pay more to help cities around the state maintain abandoned homes.

The bank-backed bill passed the Senate after weeks of closed-door meetings but stalled in the House Rules Committee. Lawmakers and advocates who opposed it credited Madigan, saying he didn’t think it raised enough money from big banks for the foreclosure funds.

Then, on the final day of the session, Yarbrough countered with her own version of the fast-track bill. It would raise twice the money — an estimated $50 million — to help municipalities and fund foreclosure counseling services. But it would only impose higher fees on the very largest banks, which have at least $10 billion in assets.

Smaller community banks and credit unions would be spared, and their lobbying association joined housing advocates in supporting it. The Illinois Bankers Association, which was representing the interests of bigger banks, opposed it.

Yarbrough said Madigan, who voted for the bill, provided counsel and was involved in the process nearly the entire time. “He held my hand all the way,” she said.

She said she wasn’t aware it helped some Madigan banking clients and said Madigan didn’t come up with the idea to exclude community banks from the bill. She said those ideas came from housing advocates who were assisting her with the bill and added that Madigan was an advocate for her concerns this session.

But Madigan also represents small, community banks, so he’s made to wear the jacket, even though the bill passed the House and stalled in the Senate. I was at that House committee hearing (I needed to talk to a committee member about another issue, so I was staking him out and watched the hearing), and a BoA lobbyist testified against it. That’s a very big MJM client, so I’m not sure what the problem is here.

Banks, like hospitals, are in every legislative district and are usually run by some of the most important people in those districts. Beating them ain’t easy, to say the least.

* The overall point of the series is that Madigan is a walking conflict of interest. He’s all-powerful and has grown personally wealthy by using that power to his own advantage. No argument there.

Madigan’s response…

No state benefit is ever offered to gain a client and any potential client who seeks a state benefit is not accepted.

If a client of the law office requests my intercession with a state agency, I refuse; and

If a client of the law office expresses an interest in legislation such as to create a conflict of interest, I recuse myself from consideration of the bill.

In real-world politics, you never specifically ask for a quid pro quo. Ever. That’s what got Blagojevich in trouble. You just assume that you’re buying good will and let it go at that. Madigan would toss an idiot out his window if he offered to sign up with the law firm in exchange for a Springfield benefit.

Bank of America is, according to the Tribune, a Madigan client. BoA lobbyist Pat Holden testified against the foreclosure bill, so shouldn’t that have created a conflict of interest?

* Dawn Clark Netsch tosses in her two cents…

“Power and secrecy are a potentially lethal, or at least an unhealthy, combination. Too much secrecy is absolutely wrong whether or not it’s combined with as much power as one individual has.

“I think there could be a much clearer definition of what constitutes a conflict of interest. That could be more precisely defined.

“Everything ought to be out on the table. Does that stop it from happening? No. But I think at least it provides the basic information that it seems to me citizens have a right to have in evaluating their elected representatives.”

More openness would obviously be better.

* Now, on to campaigns. I told subscribers months before the primary that Madigan’s organization would be backing Aurora Ald. Stephanie Kifowit over two other primary opponents. The Tribune finally reported on it this week like it was some great revelation…

And because Madigan controls both a state staff and a campaign war chest, he has a ready reserve of public employees he shifts off the payroll at will to add muscle to the most powerful election force in the state.

Decremer and other Democratic staffers are deployed to answer phone calls, schedule campaign events and scour petitions of competing Democrats to get them kicked off the ballot.

Republicans also have pulled dozens of staffers off the state payroll in election years, but after nearly 30 years as speaker, Madigan is the master at using the levers of government to his political advantage.

So, everybody does it and Madigan is the best and that makes it particularly bad. OK. But the Tribune does point out the consequences of using state staffers for campaigns…

During the March primary season, records show, nearly two dozen state staffers went off the state payroll, being paid instead by Madigan’s political funds to work for more than 30 candidates. In many of the less competitive races, the staffers worked for less than a day, simply checking to see if a Madigan-backed candidate had any opponents. In nearly half of the races, which were more competitive, the staffers worked for weeks at a time. […]

Soon after the primary campaign was done, Decremer and other Madigan staffers were back at work in Springfield.

Decremer is a fixture at major committee meetings and can often be seen in the House chamber conferring with top Madigan lieutenants. He also moves easily through the aisles and to the desks of rank-and-file lawmakers, chatting some up and checking over the shoulders of others.

In Illinois, it’s all one thing. And it’s not just Madigan or Madigan’s staff, either. It’s everybody. He just does it better, and has done it better for longer than anyone else.