Capitol Fax.com - Your Illinois News Radar

Minority drivers in Illinois were pulled over at a disproportionately high rate last year, according to government data released this week, and they were more likely to get a ticket and have their car searched.

An analysis by the Illinois Department of Transportation found that minorities made up 28.5 percent of the driving population but accounted for 31.8 percent of traffic stops in 2005.

After being stopped, 68.7 percent of minority drivers got tickets. Only 59.5 percent of white drivers who were pulled over ended up getting tickets.

Police searches also were more common for minorities. The analysis shows 2.1 percent of minority drivers allowed police to search their car, compared with less than 1 percent of white drivers.

The results, which closely resemble findings released a year ago, are likely to fuel the debate over whether police unfairly target minority drivers, but one official cautioned against jumping to any conclusions before the multiyear study is finished.

Your thoughts?

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Surprise! The deficit still exists

Wednesday, Jul 5, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

The governor constantly trumpets his victory over the state’s deficit, but Dan Hynes disagrees.

Late Friday, Illinois Comptroller Dan Hynes released a report showing the stateâ€™s general deficit hit $3.06 billion at the end of the last fiscal year. Thatâ€™s more than $500 million bigger than the $2.5 billion hole that existed at the end of the previous year.

At the same time, Blagojevichâ€™s administration â€” primarily the Department on Healthcare and Family Services â€” rolled a whopping $3 billion in bills from the last budget into the current one. In the previous year, it put off just $1.35 billion in bills.

Blagojevich spokeswoman Becky Carroll blamed state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, the GOP candidate for governor, for sitting on $200 million in special funds that Blagojevich said he wanted to spend on health care. Carroll said Blagojevich could have turned that into $400 million after federal reimbursements for health care spending.

In other words, Carroll argued that Topinka was responsible for $400 million worth of the deficit jump. â€œThat all would have gone to general revenue,â€ she said.

She also said previous deficits appeared smaller because the state enjoyed short-terms loans at the end of those years and that the figure released Friday defies an â€œapples to apples comparison.â€

Topinka campaign manager Brian McFadden responded that Blagojevich â€œisnâ€™t even in the same area code as the truth.â€

29 Comments

The case of Timothy Walker

Wednesday, Jul 5, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

Timothy Walker was brought into the Department of Employment Security to replace Georgia Brahos as human resources director after Brahos was deemed “unqualified.” Walker was sponsored by Laborers’ Union leader Ed Smith. But Walker apparently tried to run things the right way and immediately ran into trouble, according to the Tribune.

Numerous e-mails corroborate Walker’s account and support the conclusion that he ultimately lost his job over his refusal to favor “connected” candidates, according to a Sept. 9, 2004, report by Zaldwaynaka “Z.” Scott, who served as Blagojevich’s first executive inspector general under a law he championed. […]

The inspector general found that the director hired to run the Employment Services Department by Blagojevich wasn’t given the authority to bring in experienced human resources professionals to make personnel decisions.

“Instead, those who sought to bring a sense of professionalism to the operation were viewed as obstructionist and replaced in their positions with those who would `play ball,’” Scott said. […]

The report said Walker immediately ran into stiff resistance from two subordinates, George Rada and Surami “Sudi” Garcia, who “consistently pressured” Walker to hire their friends and candidates from Cini’s office, the investigation found. […]

But Walker said political clout trumped qualifications, and his attempts to promote people or make new hires were constantly obstructed.

And the three people who gave Walker the most trouble about hiring politically connected people, George Rada, Elizabeth Nicholson and Surami “Sudi” Garcia, all avoided being fired, as the Inspector General had recommended. They even avoided discipline.

Walker was fired on an apparently trumped up charge. He was eventually awarded unemployment compensation after the state ruled that his actions were not misconduct. But that didn’t stop the governor’s office from labeling him as a disgruntled former employee with an axe to grind.

21 Comments

Guv heckled

Wednesday, Jul 5, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

This sort of thing happens a lot at parades, but usually with down-ballot candidates.

Although Blagojevich received some shouts of support from Democrats at the parades he attended, the crowds in heavily Republican suburbs threw barbs his way.

“Hey! Who can I pay to get a job?” one man yelled at Blagojevich in Wheaton.

Another man shouted, “How much for a job there? Hey! How much for a job?”

This, however, is unusual.

Some bystanders in heavily Republican DuPage County rebuffed him, pulling back their hands.

Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t remember anyone doing that with George Ryan.

UPDATE: And this is from ABC7:

As the governor moved on, there came from the crowd the line — the feds are coming — a reference to the ongoing U-S Attorney’s investigation into hiring practices by the Blagojevich administration.

49 Comments

No objection to Scheurer, but Greens get one

Wednesday, Jul 5, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

According to the State Board of Elections’ website, nobody filed any objections to third party candidate Bill Scheurer’s deficient petitions by Monday’s official deadline, so it looks like he’ll stay on the 8th Congressional District ballot against Melissa Bean and David McSweeney after all.

The Green Party had no such luck.

Democrats wasted no time counterattacking after the Illinois Green Party - seen as potential spoilers - filed petitions to put candidates for Illinois’ top offices on the November ballot.

When Rich Whitney, the Green gubernatorial candidate, turned in his petition signatures last week, Michael Kasper, an attorney for the state Democratic Party, immediately ordered a copy so volunteers and staff could go to work. They spent much of last week hunched over state Board of Election computers comparing Whitney’s 19-inch-thick petition to voter registration records in hopes of finding invalid signatures.

On Monday, after slogging through hundreds of pages, Democratic operatives formally filed an objection to Whitney’s candidacy. The 51-year-old Carbondale attorney is a target because conventional political wisdom says he would siphon votes from Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who already faces a tough re-election challenge from state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, a moderate Republican.

The Republicans also filed objections to the Constitution Party candidates.

Use this as an open thread to discuss the Green’s chances.

13 Comments

Happy Independence Day!

Tuesday, Jul 4, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

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Not enough?

Monday, Jul 3, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

I told Capitol Fax readers that this would happen last week.

Gay marriage opponents have hit a hurdle in their efforts to get a measure on the November ballot because they don’t appear to have enough valid signatures, a state Board of Elections spokesman said Monday.

A check of 64,000 signatures — a sample of the more 330,000-plus submitted — did not find enough registered voters to put a measure on the ballot that would ask voters if the state should amend its constitution to ban same-sex marriage, said elections board spokesman Dan White.

The requirement is that 95 percent of signatures be valid and they had 91 percent, White said.

Still, the measure can make it to the ballot because supporters can appeal the findings of the board’s review, which they plan to do, said Peter LaBarbera, executive director of a conservative group pushing to get the gay marriage advisory referendum on the Illinois ballot.

UPDATE: Cal has more at Illinoize.

UNRELATED UPDATE: I’ve changed the Congressional news feed (scroll way down, on right) by deleting Denny Hastert, Barack Obama and Dick Durbin. The previous feed was pulling up way too many national stories. It’s a lot more localized now. I’ve also added both candidates in the state’s only open seat race, Peter Roskam and Tammy Duckworth.

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You ~~don’t~~ need to know

Monday, Jul 3, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

Â· My syndicated newspaper column this week was written before Friday’s hullabaloo over Patrick Fitzgerald’s letter.

Should citizens of this state have a right to know whether their governor and his administration are under criminal investigation?

According to the governor, the answer is “no.”

Â· The Tribune has set up a new page solely for Blagojevich investigation/corruption stories.

Â· And because it’s been pushed so far down the page, here is that special Google news feed I put together which searches for Fitzgerald, Blagojevich and Madigan.

And here is the Illinoize feed.

Â· Finally, don’t forget about your July 4th present!

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Wow

Sunday, Jul 2, 2006 - Posted by Rich Miller

Here are quotes from former Inspector General “Z” Scott that were published in today’s Tribune article about the leaked report.

The investigation concluded “the governor’s office improperly exercised a great deal, if not all, control over the hiring” at the Illinois Department of Employment Security since shortly after the Democratic governor took office in January 2003.

“This effort reflects not merely an ignorance of the law, but complete and utter contempt for the law” […]

“Evidence shows non-compliance with state hiring laws… In fact, it reveals a concerted effort to subvert the laws including veterans’ preference and the hiring process” […]

“This administration has made many public statements critical of the way in which those seeking political gains have compromised systems. We urge a similar response to the issues raised in this report” […]

“The evidence supports the conclusion that the real machine driving hiring decisions in the IDES HR department was the Governor’s Office of Intergovernmental Affairs rather than any professional management team in place in the agency.” […]

The inspector general recommended that six employees at Employment Security be disciplined, “up to and including discharge for unethical and fraudulent activity.” Three of those employees are still working for the department, including one who has been promoted since the report to become deputy director of administration. […]

“this sampling may not represent the entirety of the illegalities in hiring at IDES.”

The Trib ought to post the whole report online.

The accompanying editorial isn’t kind.

On Friday, the governor’s office asserted that there were “some bad apples who violated the rules” among the officials who were hired to run state government after Blagojevich took office in 2003. “The systems we put in place in our first year helped ferret out this wrongdoing.” That’s hard to square with the disclosure in Sunday’s Tribune that in 2004, Blagojevich’s own inspector general said the involvement of the governor’s patronage office in state hiring reflected “not merely an ignorance of the law, but complete and utter contempt for the law.”

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