* Gov. Pritzker was asked today about a bill passed by the Senate to rescind the state’s longtime moratorium on constructing new nuclear plants. The object is to spur development of small nuke plants…

Over the years, I think the environmental movement has looked at nuclear differently, especially over the last 15 years, than it did prior. Because you talk about nuclear today, you’re not talking about building another Byron plant or Zion as it used to be. Instead, you’re talking about small modular reactors. And that’s something that’s new. They’re small, they are considered much, much safer. There’s something you can really, if you had a million square foot plant for example, you could have your own small modular reactor that’s next to that plant that’s providing all the energy just for that plant.

So you know, banning nuclear entirely in a world where it’s become much safer and these are smaller, less prone to an accident, more likely for us to be able to maintain them for a long period of time. That’s something that’s worthy of consideration.

Now the devil’s in the details and we want to make sure that we’re not just opening this up to nuclear everywhere or any type of nuclear. So, I’ve talked to Sen. Rezin a bit about this and to some of the people who are contemplating sponsoring it in the House, and we will continue that dialogue. I don’t know where that bill will go this session, but I’m not opposed to it as if I’m just dead set against any nuclear. I just want, if we’re going to consider it, it’s got to be safe.

Please pardon all transcription errors.

* The governor was also asked about Misty Buscher’s Springfield mayoral win…

Well, I congratulate her on her victory. I’ve worked with Mayor Langfelder now for the last four years, and we’ve gotten an awful lot done for Springfield together and I know that I’ll work with the new mayor on whatever is best for the city of Springfield. We all spend an awful lot of time here, even if we’re not here full time. And we know that this is a special city. It’s our capital city, it ought to shine for the world. We want to bring tourists and bring the rest of the world to Springfield. And so I’m going to work closely, as I will with the mayors all across the state of Illinois.

* He was also asked about why he thought the move to ban books was gaining steam and where it was coming from…

Well, the extremists are coming after your literature. They’re coming after your libraries, they’re coming after your books under the guise of ‘we’re protecting somebody.’ That’s always the guise under which people end up banning or burning books.

The reality is more information is better. Obviously we all believe in age-appropriate materials. But the reality is our libraries have been able to manage this for years and years and years. And all of a sudden there’s this mythical thing that’s popped up with the far right, that, you know these books are being pushed on people somehow. That’s not what’s happening hasn’t been happening. Just like there’s no CRT in schools. They’ve made that up. K through 12 education has no CRT. In higher ed, there are graduate programs where people are teaching, learning, choosing. These are adults choosing to take courses like that or teach them. But K 12 education, there’s no CRT, just like there is no need for us to take books off the shelves in our libraries. They have been age appropriate for many years, librarians are highly capable of managing that.

* On that topic, he was asked which book had the most impact on him growing up…

You’re gonna look for me to pick Moby Dick or some other major classic. But I’m going to tell you the book that had the most impact on me. My great-grandfather immigrated to this country from Ukraine in 1881. And he was nine years old when he arrived. He had nothing. He sold Chicago Tribunes on a street corner to survive. There was a social service agency that gave him a place to live, a public school that gave him a place to go to school and learn English. And he became a successful lawyer during his lifetime.

He wrote a book near the end of his life, it’s called Three Score after Ten. It’s not on the bookshelves anywhere because it was just written privately by him for our family. And it’s a quite a long tome, but it’s about the history of my family, where we came from, the challenges that our family went through, the the fact that our lives, our family’s lives were threatened, had to escape and become refugees out of Ukraine, and made it to the United States. And it’s one of the reasons I believe in standing up for refugees and helping them resettle when they come to the United States when they’re escaping violence. So that book had an enormous impact on me. I read it when I was 13 years old first, and I’ve probably read it at least five or seven times since. .

* AG Raoul…

Attorney General Kwame Raoul, as part of a coalition of 22 states, urged the Biden administration to scrap dangerous federal rules that allow employers to interfere in the reproductive health decisions of their employees.

The rules, put in place under the prior administration, took away contraceptive coverage from women who should have been entitled to complete coverage under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). They added broad, unreasonable exemptions that allowed nearly all types of employers to deny birth control coverage to their employees based on religious or moral objections.

In a comment letter addressed to U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Acting U.S. Labor Secretary Julie Su, Raoul and the coalition applaud the Biden administration’s proposal to restore access to cost-free contraceptive coverage by rescinding the moral exemption and creating alternate means to cover contraceptive services for individuals whose plan sponsors claim the religious exemption. However, the letter also expresses opposition to the administration’s decision to retain the overly broad religious exemption promulgated in 2018, which is deemed far beyond what is necessary to protect those with religious objections.

“More than 60 million women rely on coverage for preventative services, including contraception, as a fundamental part of their health care plan,” Raoul said. “Access to contraceptive care supports people’s ability to control their reproductive health and promotes access to education, jobs and financial empowerment. Employers do not have the right to stand between their employees and the reproductive health care they need.”

* A bit of housekeeping news…

* Heh…

…Adding… Crain’s…

Gov. J.B. Pritzker appointed five new members to the board of trustees of Northeastern Illinois University, pending confirmation by the Illinois Senate.

The announcement comes after trustees moved to oust president Gloria Gibson amid concerns over the school’s flagging enrollment and abysmal graduation rates. Four of the previous trustees’ terms have expired and another quit in frustration. The board is made up of nine members. […]

As Crain’s previously reported, the faculty last fall issued a vote of no confidence in president Gibson and followed that with another no-confidence vote for the board. By then, the board had acted, deciding not to renew Gibson’s contract that expires June 30. In February, the vice president for enrollment management resigned.

…Adding… US Attorney’s Office…

A federal judge in Chicago held the City of Chicago liable for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act by failing to provide accessible pedestrian signals at signalized intersections throughout the city to those who are blind or have low vision.

In April of 2021, the Justice Department moved to intervene in a disability discrimination lawsuit that people with visual disabilities brought against the City under the ADA and the Rehabilitation Act. The United States’ complaint in intervention alleged that the city fails to provide people who are blind, have low vision or are deaf-blind with equal access to pedestrian signal information at intersections. Pedestrian signal information, such as a flashing “Walk/Don’t Walk” signal, indicates when it is safe to cross the street for sighted pedestrians.

Accessible pedestrian signals (APSs) are devices that provide pedestrians with safe-crossing information in a non-visual format, such as through audible tones, speech messages and vibrotactile surfaces. Since at least 2006, Chicago has recognized the need to install APSs for pedestrians with visual disabilities, specifically identifying the need for such installation in multiple city documents. Yet, while Chicago currently provides sighted pedestrians visual crossing signals at nearly 2,800 intersections, the United States’ suit alleged that — at the time it intervened — fewer than one percent of those were equipped with APSs for people who are blind or have low vision.

On March 31, U.S. District Judge Elaine E. Bucklo sided with the United States and the private plaintiffs in a decision on both sides’ motions for summary judgment, holding the city in violation of the ADA and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. The court found that the city had provided APS at only a “miniscule portion of the whole,” and thus had failed “to provide ‘meaningful access’ to its network of existing facilities and to ensure that newly constructed signals are designed and constructed in such a manner as to be ‘readily accessible’ by blind individuals.”

* Isabel’s roundup…

* NBC Chicago | 1 Firefighter Dead, Another Injured in High-Rise Blaze in Chicago’s Gold Coast: Officials: A Chicago firefighter has died after being “very critically” injured while battling a high-rise blaze in the city’s Gold Coast neighborhood that injured another firefighter Wednesday morning.

* NYT | Chicago Mayor’s Race Could Be a Blueprint for Democratic Messaging on Crime: Mr. Johnson’s victory may be a lesson for other Democrats struggling with the issue under the verbal assault of Republicans. Representative Delia Ramirez, a newly elected progressive Democrat from Chicago’s Northwest Side, was ecstatic. “We’ve had a police department that had been attempting to do the jobs of social workers, counselors, mediators, you name it,” she said. “What we haven’t had is help.”

* Tribune | Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s advice to successor Brandon Johnson: ‘Be humble. Be grateful.’: Later in the day, Lightfoot broke weeks of silence since losing her bid for re-election to address a question about what advice she’d give Johnson when it comes to handling the all-too-frequent call of a first responder death. This time, it was Chicago Fire Department Lt. Jan Tchoryk, 55. “Be humble. Be grateful,” Lightfoot said she would tell her successor. “Our first responders literally give their lives. There’s a lot of rhetoric that’s out there about first responders, particularly on the police side. When you’ve seen what I’ve seen, when you have to make the calls that I’ve had to make, you better be humble, and you better be grateful.”

* The 21st Show | What’s going on in the ComEd trials?: To explain the history of the case and what’s been happening in court, The 21st was joined by a pair of journalists who have been following the story, Dave McKinney and Hannah Meisel.

* KFVS | Carolin Harvey wins election to become first Black mayor of Carbondale: ”I want to say thank you and I would like to say hopefully we all can work together whether you voted for me or not,” Harvey said. “We’re all part of Carbondale and we want to move forward to do what’s best for all of the citizens of Carbondale.”

* Medill Reports | ‘I’m not that scared kid anymore’: Highland Park’s Rachel Jacoby on her path to becoming an anti-gun violence activist: Jacoby, 26, never expected to be on the front line of the anti-gun violence movement. She grew up “Midwestern polite”: She didn’t talk about religion or politics. She hung out with her parents, baked the “best cookies in Highland Park” and competed in soccer, tennis and other sports. But today, she is one of the loudest voices fighting for change and a driving force behind recent groundbreaking gun-reform legislation in Illinois.

* Crain’s | Northwestern, U of C join effort to boost enrollment from rural America: The newly formed STARS College Network is bankrolled by a $20 million gift from Chicago-based Trott Family Philanthropies, the foundation of Byron and Tina Trott. The nationwide effort is designed to empower students to find the best institution for them, whether that be a STARS — Small-Town And Rural Students — member university or not, said James G. Nondorf, STARS co-chair and vice president of enrollment and student advancement at the University of Chicago, in a statement.

* Bloomberg | For-profit colleges ask Supreme Court to block student loan deal: The emergency application, which challenges the Education Department’s authority to cancel so many loans in the accord, bears similarities to a pending Supreme Court fight over President Joe Biden’s plan to slash the student debt of more than 40 million people. The Supreme Court’s handling of the new case could offer hints about the outcome of the bigger fight. The court heard arguments on Biden’s plan Feb. 28 and is scheduled to rule by the end of June.

* State Journal-Register | Cannabis, electric aggregation questions fail; township questions pass: Chatham voters saw two cannabis-related measures on their ballots, one allowing dispensaries to establish businesses and the other permitting growers, cultivation centers, and transporters to operate within the village. […] Before 9 p.m., 100% of the 11 voting precincts had been tallied and the advisory questions failed. Slightly more than 1,500 voters cast their ballots on the questions, where neither levied more than 45% of the voter’s support.

* PJ Star | Fulton County suffers damage from funnel clouds, storms: Illinois Route 100 was closed Tuesday night from Lewistown to the junction with Illinois Route 78 due to multiple power poles and power lines being down, according to the Fulton County Emergency Services and Disaster Agency. Authorities also reported that several people were injured from the storm. The National Weather Service in Lincoln said one funnel cloud was observed near Bryant.

* NPR | Twitter labels NPR’s account as ’state-affiliated media’, which is untrue: NPR operates independently of the U.S. government. And while federal money is important to the overall public media system, NPR gets less than 1% of its annual budget, on average, from federal sources. Noting the millions of listeners who support and rely upon NPR for “independent, fact-based journalism,” NPR CEO John Lansing stated, “NPR stands for freedom of speech and holding the powerful accountable. It is unacceptable for Twitter to label us this way. A vigorous, vibrant free press is essential to the health of our democracy.”

* NFL | Illinois CB Devon Witherspoon runs 4.42-second 40-yard dash at private workout: The 5-foot-11, 181-pound Witherspoon ran 40-yard dash times of 4.46 and 4.42 seconds at his private workout at Illinois, according to NFL Network draft analyst Daniel Jeremiah. Because of a hamstring injury, Witherspoon was unable to work out at all at the NFL Scouting Combine or Illinois’ pro day on March 10.

* Patch | 23 IL Billionaires Make Forbes List Of Richest People In The World: Those on the world’s billionaires list, which includes 23 Illinois residents, aren’t as flush as they were a year ago, but collectively are still worth $12.2 trillion, Forbes said with the release of its annual list.

* Capital B | What Happens When a Black Enclave Is Built by Big Oil: Despite a historic focus on environmental injustices by the Biden administration, ExxonMobil leaders last year cited his administration’s calls for the country’s oil companies to ramp up production as one of the motivators behind completing the project. A recent forecast by the Energy Information Administration found that petrochemical projects ushered in during the first two years of Biden’s administration will not allow the country to reach a 50% drop in domestic greenhouse gas emissions from 2005 levels by 2030 as once targeted by the administration.