Illinois House Republican Leader Jim Durkin released the following statement on the U.S. Attorney’s announcement of indictments against Speaker Madigan’s allies including Mike McClain, Anne Pramaggiore, John Hooker and Jay Doherty:
“Today’s news makes it abundantly clear that the Democratic Party of Illinois, chaired and controlled by Speaker Madigan also known as Public Official A, is a corrupt organization that has run its course. For the past many months and years, Madigan’s apologists from the Governor to the rank-and-file House Democrats have turned a blind eye to his corrupt practices. Speaker Madigan and his long list of defenders need to be removed from power, and that starts with Chairman Welch reconvening the Special Investigating Committee immediately.”
JUST IN: @RayLong just got the exclusive react from Mike McClain's lawyer, the charges were “the result of a misguided investigation and misapplication of the law driven by an obvious desire to find some way to criminally implicate” Speaker Madigan.
The goal, according to Cotter, was the apply “maximum pressure on Mike McClain” in order to get to Madigan, something he is unwilling to help with. “Mike McClain cannot agree to allegations that are untrue, even to escape the crippling weight of the government’s attacks."
"After enduring months of baseless innuendo and misinformation, Pramaggiore … is confident a review will reaffirm her unwavering adherence to the highest ethical standards and finally put to rest the damaging speculation that any actions she took constitute illegal activity."
From Jay Doherty's attorneys, Mike Gillespie and Gabrielle Sansonetti: "Mr. Doherty was just made aware that he’s been indicted. He intends to plead not guilty because he is not guilty of these charges."
*** UPDATE *** Here’s the full McClain statement from Pat Cotter…
During his career of more than 50 years, Mike McClain has served the people of the State of Illinois both as a public servant and an advocate. He is an honest and honorable man – as everyone who has worked with him well knows.
The charges filed today by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois are the result of a misguided investigation and misapplication of the law, driven by an obvious desire to find some way to criminally implicate a current elected official, who happens to be Mike McClain’s longtime friend.
In its zeal to find any evidence of criminal misconduct by that official, the Government is attempting to rewrite the law on bribery and criminalize long-recognized legitimate, common, and normal lobbying activity into some new form of crime. The goal of these meritless charges is clear: to apply maximum pressure on Mike McClain, and others, to help the Government in its efforts against his friend. But Mike McClain cannot agree to allegations that are untrue, even to escape the crippling weight of the Government’s attacks.
Mike McClain absolutely denies that he has committed any crime, and he will fight these charges as long as it takes, and as long as his age and health allow, to restore his well-earned honest and honorable reputation.
Former Commonwealth Edison executives, including the former Chief Executive Officer, conspired with outside consultants to corruptly influence and reward a high-level elected official for the State of Illinois to assist with the passage of legislation favorable to the electric utility company, according to an indictment returned today in U.S. District Court in Chicago.
The indictment charges four individuals with bribery conspiracy, bribery, and willfully falsifying ComEd books and records:
· MICHAEL McCLAIN, 73, of Quincy, Ill. McClain worked as a lobbyist and/or consultant for ComEd after serving in the Illinois House of Representatives in the 1970s and early 1980s.
· ANNE PRAMAGGIORE, 62, of Barrington, Ill. Pramaggiore was CEO of ComEd from 2012 to 2018, and later served as a senior executive at an affiliate of Exelon Corp., of which ComEd was a subsidiary.
· JOHN HOOKER, 71, of Chicago, Ill. Hooker served as ComEd’s executive vice president of legislative and external affairs from 2009 to 2012, after which he worked as an external lobbyist for ComEd.
· JAY DOHERTY, 67, of Chicago, Ill. Doherty owned Jay D. Doherty & Associates, which performed consulting services for ComEd from approximately 2011 to 2019.
Arraignments in federal court in Chicago have not yet been scheduled.
The indictment was announced by John R. Lausch, Jr., United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; Emmerson Buie, Jr., Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago Field Office of the FBI; and Tamera Cantu, Acting Special Agent-in-Charge of the IRS Criminal Investigation Division in Chicago. The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Amarjeet S. Bhachu, Diane MacArthur, Timothy J. Chapman, Sarah E. Streicker, Matthew L. Kutcher, and Michelle Kramer.
According to the charges, the defendants’ efforts to influence and reward the high-level elected official – identified in the indictment as “Public Official A” – began in or around 2011 and continued through in or around 2019. During that time, Public Official A controlled what measures were called for a vote in the Illinois House of Representatives and exerted substantial influence over fellow lawmakers concerning legislation affecting ComEd, the indictment states. The charges allege that the defendants conspired to corruptly influence and reward Public Official A by arranging for jobs and contracts for Public Official A’s political allies and workers, even in instances where those people performed little or no work that ComEd purportedly hired them to perform. The defendants allegedly created and caused the creation of false contracts, invoices, and other books and records to disguise the true nature of some of the payments and to circumvent internal controls at ComEd.
In addition to the jobs and contracts, the indictment alleges that the defendants undertook other efforts to influence and reward Public Official A, including causing ComEd to retain a particular outside law firm favored by Public Official A and to accept into ComEd’s internship program a certain amount of students who resided in the Chicago ward associated with Public Official A. Pramaggiore and McClain also allegedly took steps to have an individual appointed to ComEd’s Board of Directors at the request of Public Official A and McClain, the indictment states.
The public is reminded that an indictment is not evidence of guilt. The defendants are presumed innocent and entitled to a fair trial at which the government has the burden of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. If convicted, the Court must impose reasonable sentences under federal statutes and the advisory U.S. Sentencing Guidelines.
An ex-powerful Springfield lobbyist and confidant of House Speaker Michael Madigan has been charged with bribery in a criminal case in Chicago, along with the former ComEd CEO, a top ComEd lobbyist and the ex-head of the City Club.
Named in the indictment are Michael McClain, Anne Pramaggiore, John Hooker and Jay Doherty.
More…
The indictment also alleges the four falsified ComEd's books and records. And here it says they referred to Public Official A — known to be House Speaker Michael Madigan — as "our Friend" or "a Friend of ours" rather than use his true name. pic.twitter.com/2yMveTnGRB
corruptly solicit and demand, and to accept and agree to accept from another person things of value, namely, jobs, contracts, and monetary payments associated with those jobs and contracts, for the benefit of Public Official A and his associates, intending that Public Offlcial A, an agent of the State of Illinois, be influenced and rewarded in connection with any business, transaction, and series of transactions of the State of Illinois involving things of value of $5,000 or more, namely, legislation affecting ComEd and its business, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 666(aX1)(B);
to corruptly give, offer, and agree to give things of valu6, nameiy, jobs, contracts, and monetary pa;rments associated with those jobs and contracts, for the benefit of Public Offlcia] A and his associates, with intent to influence and reward Public Official A, as an agent of the State of Illinois, in connection with any business, transaction, and series of transactions of the State of Illinois involving things of value of $5,000 or more, namely, legislation affecting ComEd and its business, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 666(a)(2); and
knowingly and willfully to circumvent a system of internal accounting controls and to falsify any book, record, and account of Exelon and ComEd, in violation of Title 15, United States Code, Sections 78m(bX5) and 78ff(a).
It was part of the consplvacy that, for the purpose of influeneing and rewarding Pubiic Official A in connection with his offrcial duties as Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives, and to assist ComEd with respect to the passage of legislation favorable to ComEd and its business and the defeat of legislation unfavorabie to ComEd and its business, the conspirators (i) anranged for various associates of Public Official A, including Public Official A’s political allies and individuals who performed political work for Public Official A, to obtain jobs, contracts, and monetary payments associated with those jobs and contracts from ComEd and its affiliates, even in instances where such associates performed little or no work that they were purportedly hired to perform for ComEd; and (ii) created and caused the creation of false contracts, invoices and other books and records to disguise the true nature of certain of the payments and to circumvent internal controls.
* And then there are specific instances. Here are some headlines with a little context…
Hiring of Publie Official A’s Associates as Vendor “Subeontraetors” Who Performed Little or No Work for ComEd
Public Official A and McCLAIN sought to obtain from ComEd jobs, vendor contracts and subcontracts, as well as monetary payments for various associates of Public Official A, including Public Official A’s political allies and individuals who performed political work for Public Official A, such as ward precinct captains who worked within Public Offieial A’s district.
Retention of Law Firm A
[Appears to be Victor Reyes’ law firm which got its hours cut]
Thirteenth Ward Interns
It was further part of the conspiracy that potential Thirteenth Ward interas identified by McCLAIN did not need to compete against the general intern applicant pool, and instead, received more favorable treatment when it came to assessing their qualifications for a position within the ComEd Internship Program. … It was further part of the conspiracy that ComEd’s minimum academic requirements for intern candidates, such as a minimum required grade point average, were waived at times for certain Thirteenth Ward intern candidates who did not meet those requirements.
Apoointment to ComEd Board
[Juan Ochoa]
Hiring of Other Individuals
It was further part of the conspiracy that, in order to conceal the nature and purpose of their conduct, conspirators often referred to Public Offlcial A as “our Friend,” or “a Friend of ours,” rather than using Public Official A’s true name.
* “Overt Acts”…
On or about each date set forth below, defendants caused payments to be made to [Jay D. Doherty & Associates] in the approximate amount set forth below, with a substantial portion of each payment intended for associates of Public Official A […]
On or about each date set forth below, defendant DOHERTY caused a check to be made to [the Alderman for the Thirteenth Ward from in or around 1994 until on or about Aprii 30, 2011] in the approximate amount set forth below, for payments totaling approximately $256,000 […]
On or about each date set forth below, defendant DOHERTY caused a check to be made to Individual 13W-2’s [13th Ward precinct captain] company in the approximate amount set forth below, for payments totaling approximately $325,000 […]
On or about each date set forth below, defendant DOHERTY caused a check to be made to Individual 13W-3 [13th Ward precinct captain] in the approximate amount set forth below, for payments totaling approximately $144,000 […]
On or about February 25, 2015,McCLAIN sent an email to Marquez, in which he wrote, “Our Friend’s ward? Summer interns? 10 jobs or 12 or what is the ceiling? Best, Mike.”
On or about April 2, 2015, in response to an email asking whether there was pressure to hire a prospective intern associated with the Thirteenth Ward, or whether the intern could simply be “fairly considered” for the ComEd Internship Program, Marquez wrote an email that said, “There is pressure to hire Hope she interviews well.”
On or about April 29, 2015, Marqaez forwarded an email to MeCLAIN, advising that a candidate McCLAIN had referred to ComEd for the ComEd Internship Program had been hired.
On or about January 20, 2076, McCLAIN wrote an email to PRAMAGGIORE and HOOKER that said the following: “I am sure you know how valuable [Lawyer A] is to our Friend,” and then went on to write, “I know the drill and so do you. If you do not get involve [sic] and resolve this issue of 850 hours for his law firm per year then he wilI go to our Friend. Our Friend will cail me and then I will call you. Is this a drill we must go through? For me, Hook and I am sure you I just do not understand why we have to spend valuable minutes on items like this when we know it will provoke a reaction from our Friend.”
On or about January 20,2016, PRAMAGGIORE wrote an email to McCLAIN, in response to the email referenced in paragraph 28(h) and responded, “Sorry. No one informed me. I am on this.”
On or about January 20, 2016, PRAMAGGIORE forwarded the email referenced in paragraph 28(h) to Marquez.
On or about January 20,2016, PRAMAGGIORE forwarded the email referenced in paragraph 28(h) to an employee in ComEd’s legal department.
On or about February 25, 2016, McCLAIN wrote an emaii to Marquez, in which McCLAIN advised that “the 13th Ward may not want these people in their column,” in reference to ComEd counting interns that returned to the ComEd Internship Program against the number of spaces allotted to individuals from the Thirteenth Ward.
On or about April 15,2016, McCLAIN wrote an email to ComEd’s project manager for FEJA with the subject heading, “[Lawyer A] law firm?!”
On or about May 22,2016, the project manager for FEJA wrote an email to a member of ComEd’s legal department that asked, in reference to Law Firm A, “Are we closed out on this topic?”
On or about May 24,2016, McCLAIN wrote an email to a member of ComEd’s legal department, HOOKER, and the project manager for FEJA, in which MeCLAIN proposed terms for the renewal of Law Firm A’s contract with ComEd.
On or about December 2, 20L6, McCLAIN wrote an email to a member of ComEd’s legal department, in which McCLAIN followed up on a prior email concerning Law Firm A, and asked “After you catch a couple of good nights [sic] sleep can we put this item to bed?”
On or about December 3,2016, PRAMAGGIORE sent an email to McCLAIN in which she assured McCLAIN that she would resolve outstanding issues relating to Law Firm A’s contract, by noting, “Fidel and I are meeting on Monday to make our list. This will be on it.”
In or around January 2017, in connection with the renewal of JDDA’s contract, PRAMAGGIORE signed a false and misleading document, known as a “Single Source Justification,” in support of the renewal of JDDA’s [Doherty’s] contract and caused it to be submitted to Exelon Business Services. This Single Source Justification form made it falsely appear that the large amount of money to be paid to JDDA under the contract was on account of, among other things, JDDA’s “unique insight & perspective to promote ComEd and its business matters to further develop, execute and manage its Government Relations presence” and did not indicate that a substantial amount of the fees that would be paid to JDDA was intended for third parties in an effort to influence and reward Public Official A.
On or about February 9, 2017, McCLAIN sent an email to Marquez’s assistant, in which McCLAIN wrote that it was his understanding that the Thirteenth Ward would be provided ten positions in the ComEd Internship Program: “[F]or as long as I can remember it has been ten interns??”
On or about February L2,2018, Marquez caused an email to be sent by his assistant to McCLAIN, in which the assistant wrote, “Confirmed with Fidel we will work to provide you 10 slots.”
On or about May 2,2018, McCLAIN placed a call to Public Official A, and advised Public Official A that PRAMAGGIORE was experiencing push-back to the appointment of Individual BM-1 to the ComEd board of directors, and had proposed finding a job that would pay Individual BM-1 the same amount of money as a board member. [Emphasis added because this seems to be new.]
On or about May 16, 2018, McCLAIN placed a telephone call to PRAMAGGIORE, during which call PRAMAGGIORE advised McCLAIN that (i) she had instructed Marquez to “hire” Individual2SW-1 after checking with DOHERTY; and (ii) she would, at Public Official A’s request, “keep pressing” to appoint Individual BM-1 to the ComEd board of directors.
On or about May 16, 2018, McCLAIN placed a telephone call to Marquez, during which McCLAIN explained why certain individuals were being paid indirectly through JDDA, by making reference to their utility to Public Official A’s political operation, and advised Marquez that Individual23W-1 should be paid $5,000 a month.
On or about June 29, 2018, DOHERTY caused an email to be sent to a ComEd employee, which made it falsely appear that the justification for an additional $5,000 a month sought underJDDA’s revised contract was because JDDA would assume an “expanded role with Cook County Board President’s office and Cook County Commissioners and Department Heads,” when in fact the additional $5,000 a month in compensation sought was intended for pa;rment to Individual 23W-1, who performed little or no work forJDDA or ComEd.
On or about September 7,2018, MeCLAIN and PRAMAGGIORE parbicipated in a telephone call, during which PRAMAGGIORE assured McCLAIN that PRAMAGGIORE was continuing to advocate for the appointment of Individual BM-1 to ComEd’s board of directors and explained “You take good care of me and so does our friend and I witl do the best that I can to, to take care of you.”
On or about December 6,2018, McCLAIN sent an email to Marquez and others at ComEd, in which McCLAIN advised, in reference to the ComEd Internship Program, “f am pretty sure the ‘ask’ will be to ‘put aside’ or’save’ ten summer jobs for the 13th Ward.”
On or about January 29, 20L9, HOOKER traveled to the Union League Club, in Chicago, Illinois for the purpose of meeting with Marquez to discuss the renewal of the JDDA contract.
On or about February 7,2019, McCLAIN traveled to a restaurant in Springfield, Illinois, for the purpose of meeting with Marquez to discuss the renewal of the JDDA contract.
On or about February 13,2019, DOHERTY met with Marquez in Chicago, Illinois, and discussed how to present information to ComEd’s chief executive officer concerning the renewal of the JDDA contract.
On or about February 18,2019, PRAMAGGIORE participated in a telephone call with Marquez, during which call, afber she was told that the subcontractors associated with DOHERTY just “collect a check” and that Marquez needed to brief the chief executive officer of ComEd coneerning the JDDA contract, PRAMAGGIORE advised Marquez not to make any changes to the contract, because “we do not want to get caught up in a, you know, disruptive battle where, you know, somebody gets their nose out of joint and we’re tryrng to move somebody off, and then we get forced to give ‘em a five-year contract because we’re in the middle of needing to get something done in Springfield.”
In or around March 2019, in connection with the renewal of JDDA’s contract, the defendants caused the preparation of a false and misleading document, known as a “Single Source Justification,” in support of the renewal of JDDA’s contract, and the submission of this form to Exelon Business Services. This Single Source Justification form made it falsely appear that the large amount of money to be paid to JDDA was because, among other things, “Consultant has specific knowledge that cannot be sources [sic] from another supplier/contractor,” and did not indicate that a substantial amount of the fees that would be paid to JDDA was intended for third parties in an effort to influence and reward Public Official A.
On or about March 5,2079,McCLAIN met with a ComEd executive and Marquezfor the purpose of explaining why the JDDA contract and the payments to Individual 13W-1, Individual 13W-2, and Individual 23W-1 should be continued for another year.
On or about March 17,2019, DOHERTY caused a representative from Exelon Business Services to execute a contract containing false representations and promises that the compensation paid to JDDA was in return for providing ComEd with advice on legislative issues, when in fact a significant portion of the compensation to be paid to JDDA was intended for Individual 13W-1, Individual 13W-2, and Individual 23W- 1 [former Ald. Zalewski], who in fact did little or no legitimate work for ComEd.
On or about April }I,?}L},PRAMAGGIORE advised McCLAIN by text message, “Just sent out Board approval to appoint [Individual BM-l] to ComEd Board.”
On or about April 26,2019, ComEd filed a notice with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission stating that Individual BM-1 had served as a director of ComEd since April2019.
All in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 371and2.
* Count 2…
MICHAEL McCLAIN, and ANNE PRAMAGGIORE, defendants herein, corruptly offered and agreed to give a thing of value, and caused ComEd to offer and agree to give a thing of value, namely, a contract for Law Firm A and monetary payments associated with that contract, for the benefit of Public Offrcial A and his associate, Lawyer A, with intent to influence and reward Pubtic Official A, as an agent of the State of Illinois, in connection with any business, transaction, and series of transactions of the State of Illinois involving a thing of value of $5,000 or more, namely, legislation affecting ComEd and its business;
In violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 666(a)(2) and2
* Count 3…
MICHAEL MCCLAIN, ANNE PRAMAGGIORE JOHN HOOKER, and
JAY DOHERTY, defendants herein, knowingly and willfully falsified and caused to be falsified certain ComEd and Exelon books, records, and accounts, so that those books, records, and accounts did not in reasonable detail, accurately and fairly reflect the transactions and dispositions of ComEd’s and Exelon’s assets, namely, in connection with the renewal of
JDDA’s contract for 2077;
In violation of Title 15, United States Code, Sections 78m(bX5) and 78ff(a), and
Title L8, United States Code, Section 2.
* Count 4…
MICHAEL MCCLAIN, ANNE PRAMAGGIORE, JOHN HOOKER, and JAY DOHERTY, defendants herein, knowingly and willfuIly falsified and caused to be falsified certain ComEd and Exelon books, records, and accounts, so that those books, records, and accounts did not in reasonable detail, accurately and fairly reflect the transactions and dispositions of ComEd’s and Exelon’s assets, namely, in eonnection with the renewal of JDDA’s contract for 2018;
In violation of Title 15, United States Code, Sections 78m(b)(5) and 78ff(a), and Title 18, United States Code, Section 2.
* Count 5…
MICHAEL McCLAIN, and ANNE PRAMAGGIORE, defendants herein, corruptly offered and agreed to give a thing of value, and caused ComEd and Exelon to offer and agree to give a thing of value, namely, a position on the ComEd board of directors and monetary payments associated with that position, for the benefit of Public Official A and his associate, Individual BM-1, with intent to influence and reward Public Official A, as an agent of the State of Illinois, in connection with any business, transaction, and series of transactions of the State of Illinois involving a thing of value of $5,000 or more, namely,legislation affecting ComEd and its business;
In violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 666(aX2) and2.
* Count 6…
MICHAEL McCLAIN, and ANNE PRAMAGGIORE, defendants herein, corruptly offered and agreed to give a thing of value, and caused ComEd to offer and agree to give a thing of value, namely, payments of $5,000 a month, for the benefit of Public Official A and his associate, Individual 23W-1, with intent to influence and reward Public Offrcial A, as an agent of the State of Illinois, in connection with any business, transaction, and series of transactions of the State of Illinois involving a thing of value of $5,000 or more, namely,Iegislation affecting ComEd and its business;
In violation of Title 18, united states code, sections 666(aX2) and2.
* Count 7…
MICHAEL MCCLAIN, ANNE PRAMAGGIORE, JOHN HOOKER, and JAY DOHERTY, defendants herein, knowingiy and willfully falsified and caused to be falsified certain ComEd and Exelon books, records, and accounts, so that those books, records, and accounts did not in reasonable detail, accurately and fairly reflect the transactions and dispositions of ComEd’s and Exelon’s assets, namely, in connection with the amendment of JDDA’s contract for 2018;
In violation of Title 15, United States Code, Sections 78m(b)(5) and 78ff(a), and Title 18, United States Code, Section 2.
* Count 8…
MICHAEL MCCLAIN, ANNE PRAMAGGIORE, JOHN HOOKER, and JAY DOHERTY, defendants herein, corruptly offered and agreed to give a thing of value, and caused ComEd to offer and agree to give a thing of value, namely, a new annual contract for JDDA and monetary payments associated with that contract, for the benefrt of Public Official A and his associates, Individuai 13W-1, Individual 13W-2, and Individual2SW-1, with intent to influence and reward Public Offlcial A, as an agent of the State of Illinois, in connection with any business, transaction, and series of transactions of the State of Illinois involving a thing of value of $5,000 or more, namely,legislation affecting ComEd and its business;
In violation of Title 18, united states code, sections 666(a)(2) and}.
* Count 9…
MICHAEL MCCLAIN, ANNE PRAMAGGIORE, JOHN HOOKER, and JAY DOHERTY, defendants herein, knowingly and willfully falsified and caused to be falsified certain ComEd and Exelon books, records, and accounts, so that those books, records, and accounts did not in reasonable detail, accurately and fairly reflect the transactions and dispositions of ComEd’s and Exelon’s assets, namely, in connection with the renewal of JDDA’s contract for 2019;
In violation of Title 15, United States Code, Sections 78m(b)(5) and 78ff(a), and Title 18, United States Code, Section 2.
In Chicago, 18th Ward Republican precinct committeeman Devin Jones said on election day he saw improper handling of ballots, poll workers trying to change ballots and Dominion machine malfunctions.
“They had ballots all over the place,” Jones said in an interview. “They had ballots on the desk where people checked in, they were eating chicken with the ballots sitting right there. They had ballots on a chair, under someone’s coat.”
“At this one particular precinct they were trying to redo the ballot, like remake the ballot [after someone left], which is not the proper process,” Jones said.
“I know we use Dominion in Chicago and I know that at more than half the predictions there were issues with the counter, the machine that you slide the ballots in which is how these people were able to have all these ballots laying around at different places,” Jones said. “A lot of the stuff I saw was these counter machines not working.”
Jones said he reported his findings to authorities but says he never got any follow up.
* I checked with the Chicago Board of Elections’ Jim Allen and asked if the report had actually been made…
No such complaint was filed with the Board. The Board keeps a database of all calls received on Election Day. Not one even resembles these allegations.
This did not happen and here’s why:
The ballot scanner captures an image of each ballot at the time the ballot is cast by the voter.
If anyone were to try to “remake” ballots after voters left or make additional ballots, that would not erase the original scanned images of the voters’ ballots. Instead, it would add scanned images and votes — and then create a discrepancy between the number of ballots cast and the applications for ballots (both paper and electronic poll book).
No such discrepancy occurred.
Further, that kind of a discrepancy would stand out like a sore thumb even more so this election, because more than two-thirds of the ballots in Chicago were cast before Election Day via Early Voting and Vote By Mail — and less than one third were cast in the precincts on Election Day. As detailed in the attached turnout report, that pattern held true in the 18th Ward. The turnouts in the 18th Ward also were comparable to turnouts in surrounding wards and the rest of the city.
The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) today reported 8,922 new confirmed and probable cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Illinois, including 140 additional deaths.
- Adams County: 1 male 90s
- Bureau County: 1 female 90s
- Champaign County: 1 female 100+
- Clinton County: 1 male 70s, 1 female 90s, 1 male 90s
- Coles County: 1 male 90s
- Cook County: 2 males 30s, 1 female 40s, 2 males 40s, 2 females 50s, 4 males 50s, 7 females 60s, 13 males 60s, 10 females 70s, 9 males 70s, 6 females 80s, 13 males 80s, 6 females 90s, 4 males 90s, 1 male 100+
- DeWitt County: 1 female 90s
- DuPage County: 1 female 60s, 2 males 60s, 1 male 70s, 2 males 80s, 2 males 90s
- Effingham County: 1 male 90s
- Fayette County: 1 male 80s
- Franklin County: 1 male 90s
- Greene County: 1 male 90s
- Jackson County: 1 male 70s
- Kendall County: 1 female 50s, 1 male 90s
- Knox County: 1 female 90s
- Lake County: 1 male 90s
- LaSalle County: 1 male 70s, 1 female 80s, 3 males 80s, 1 female 90s
- Livingston County: 1 male 60s
- Logan County: 1 male 80s
- Macon County: 1 male 50s, 1 female 90s
- McDonough County: 1 female 80s, 1 male 90s
- McHenry County: 1 male 70s, 2 females 90s
- Ogle County: 1 male 50s, 1 female 90s
- Peoria County: 2 females 80s
- Sangamon County: 1 male 80s
- St. Clair County: 1 female 70s
- Stephenson County: 1 female 80s
- Tazewell County: 1 male 90s
- Vermilion County: 1 male 70s
- Warren County: 1 female 80s
- Wayne County: 1 male 90s
- Whiteside County: 1 male 70s, 1 female 80s, 1 male 90s
- Will County: 1 male 70s, 1 male 80s, 1 female 90s
- Williamson County: 1 male 70s
- Winnebago County: 1 female 60s, 1 female 80s
Currently, IDPH is reporting a total of 606,771 cases, including 11,014 deaths, in 102 counties in Illinois. The age of cases ranges from younger than one to older than 100 years. Within the past 24 hours, laboratories have reported 103,569 specimens for a total 9,359,227. As of last night, 5,953 in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 1,146 patients were in the ICU and 547 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators.
The preliminary seven-day statewide positivity for cases as a percent of total test from November 11 – November 17, 2020 is 11.9%. The preliminary seven-day statewide test positivity from November 11 – November 17, 2020 is 14.2%.
*All data are provisional and will change. In order to rapidly report COVID-19 information to the public, data are being reported in real-time. Information is constantly being entered into an electronic system and the number of cases and deaths can change as additional information is gathered. Information for a death previously reported has changed, therefore, today’s numbers have been adjusted. For health questions about COVID-19, call the hotline at 1-800-889-3931 or email dph.sick@illinois.gov.
* Today would’ve been Steve Schnorf’s 76th birthday. I never met anybody who knew more about the operation of state government than Steve. Man, we could use a man like that today.
He was also incredibly kind-hearted and took great pride in mentoring young people.
I met a lady on a plane last year who told me a great Schnorf story. She was working at a Springfield hotel many years ago and Schnorf was a guest. On one particularly cold day, Schnorf walked out to his car then returned to the lobby and asked the manager if he could get some help starting his car. His battery was dead and he needed a jump. The manager gruffly refused, but the woman behind the counter (the lady I met on the plane) said she’d lend a hand.
They got Schnorf’s car started and he drove off. The lady said she was a bit miffed that he didn’t even thank her.
Later, Schnorf approached the same lady and asked if she liked her job at the hotel. Oh, yes, she said. She loved her job. Schnorf then asked if she’d like to work at the secretary of state’s office (he was a Jim Edgar bigwig at the time). She said yes, and he set her up with a gig and she worked for him the rest of his time in government.
She told me she eventually asked Schnorf why he offered her a job. He said something along the lines of: “If you could enjoy working for that [expletive deleted] manager, I figured you’d do fine working for me.”
* I think of Steve almost every single day. Oscar loved him, too. From 2016…
I’m asking for help for my good friend Mbanna Kantako who lost EVERYTHING he owns due to a house fire. He is an amazing friend, father, uncle, brother and much more. He is a positive role model in the community. He has given back over and over again. He started better life better living for kids a non-profit organization that did tons of stuff for the children in our community. He also organized a clean up the east side project amongst many others. Now he needs you! He has worked very hard to put himself through school in which he earned a masters degree. He has a 1 year old son and a baby due any day. He lost EVERYTHING. Please donate to help this wonderful man any amount will help. He has to start all over with nothing but the clothes on his back! LET’S SHOW HIM SOME OF THE LOVE HE SHOWS EVERYONE ELSE
Mbanna is Sen. Emil Jones III’s legislative assistant. He could really use your help, so let’s do what we always do here and help him and his family recover from this. Please, click here.
With the coronavirus spreading uncontrolled across nearly the entire country, many public health experts are urging Americans to cancel their Thanksgiving gathering plans.
But not everyone is taking this advice to heart: Roughly 40 percent plan to attend a Thanksgiving gathering with 10 or more people, according to a recent survey commissioned by Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center.
Peer-reviewed risk assessment data produced by researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology suggests that many of those big events may become coronavirus super-spreaders. Drawing on public data sets, the Covid-19 Event Risk Assessment Planning Tool produces daily county-level estimates of the odds of encountering at least one coronavirus-positive person at a gathering of 10 or more people.
There is no scientific data that supports lower occupancy limits or for keeping restaurants closed to indoor dining.
Joe, the more people who are in an enclosed space, the more likely it is that somebody will catch a virus - any virus, not just COVID-19. It’s not just science, it’s simple common sense, man.
On the same day local enforcement began of COVID-19 mitigations aimed at bars and restaurants, the Sangamon County Department of Public Health released contact tracing data Friday showing where people who tested positive for COVID-19 and their close contacts had been the two weeks prior to the positive test.
A Highland, Illinois attorney who has been giving Governor J.B. Pritzker grief with multiple lawsuits around the state appeared in Jacksonville last night at Bogart’s Banquet Hall to explain to bar & restaurant owners their rights according to their businesses and the state’s ability or inability to close them under current executive orders. There were approximately 70 people in attendance from Morgan, Cass, Greene, Sangamon, and Macon counties – many of whom were bar & restaurant owners. […]
DeVore said near the end of the presentation that bars and restaurant owners should stay open whether ticketed or not and continue moving forward. He implored businesses to not give into what he called fear tactics and shoddy statistics surrounding COVID-19 being distributed by the media and state government, and to take their fights to the courts if they have to.
1) If “giving Governor J.B. Pritzker grief” equals “losing a bunch of cases, then that lede is spot on;
2) Following DeVore’s sage advice to remain open resulted in the ordered closure of several of his restaurant clients yesterday…
A Sangamon County judge Tuesday granted the Sangamon County Department of Public Health a temporary restraining order against four Springfield restaurants operating without food permits.
Circuit Judge Raylene Grischow’s ruling goes against D&J Café , also known as DJ’s Café, 915 W. Laurel St.; Charlie Parker’s, 700 W. North St.; Fox Run Restaurant & Lounge, 1130 Legacy Pointe Drive and Sweet Basil Café , 4241 Conestoga Drive. All four restaurants had their food permits suspended by Public Health Sunday. […]
All five were serving indoor diners Sunday in defiance of the mitigations prohibiting indoor dining that went into effect Friday.
Three of the restaurants, D&J Café, Fox Run and Sweet Basil, had been fined also last week.
Wilhite confirmed that the owners of the suspended restaurants have requested hearings with the board of health, though their doors will remain shut in the meantime.
* Gov. Pritzker’s chief of staff Anne Caprara on Twitter yesterday…
I want to take a moment today to talk about how the right wing misinformation machine works, how it churns up outrage, how supposedly “civil” Republicans fuel it…and what the real world consequences are for innocent people caught in its trap.
Last week a ton of people sent me a screenshot from a Twitter/Instagram account called @deuxmoiworld. They track supposed celebrity sightings - basically a completely unverifiable gossip account.
The particular post in question claimed to be a picture of the daughter of @GovPritzker
at a restaurant in Chicago seated outside in a large group of people for a birthday party. Only problem is that’s not the Governor’s daughter (and doesn’t even look like her.)
I dutifully clarified this for people sending me the picture but, like clockwork, it soon made its way to the army of Twitter trolls invested in combatting the Governor’s Covid mitigations. Kicked off with tweets like this…
Putting aside the absurdity of the statements made in this tweet and the fact that this account self identifies as a “parody” account - the right wing media machine took the picture and ran with it as fact.
Our friends at a local “news” radio show trolled Chicago doctors trying to correct misinformation with the fake picture. The statewide network of propaganda publications (recently profiled by the @nytimes for their spread of disinformation) posted this article…
Real news publications mostly ignored this or helped debunk it - but unfortunately their reach is much more limited than the right wing online outrage machine.
And then there is GOP state Senator-elect Darren Bailey who shared the “news” on his Facebook page - truly helping spread the lies about the Governor’s daughter to a whole new reach of people.
And so over this past week, @GovPritzker HIGH SCHOOL age daughter started getting hateful and threatening DM’s on her social media accounts directly linked to the pic - prompting her parents to spend the weekend trying to make hard decisions about her safety & welfare.
Which brings us to [Monday] when the Governor got a (legitimate) question at his press conference about where he was celebrating Thanksgiving. He’s human, he & the First Lady hadn’t made a decision yet about how they were dealing with Thanksgiving, & he gave an unsure answer.
Here is where the right wing outrage machine really grinds into action, breaking through to “mainstream” Republicans. @RodneyDavis - who likes to talk a lot about “civility” - posted this after the presser yesterday
This is from the Congressman’s official Twitter account. It’s nice how he added the coda about where he will be celebrating - just to really twist the knife. Super civil. Lest you think this is an errant tweet - his account reposted it today
Then there was this FB post from the ambulance chasing lawyer who has gone all around IL trying to invalidate the Governor’s Covid orders (unsuccessfully - he’s been beaten in almost every case) - offering $1000 bounty for pics of the Gov celebrating Thanksgiving with his family
A bounty. A BOUNTY. For pics of the Governor’s family. In a post that was shared over 1000 times. Who do you think that incites?
I see the threats that come in to our office ever day. The governor is like every other father who loves his children, and hurts when they hurt and gets angry when his children are threatened.
I agree wholeheartedly that the Governor (and his family) should live by the rules he sets for the state. But notice how no rules have been broken here, just a lot of lies and innuendo that by the time it reaches Joe Q. Citizen look real.
And given credence and validity when - say - the Illinois GOP’s official Twitter account posts things like this:
I realize people think every single thing an elected official does is scripted down to the moment. It’s not. And right now, in the middle of this pandemic, we are lucky if we find time for meals - much less the full time image machine some folks seem to expect.
Notice also how supposedly responsible office holders jump to spread the innuendo - and will do nothing to correct the spread of lies when they are called out. Notice how we went from a fake picture to “GOVERNOR PRITZKER IS BREAKING THE RULES!!”
At the heart of this is a kid. A teenager. Who has every right to expect privacy no matter who her Dad is. This didn’t used to be controversial! When did we lose the common decency to keep kids off the table??
There is also a sentiment amongst some political folks and journalists that elected officials need to just ignore these things. That they should expect social media attacks on their family. And that they shouldn’t do anything to try & combat them bc that just fuels the machine.
That might have been true at some point - but it isn’t anymore. I’ve seen firsthand how things have gotten out of control. Elected officials can’t be silent anymore - we are charging towards a dangerous place. And we need to start calling a spade a spade.
I don’t have great answers for how we solve this. But we at least need to start combatting it aggressively and stop pretending that the misinformation spread online doesn’t matter or doesn’t hurt people.
“I can handle people throwing my face up on anti-Semitic picket signs likening me to Hitler,” he said. “This kind of vitriol is apparently what I have to deal with to keep the state and its people safe, but my kids are off limits.”
Pritzker’s comments drew support from Republicans circles, too. Rep. Grant Wehrli tweeted: “I do not agree with Gov. Pritzker on much. I do 100% agree with him that a politician’s family is off limits. They are not in the arena and already have a difficult task. They should damn well be left alone by everyone.”
Also on Tuesday came the revelation that four more House lawmakers — Reps. Deb Conroy (46th), Robyn Gabel (18th), Rep. Anna Moeller (43rd) and Rep. Ann Williams (11th) — recently sent a letter to Madigan telling him it was time for new leadership. Rich Miller’s Capitol Fax blog first reported it.
A source tells Playbook that the foursome didn’t intend to go public with their message to Madigan, and they still aren’t releasing the letter.
Instead, they issued a statement Tuesday saying: “Ensuring that the voters have confidence in their elected leaders at all levels of government is of the utmost importance to us. The conversation about the leadership of the Illinois House is a critical one, especially during this time of unprecedented crisis in the state of Illinois. We will continue to work internally within the House Democratic caucus to determine the future of our leadership while working to restore public trust.”
The four reps join eight others who have already said they aren’t backing Madigan. The opponents to Madigan expect one more representative to step forward. That would leave Madigan with a 60 to 13 vote, if it were held today.
I think there’s more than one, but we’ll see who steps forward and when. And we’ll see where this latest twist goes.
The four reps did not make public the text of their letter, which reportedly stops short of explicitly saying they’ll vote for someone else for speaker in January if Madigan, now 78, seeks a new term. The letter was first reported by Capitol Fax. […]
Springfield insiders I’ve spoken with say it’s too early to count out Madigan, who retains strong support from organized labor and most members of the black and Latino caucuses, despite Madigan being under federal investigation in the ComEd bribery probe.
But they also indicate that his rule is in real jeopardy.
“He’s got nine lives, so he’s not gone yet,” one veteran House member told me. Still, that source added, the letter “is not great for his prospects.”
* Posted in the order they were received. Press release…
Joint Statement on Murray Developmental Center COVID-19 Cases
The following statement can be attributed to State Senator Jason Plummer, State Representative Charles E. Meier, the Illinois Department of Human Services, and the Clinton County Health Department:
The health, safety, and well-being of the residents and employees at Murray Developmental Center are of the utmost importance.
The 56 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the last 19 days, which include 24 residents and 32 Murray Developmental Center staff, are deeply concerning and news we take very seriously. We are taking every precaution for the individuals receiving care and for the staff working at the Murray Developmental Center who have tested positive for COVID-19 – for their families and for their fellow residents and colleagues.
Together, we are urging everyone in Clinton County to work collaboratively in the public interest to limit further spread of COVID-19. We know that Murray Developmental Center is in Illinois’ COVID Region 4, which currently has a 7-day rolling average positivity rate of 16.1%. Currently, the COVID-19 positivity rate in all of Clinton County is 19.5%, exceeding the State target for containing the virus.
To protect the residents and staff of Murray Developmental Center – as well as their families and others in our community – we remind everyone, outside of your home and household: please wear a face covering, wash your hands, and practice social distancing measures.
These actions can save lives and prevent short- and long-term health problems.
* Press release…
Joint Statement on Ludeman Developmental Center COVID-19 Cases
The following statement can be attributed to State Senator Patrick J. Joyce, State Representative Anthony DeLuca, and the Illinois Department of Human Services:
The health, safety, and well-being of the residents and employees at Ludeman Developmental Center are of the utmost importance.
The 46 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the last 18 days, which include 19 residents and 27 Ludeman Developmental Center staff, are deeply concerning and news we take very seriously. We are taking every precaution for the individuals receiving care and for the staff working at the Ludeman Developmental Center who have tested positive for COVID-19 – for their families and for their fellow residents and colleagues.
Together, we are urging everyone in Cook County to work collaboratively in the public interest to limit further spread of COVID-19. We know that Ludeman Developmental Center is in Illinois’ COVID Region 10, which currently has a 7-day rolling average positivity rate of 15.9%. Currently, the COVID-19 positivity rate in all of Cook County is 15.9%, exceeding the State target for containing the virus.
To protect the residents and staff of Ludeman Developmental Center – as well as their families and others in our community – we remind everyone, outside of your home and household: please wear a face covering, wash your hands, and practice social distancing measures.
We will continue to urge area residents to follow the recommendations set forth by the Illinois Department of Public Health and the CDC. These actions can save lives and prevent short- and long-term health problems.
The Illinois Retail Merchants Association (IRMA) has released the following statement regarding the statewide Tier 3 mitigations issued today by Gov. J.B. Pritzker:
“The Tier 3 mitigations announced today by Gov. J.B. Pritzker strikes the right balance between allowing access to retail services and the need to adjust safety measures in response to the latest science about how to address this virus. While additional capacity restrictions will impose significant hardship on retailers already devastated by the pandemic – especially during what is usually the busiest shopping time of the year – we are glad customers will continue to have numerous safe shopping options,” said IRMA President and CEO Rob Karr. “It is our hope the same science that provides for safe shopping can soon be applied to restaurants and bars so they can again allow inside dining, albeit at a reduced capacity. Finally, we look forward to the support of the Pritzker Administration and legislators in ensuring the beleaguered retail sector is best positioned to regain full strength. As the second largest revenue generator for the state and the largest for local governments, without a fully revived retail sector, Illinois faces a more dire future.”
* IHA…
“The Illinois Health and Hospital Association and our member hospitals and health systems across the state commend Governor J.B. Pritzker for his exceptional leadership in this extraordinary time, including his decisive action today to address and mitigate the alarming surge in COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations.
“Hospitals in every area of the state now have higher caseloads of COVID-19 patients than they faced during the spring surge. While hospitals and health systems are continuing to ramp up their capacity and manage their caseloads, the surge in infections and hospitalizations will soon present significant challenges to the healthcare delivery system.
“We support the Governor and Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike as they take important and necessary steps so Illinois’ hospitals and their 285,000 nurses, doctors and other healthcare professionals can continue their heroic work every day to serve their patients and save lives.
“Hospitals, doctors, nurses and all healthcare providers on the front lines are asking Illinoisans to help stop the spread of the virus. We urge everyone to follow these simple but very effective public health measures: wear a mask, watch your distance, wash your hands, avoid large family and social gatherings, and get a flu shot. All of us must act now and work together to protect our families, friends, neighbors, and the healthcare workers who are selflessly serving our communities.”
* IMA…
The Illinois Manufacturers’ Association released the following statement regarding the new statewide mitigations issued today by Gov. JB Pritzker:
“As our state and nation continue to grapple with this virus, Illinois manufacturers remain committed to leading the way forward. Manufacturers are developing life-saving vaccines and treatments, producing needed personal protective equipment, keeping store shelves stocked with important goods and nutritious foods, and powering our homes and businesses,” said Mark Denzler, president & CEO of the Illinois Manufacturers’ Association. “We remain committed to working with state officials and health experts to ensure the protection of all workers, customers and our communities. Indeed, manufacturers have proven they are not only vital to our response to this pandemic but will also be critical to our recovery as they look to hire more workers and pour billions of dollars into our economy.”
* INA…
The Illinois Nurses Association supports Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker’s statewide COVID-19 mitigation measures. Nurses are on the front lines of the state’s health care system and a spike in COVID-19 cases puts them at heightened risk and jeopardizes the health care system’s ability to care for all Illinois patients. Two nurses died earlier this Spring from COVID-19 and even now, nurses continue to test positive. Stringent mitigation measures based on sound science and public health practices are called for to ensure we reduce the infections from COVID-19.
* IPHCA…
-The Illinois Primary Health Care Association (IPHCA) commends Governor Pritzker for making the tough decision to move our entire state into Tier 3 mitigation to combat surging COVID-19 cases. Over the course of the last several weeks, we have seen an exponential increase in the number of new COVID-19 cases, the rate of hospitalizations, and the rates for which patients have been admitted to ICUs and put on a ventilator. Additionally, and more disheartening, we are also seeing an unacceptable increase in the death rate.
Our ability to effectively combat this pandemic is being jeopardized by the number of sick and those requiring hospital-level care. If we do not take immediate action, the consequences will be devastating. It is up to all of us, every resident, business, health care organization, and community leader to combat this COVID-19 surge by staying home whenever possible, practicing social distancing, and wearing a mask.
IPHCA understands the Governor’s decision to move all of Illinois into Tier 3 mitigation was not made easily, but that it was done in an effort to keep our communities safe and to save lives. Community health centers across the state are committed to doing our part, in collaboration with state and local leaders, to fight back against this pandemic.
* IllinoisPIRG…
“The past few weeks have seen COVID-19 surge across the country, with Illinois and the Midwest among the hardest hit areas. As the weather gets colder and people spend more time inside, we are at a critical point. The decisions made by our leaders today will determine how many lives we can save and help us get through the winter as safely as we can. By rolling back some of the most high-risk activities where people gather indoors, Governor Pritzker is protecting public health.
“While the governor’s action is welcome, given how quickly and widely the virus is spreading, more action is needed right away. The quickest way to lower cases dramatically is to issue a temporary stay-at-home order and close non-essential businesses until we effectively curb transmission.
“Two things are as clear as they’ve been for months: It’s in our power to save lives, and taking measures to do so quickly will help, not hurt the economy long-term.”
…Adding… SEIU Healthcare Illinois…
Members of SEIU Healthcare Illinois support Gov. Pritker’s call for increased mitigation strategies as our state confronts the rising number of Illinoisians contracting and dying from the Covid-19 virus.
Our members – many of whom are frontline, essential workers who deliver vital care to patients in hospitals and nursing homes – find it necessary to navigate Covid environments every day. They go to work fearing that they could contract the virus and bring it home to their families.
These workers are predominantly female and mostly women of color who are predisposed to having underlying conditions. When many in the public are cavalier about a life-threatening virus, it endangers the lives of the essential healthcare workers that society depends on to save them.
If we as a society follow safety protocols, we can get through this pandemic with fewer illnesses and loss of life.
* IAMHP…
Illinois has seen a rapid increase in new COVID-19 cases and positivity rates. Since the October 1, new cases are up 516% and the number of Illinoisans hospitalized with COVID-19 has grown by 235%. While deaths are a lagging indicator, statewide data show that COVID-19 deaths are up 260% and we are now averaging 81 deaths per day.
The members of the Illinois Association of Medicaid Health Plans (IAMHP) collectively serve over 2 million Illinois residents. The state of Illinois has entrusted these health plans with caring for Illinois’ most vulnerable residents and improving the health of families across the state.
For these reasons, IAMHP appreciates the Governor’s leadership and supports his tough decision to implement mitigations efforts to slow the spread of the virus and save lives. We recognize that these decisions were not taken lightly, and they are not without a cost, however, we believe they are necessary to save lives.
The Medicaid Health Plans recognize the economic impacts of COVID-19 have put extreme pressure on the already limited publicly available community-based services. In order to assist with this, health plans invested more than $56 million of their 2020 quality payment with providers and community organizations. Of that $56 million, $27.6 million, nearly 50% of the total, was spent in disproportionately impacted area zip codes across the state of Illinois.
During these challenging times, Medicaid health plans will continue to support their members, provider partners and community-based organizations through community reinvestment projects.
* IARF…
“Today Governor Pritzker announced a series of statewide mitigation efforts to try and bring Illinois’ COVID outbreak under control. As developmental disability and mental health service providers across the state are grappling with the impact of COVID-19 on staff and individuals they serve, we support the Governor and his Administration’s move.”
“A recent study by Johns Hopkins School of Medicine noted that persons with developmental disabilities who contract COVID-19 face a higher risk of dying than other populations. With that in mind, we applaud provider agencies across the state that have done their level best to meet their missions of service and prevent the spread of this virus to-date. Unfortunately, the virus has spread rapidly in the past several days and the challenges of meeting our shared goals of maintaining health, safety, and community integration have escalated substantially.”
“The Illinois Department of Human Services sent out further information/guidance late today, which is under review by our team. As we all work diligently to mitigate the spread of this virus, we hope the resources that have been provided to the social safety net so far to ensure providers have the tools and quality staff they need can be maintained – they continue to be needed.”
“IARF stands with efforts to alleviate COVID infection rates and reduce the burden on our decimated health care system. The Governor’s measures are necessary to stem the tide, and all of us must do our part. If we do not, more people will needlessly die. We should all know the drill by now: stay at home if you can, maintain social distance and wear a mask if you cannot.”
* IAC…
llinois Action for Children supports Governor Pritzker’s difficult but necessary decision to issue the order for some nonessential businesses in Illinois to close and/or reduce capacity as COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths continue to rise exponentially throughout our state. The order also asks all people who can work from home to do so for the duration of these Tier 3 mitigations.
From the beginning, the Pritzker Administration has taken a science- and public health-based approach to the COVID-19 crisis. This order announced today is the next step in that approach, as it is necessary to stop the uncontrolled spread of the virus throughout our state.
Child care is deemed an essential business in this order, as workers for other essential businesses that must continue to operate—grocery stores, essential retail, health care, teachers, among others—will still need access to child care to support the community and fight this pandemic.
Early childhood programs and the child care workforce will need additional support to meet their community’s needs during this time—this includes financial support for personal protective equipment, cleaning supplies, and hazard pay for providers who stay open. Additional support is also needed to keep programs afloat while demand for child care diminishes during this order. Providers and caregivers should have flexibility to decide if they can remain open or shut down as community spread of COVID-19 remains high throughout the holiday season.
We thank the Governor for taking the steps needed to help mitigate the spread and devastation of COVID-19 in an effort to keep our children, families, and communities safe, all while supporting the critical early childhood workforce as they serve essential workers during the pandemic.
* ISMS…
he doctors of the Illinois State Medical Society support Governor J.B. Pritzker’s actions today to hit pause for the sake of protecting our public health.
If no action is taken we are on a trajectory that more people will get sick, deaths will increase and our health care delivery system will quickly become overrun.
We want people to stay healthy and we need to make sure medical care is available for all patients. When health systems are overloaded with COVID-19 patients they can’t treat other emergencies and urgent care needs.
It’s important to note many preplanned medical services and surgical procedures remain available in most settings. Illinois doctors, medical clinics and many hospitals will continue to provide timely care during this challenging time. Doctor’s offices remain open and telehealth can be an option for certain patients and treatments.
As the Governor said, hope is on the horizon with the news of the COVID vaccine trials, but we have a way to go until the treatment is available. We will get through this together. To do so it’s important that we wear masks and avoid gatherings. And if able, stay home!
* IHSA…
“The Illinois High School Association (IHSA) recognizes that today’s announcement (November 17, 2020) by Governor Pritzker will temporarily pause the IHSA’s winter sports season. We remain optimistic that these new mitigations, coupled with the emergence of a vaccine, will aid in creating participation opportunities in the New Year for IHSA student-athletes in winter, spring, and summer sports. The IHSA Board of Directors will meet as scheduled on November 19, 2020, to continue plotting out potential paths for IHSA sport and activity participation through the remainder of the school year. Although representatives from the Governor’s office and the Illinois Department of Public Health will be unable to attend the meeting, today’s updated guidance from Governor Pritzker will aid the Board’s decision-making. We have asked Deputy Governor Ruiz and Dr. Ezike to engage with us in the near future, so that we can collaborate on developing a plan to safely conduct IHSA sports and activities as soon as possible. IHSA schools have been exemplary in adhering to state regulations throughout this pandemic and we hope that non-school programs will hold themselves to the same standard as we all put the long-term health and safety of our fellow citizens ahead of short-term athletic competition.”
* The Affordable Assisted Living Coalition…
“As the association representing Supportive Living Communities for seniors and persons with disabilities throughout Illinois, AALC’s mission is to help residents and their loved ones live with the peace of mind that they have high-quality, affordable health care and safe living environments,” said AALC Executive Director Karin Zosel.
“We know that seniors and people with underlying health conditions are the population most at risk for infection. Therefore, with the alarming increase in COVID-19 cases and positivity rates in every region of the state, we welcome additional steps to protect the health and safety of our Supportive Living Communities.
“With increasing community spread occurring statewide, we must protect both our residents and our staff who are working overtime to keep our residents healthy and safe. We fully support the governor’s mitigation efforts to help curb this virus and prevent future hospitalizations and deaths. We recognize that these are difficult choices, but know they are needed to protect those around us.”
Before I take questions today I want to discuss my personal plans for the Thanksgiving holidays.
I think you all know that I try very hard to keep my high school-aged children out of the spotlight. They were not elected to anything. They did not choose this public life. And I have a reasonable expectation that their privacy will be protected.
I was taken aback by yesterday’s question about my family’s holiday plans, in part because my wife and I were in the process of making the very hard decision that we may need to celebrate Thanksgiving apart from one another for the first time ever, and it was weighing heavily on my mind.
I will be celebrating Thanksgiving in Chicago with our son.
Our state is at a crisis point when it comes to the COVID pandemic. And as leader, I believe that the situation is simply too grave for me to be elsewhere.
My wife and daughter are in Florida, and they will remain there indefinitely. Let me tell you why.
Last week, my daughter came under attack. In an attempt to have some political effect on me, a parody Twitter account posted a picture of a group of individuals eating outside at a Chicago restaurant, supposedly breaking the COVID rules the city put in place. And the person posting the photo claimed one of the people in it was my daughter. That was a lie.
It wasn’t her. But the picture falsely identifying her started making the rounds on social media, helped along by the trolls who permeate these social media platforms these days. My office put out a statement making clear this wasn’t my daughter. But that didn’t stop republican elected officials, a network of propaganda publications in the state and some radio shock jocks from telling people that the picture was of my daughter, despite knowing that this was a lie.
Which lent permission to a slew of strangers who sent hateful, threatening messages to my daughter over the subsequent few days. If that wasn’t bad enough, then a well-known lawyer who cares more about headlines than winning cases posted a bounty on his Facebook page, offering money to harass my family at Thanksgiving [click here]. An actual cash bounty, including my kids, harassing them. My high school-aged kids.
Put yourself in the shoes of a high school girl who is being weaponized against her father by his political opponents. Weaponized with lies.
Put yourself in my shoes. We have threats that stream into my office daily while we have watched the kidnapping plot against the Michigan governor unfold just a state away.
I’m the governor, I was elected to this job and while I don’t think it should come with a fear for my health and safety. I accept that sometimes it does. I’m an adult. And I can handle people throwing my face up on anti-semitic picket signs likening me to Hitler. This kind of vitriol is apparently what I have to deal with to keep the state and its people safe.
But my kids. My kids are off limits.
Among elected officials and people in positions of responsibility. That didn’t use to happen. There was a time in American politics when the rule was sacrosanct: Kids are off limits.
This should not be controversial. So I’m appealing to our collective sense of decency and our fundamental understanding of right and wrong to keep my child out of political disagreements, and to understand that I’m going to fight like hell to protect her privacy.
I ask that you all respect that privacy. I’m willing to make the hard decisions that sometimes brings on vitriol from political opponents, but my children shouldn’t have to come under attack. Just like all of you, I want to be with my family for the holidays. And just like all of you, because of COVID, my family is having to make sacrifices to stay safe.
This is not a political fight. This is a fight to save people’s lives. Let’s remember that as we enter the holiday season.
As always, please pardon any transcription errors.
With a new wave of COVID-19 surging across the state of Illinois, the Midwest and the nation, Governor JB Pritzker and the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) today announced additional COVID-19 resurgence mitigations will take effect in every region across the state in an attempt to slow the spread of the virus. Tier 3 mitigations build on the Resurgence Mitigation Plan released in July to suppress the spread of the virus and prevent hospitals from becoming overrun. This latest round of mitigations aims to limit gatherings and encourages residents to stay home as much as possible and follow proper safety measures when out in public. The mitigations carefully balance the paramount goal of saving lives while preserving the option for in-person learning for children and protecting as much of the economy as possible from the continued impacts of the virus.
The Tier 3 resurgence mitigations will take effect statewide at 12:01 am on Friday, November 20, 2020.
“To stop this spread and preserve some semblance of the holidays, all of us need to do more than just wear our masks now – though masks are mandatory throughout the state. The simple fact is that COVID-19 is spreading so quickly and so widely, and our hospitals are beginning to experience real strain and at the current infection rate they will be overwhelmed. So whenever possible, we need you to stay home,” said Governor JB Pritzker. “I’m hopeful that by limiting our in-person interactions, we will succeed at avoiding a stay at home order like what we had in the spring – when the choice between saving lives and saving livelihoods was even more stark. Tier 3 may allow us to do both. Like in other states like Michigan and California and Washington, it’s our best effort to avoid a stay-at-home order and save lives.”
The first tiers of the Resurgence Mitigation Plan initially suppressed the virus and protected the progress Illinois made towards bending the curve during the Spring, while allowing each of the state’s eleven regions to progress through the phases based on local metrics. But with COVID-19 spread now exponential in every region of the state, our statewide positivity rate at record highs and hospitalizations already surpassing our Spring peak, an additional tier of more stringent, statewide mitigations is required to combat the surge and preserve hospital capacity.
“There is no denying that the state is headed in the wrong direction with increased cases, hospitalizations, and deaths,” said IDPH Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike. “There also is no denying that reducing the opportunities for the virus to spread can reverse our direction. This includes staying home as much as possible, wearing a mask and keeping social distance when we do have to go out, and not gathering with people outside our households. Until a vaccine is widely available and people understand the importance of being vaccinated, we must continue to take preventive actions to stop the transmission of the virus. Right now, our preventive actions are the best way to prevent new cases, hospitalizations, and deaths.”
While this latest round of mitigations does not include a stay at home order, if the mitigations are not adhered to and cases continue to rise in the weeks ahead, another order may be required. For all regions, additional mitigation measures taking effect Friday, November 20th include guidance for the following settings and industries:
Retail
Personal Car Services
Health and Fitness Centers
Hotels
Manufacturing
Bars and Restaurants
Meetings and Social Events
Offices
Organized Group Recreational Activities
Indoor Recreation, Theater, Cultural Institutions
As they have since the start of COVID-19, grocery stores across the state will remain open and available. Child care facilities may continue to operate subject to guidelines from the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. School districts and officials should continue to follow the extensive guidance released by the Illinois State Board of Education in August to make decisions related to in-person and remote learning at the local level.
To prevent the further spread of COVID-19, Illinois residents are urged to stay home as much as possible and celebrate upcoming holidays with members of their household. Illinoisans over the age of two years are required to wear a face covering when out in public and social distancing is not easily achievable. Anyone exhibiting symptoms of COVID-19 or who may have been in contact with someone exhibiting symptoms should seek out testing and quarantine at home; anyone who has tested positive for the virus should isolate at home as directed by their physician or local health department.
IDPH will continue to track the positivity rates and hospital capacity metrics in regions over a 14-day monitoring periods to determine if mitigations can be relaxed, if additional mitigations are required, or if current mitigation should remain in place. In order for a region to move back to Tier 2 mitigations, a region must experience less than 7-day 12 percent test positivity average for three consecutive days AND greater than 20 percent available intensive care unit (ICU) and hospital bed availability for three consecutive days AND declining 7-day COVID hospitalizations average in 7 out of the last 10 days. Follow the latest regional metrics at: https://dph.illinois.gov/regionmetrics
In response to the rising test positivity rate statewide, the administration continues to strengthen its nation-leading testing operation. Last week, the state reported a record high of 114,370 tests within a 24-hour period, now averaging more than 97,800 tests per day. Although the administration continues to build upon this progress, the state’s rate of growth in positivity is outpacing the growth in testing. It is critical to get tested before developing symptoms, as testing remains free to all Illinois residents and readily available throughout the state. To find a testing center near you, please visit DPH.Illinois.Gov/Testing.
More in a minute.
…Adding… Here are the mitigations. Bars and restaurants…
• All bars and restaurants close at 11pm and may reopen no earlier than 6am the following day
• No indoor service
• All bar and restaurant patrons should be seated at tables outside
• No ordering, seating, or congregating at bar (bar stools should be removed) • Tables should be 6 feet apart
• No standing or congregating outdoors while waiting for a table or exiting
• No dancing or standing indoors
• No tables exceeding 6 people
• Reservations required for each party
• No seating of multiple parties at one table
• Indoor gaming terminals must suspend operations
• Includes private clubs and country clubs
* Health and fitness centers…
• Operate at no more than 25% capacity
• No indoor group classes
• Face coverings must be worn at all times, including while engaged in individual exercise regardless of person or machine spacing
• Reservations required
• Locker room areas should be closed
* Hotels…
• Hotel room occupancy should be limited to registered guests only, with the maximum allowance being the number of individuals permissible per existing fire code for each applicable guest room
• Fitness centers should be closed, or operated only on a reservation model with capacity limited to 25% of the maximum occupancy for the room
• Grab and go food allowed
• Event and meeting space closed
* Indoor recreation, theaters, cultural institutions (e.g. casinos, bowling, arcades, movie theaters, museums and zoos)…
• Gaming and casinos close
• Indoor recreation centers, including theaters, performing arts centers and indoor
museums and amusement centers, close
• Live streaming of performances encouraged with social distancing of performers and minimum operational staff
• Outdoor activities allowed at 25% capacity or less
• Outdoor group activities limited to 10 persons or less, participants/guests must
wear face coverings at all times
• Reservations required for each guest for outdoor activities
* Manufacturing…
• Additional COVID training for all employees required even if previous training occurred
• Operators should coordinate with IDPH to implement testing protocols and contact tracing, upon request, consistent with available testing supplies
• All employees must wear face coverings at all times unless eating or drinking. Exemptions only for safety purposes.
• Only manufacturing staff and key personnel allowed in facilities. Non-production employees must work remotely. Non-essential staff and visitors are not permitted. Exemptions only for critical equipment repairs, supply deliveries and safety reasons (“critical visitors”).
• All critical visitors must have an Employee Health and Safety (EHS)-approved risk-assessment done in advance, including travel history, tracking, and temperature check prior to entrance.
• Implement additional workstation realignment when feasible
• Stagger and space shifts, and designate shift entrances and exits (when
possible) to minimize interactions of employees across unique shift groupings
• Station sanitation required at beginning and ending of shifts
• Operators must suspend COVID-related incentive pay and promote staying
home when sick or showing symptoms
• Implement temporary leave policies to accommodate workers who are sick
• Develop and implement safety protocols for employee travel vans to promote spacing, require face coverings, temperature checks, air circulation, and vehicle sanitization
* Meetings, social events and gatherings (including weddings, potlucks, etc.)…
• Limit in home gatherings to household members
• Meeting rooms, banquet centers, private party rooms, private clubs and country
clubs may not host gatherings
• No party buses
• Funerals are limited to 10 family members of the decedents, not including staff, see IDPH guidance
* Offices…
• All employees who can work remotely should work remotely
* Organized group recreational activities (sports, indoor sports and activity facilities, etc.)…
• Pause all indoor group sporting and recreational activities including youth and adult recreational sports, individual training may remain (with facility reservation) Includes park districts and travel leagues
• Outdoor sports and recreation allowed
• Participant groups and practices outdoors limited to 10 persons or less with social distancing
• Face coverings required for all activities at all times
• Locker rooms should be closed
* Personal care service…
• Operate at lesser of 25 clients or 25% capacity
• Face coverings must be worn at all times by clients and service providers
• Suspend services where a face covering cannot be worn (e.g. facials, beard
trims)
• Physical, occupational and massage therapy allowed as deemed necessary by a medical provider, but appointments must be spaced by a minimum of 15 minutes and facilities should take steps to sanitize and circulate clean air through service rooms before and after each service
• Virtual consultations recommended
* Retail (including service counters)…
• Operate at no more than 25% capacity, including general merchandise stores, “big box” stores that offer groceries and pharmacy, and convenience stores
• Grocery stores and pharmacies may operate at up to 50% capacity
• Encourage delivery or curbside pickup options wherever possible
• When in-store shopping is necessary, promote efficient trips and consistent circulation
* More…
The provisions above apply to industries/sectors with Restore Illinois Phase 4 guidance or other mitigations. Other functions (i.e. infrastructure, governments, logistics and warehousing, etc.) that previously have not been subject to specific guidance may continue regular operations but are encouraged to voluntarily take proactive steps to support new mitigation strategies wherever possible. In these areas, customer serving functions should be limited to 25% capacity, aligned with retail mitigations, and maximize work from home wherever possible.
IDPH will continue to track the positivity rates and hospital capacity metrics in regions over 14-day monitoring periods to determine if mitigations can be relaxed, if additional mitigations are required, or if current mitigation should remain in place. In order for a region to move back to Tier 2 mitigations, a region must experience less than 12% 7-day average test positivity rate for three consecutive days AND greater than 20% available intensive care unit (ICU) and hospital bed availability for three consecutive days AND declining 7-day average COVID hospitalizations for 7 out of the last 10 days.
In one of the most aggressive actions taken to confront the looming crisis, Philadelphia officials on Monday ordered a ban on “indoor gatherings of any size in any location, public or private,” except among individuals who live together. […]
In neighboring New Jersey, one of the hardest-hit states in the early phase of the pandemic, Governor Phil Murphy said he was ordering indoor gatherings of individuals from different households to limit to 10 people, down from 25, while the mandatory cap on outdoor gatherings will be lowered next week to 150 from 500. […]
Under Newsom’s announcement, [California’s] commercial and social restrictions will be tightened starting Tuesday in 40 of the state’s 58 counties, covering the vast majority of its 40 million residents.
The crackdown means no indoor service in bars and restaurants and more restrictions on many other businesses and public gatherings. California is also strengthening its face covering guidance to require individuals to wear a mask whenever outside their home, with limited exceptions, Newsom said.
In Ohio, where daily case tallies have increased by 17% and total hospitalizations by at least 25% in the past week, the state’s health department issued a revised order to limit mass gatherings starting on Tuesday, Governor Mike DeWine announced.
I’ve often noted that Gov. Pritzker has never been the first one to take shutdown actions, going back to March.
* The Question: Do you think that now is the time for Gov. Pritzker to impose additional mitigations statewide? If so, what would you have him do? If not, why not?
The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) today reported 12,601 new confirmed and probable cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Illinois, including 97 additional deaths.
- Bureau County: 1 female 80s, 1 male 90s
- Cass County: 1 female 80s
- Coles County: 1 female 80s
- Cook County: 1 female 30s, 2 females 60s, 3 females 70s, 1 male 70s, 2 females 80s, 3 males 80s, 4 females 90s, 1 male 90s, 1 male 100+
- DuPage County: 1 female 40s, 1 female 80s, 1 female 90s, 1 male 90s
- Franklin County: 1 male 80s
- Greene County: 1 female 80s
- Hancock County: 1 male 80s
- Iroquois County: 1 female 70s
- Jefferson County: 1 female 80s
- Jo Daviess County: 1 male 70s, 1 female 100+
- Kane County: 1 female 60s, 1 male 60s, 1 female 70s, 1 male 70s, 1 female 80s, 1 male 80s, 1 male 90s
- Kankakee County: 1 male 80s, 1 male 90s
- Knox County: 1 female 80s, 1 female 90s
- Lake County: 1 male 40s, 1 male 70s, 1 female 90s, 1 male 90s
- Logan County: 1 female 70s, 1 male 90s
- Macon County: 2 males 70s, 1 female 90s, 1 male 90s
- Madison County: 1 female 50s, 1 female 60s, 2 females 70s, 2 males 70s, 2 females 80s, 3 males 80s, 1 female 90s
- Marion County: 1 female 60s, 1 male 70s, 1 female 80s, 1 female 90s
- Morgan County: 1 female 80s, 1 female 90s
- Ogle County: 1 female 80s, 1 male 90s
- Peoria County: 1 female 60s
- Rock Island County: 1 female 70s, 1 male 70s, 1 female 80s, 1 male 80s
- Sangamon County: 1 female 90s
- St. Clair County: 1 male 90s
- Tazewell County: 2 males 70s
- Vermilion County: 1 male 70s, 2 males 80s
- Warren County: 1 male 60s
- Wayne County: 1 female 80s
- Whiteside County: 1 male 70s
- Will County: 2 females 80s, 1 male 80s
- Williamson County: 1 male 70s, 1 female 80s
- Winnebago County: 1 male 70s, 1 male 80s, 1 male 90s
Currently, IDPH is reporting a total of 597,849 cases, including 10,875 deaths, in 102 counties in Illinois. The age of cases ranges from younger than one to older than 100 years. Within the past 24 hours, laboratories have reported 94,205 specimens for a total 9,255,658. As of last night, 5,887 in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 1,158 patients were in the ICU and 545 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators.
The preliminary seven-day statewide positivity for cases as a percent of total test from November 10 – November 16, 2020 is 12.5%. The preliminary seven-day statewide test positivity from November 10 – November 16, 2020 is 14.5%.
*All data are provisional and will change. In order to rapidly report COVID-19 information to the public, data are being reported in real-time. Information is constantly being entered into an electronic system and the number of cases and deaths can change as additional information is gathered. Information for a death previously reported has changed, therefore, today’s numbers have been adjusted. For health questions about COVID-19, call the hotline at 1-800-889-3931 or email dph.sick@illinois.gov.
* Also…
Bad news: Another record high for Illinoisans hospitalized with COVID. (Numbers always reported as of 11:59 p.m. last night).
There are 5,887 COVID patients hospitalized in Illinois.
Of those, 1,158 are in ICU beds (getting close to that spring record).
* Several of my friends live in the South Loop and one of them sent me this grainy video early in the pandemic of people in her neighborhood lifting each others’ spirits by shouting, turning their lights on and off, shooting off fireworks and playing music…
* If you pay attention to the very beginning of the video, you’ll see this building right across the street…
The man in the window with his dog is my friend’s husband. He’s quarantining in a hotel after contracting COVID-19.
Today, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker, Indiana Governor Eric Holcomb, Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine, and Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers joined together in a social media video to encourage everyone across the region to remain safe heading into the holiday season.
“For eight months, the COVID-19 pandemic has devastated American families everywhere. To fight this virus, governors across the country have listened to medical experts, stepped up, and worked around the clock to protect our families, the brave men and women on the front lines, and our small business owners. And no matter the action we take, we understand that our fight against COVID-19 will be more effective when we work together,” the governors said. “That is why this group of bipartisan governors is joining forces today to urge families across our region, and Americans everywhere, to do their part to protect themselves and their families from the spread of COVID-19. When it comes to fighting this virus, we are all on the same team.”
Over the past month COVID-19 cases have skyrocketed across the Midwest and medical experts are advising people not to host Thanksgiving with people from outside of their households. Together, the governors each addressed the families in their region on how they can protect their loved ones, the frontline workers, and small businesses owners from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Joint Statement of University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Jewish United Fund Chicago,
Illini Hillel, Hillel International, Illini Chabad, Arnold & Porter, and
the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law
Students who choose the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for their college education make that decision with an expectation that they will find the freedom and security to grow, to explore and to express their whole and best selves.
But, sadly, that is not the experience of all members of the student community. Anti-Semitic acts and expressions are all too common in our country and in our world, and examples of that intolerance have occurred at this university as well. This is unacceptable. While the university has taken measures in the past to address this problem, the university must do more.
Over the past several months, and especially over the past few days, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, leaders in the Jewish community and counsel for the Jewish students have engaged in meaningful and productive conversations. While we may not agree on all aspects of these complex and critical issues, we are united in a single view that our shared and common goal must be to support a safe and welcoming environment for Jewish and pro-Israel students at the University of Illinois that is free of discrimination and harassment.
We acknowledge and affirm our shared belief in the rights of all members of the university community to express their viewpoints, identity and lived experiences. Every student should have the opportunity to have a transformative and positive educational experience from the day they arrive to the day they earn their degree. But acts and expressions of anti-Semitism—in any form—actively undermine the educational process and are in direct opposition to our core values.
For many Jewish students, Zionism is an integral part of their identity and their ethnic and ancestral heritage. These students have the right to openly express identification with Israel. The university will safeguard the abilities of these students, as well as all students, to participate in university-sponsored activities free from discrimination and harassment.
We deplore anti-Semitic incidents on campus, including those that demonize or delegitimize Jewish and pro-Israel students or compare them to Nazis. This subjects them to double standards that are not applied to others. All Jewish students, including those who identify with Israel or Jewish campus organizations, should be able to participate in campus activities aimed at fighting racism and achieving social justice.
All Jewish students should be able to proudly display religious emblems without fear of being targeted by their fellow students. All Jewish students should feel confident that if they encounter a swastika on campus, the university stands with them in rejecting symbols of hate. Anti-Semitism, anti-Semitic forms of anti-Zionism and other forms of discrimination have no place at this university. We will stand united against all forms of anti-Semitism.
We agree that our mutual priority must be to continue working together to more rapidly advance clear, concrete and actionable steps to support Jewish students, staff and faculty so their lived experiences match the expectations that brought them to the university in the first place. As a result:
• The university will create an Advisory Council on Jewish and Campus Life that will consist of undergraduate and graduate students, staff, faculty and alumni, as well as representatives from the Jewish community committed to the principles set forth in this statement. This advisory group will assist the chancellor and university leadership to identify opportunities to enhance the campus environment for all students, faculty and staff, and to advance its commitment to an inclusive community where all feel welcome. The university expects to have the Advisory Council on Jewish and Campus Life in place before the beginning of the Spring 2021 semester.
• As part of its broader and expanding efforts to curb hate and intolerance, and in consultation with the Advisory Council on Jewish and Campus Life, the university will institute focused and regularly recurring educational programming regarding anti-Semitism.
• The university will review, evaluate and, when necessary, revise procedures and practices so they are appropriately aligned with shared values opposing discrimination and harassment on campus, including anti-Semitic actions.
Finally, we emphasize our shared commitment to the values of free speech and academic freedom. Freedom of speech is of paramount importance on a college campus. Also paramount is the university’s commitment to never tolerate harassment or discrimination, including against its Jewish students, and to enforce its nondiscrimination policy to the fullest extent. In this as well as all areas, the university is committed to complying with applicable federal, state and local antidiscrimination laws as a state and federally funded institution.
Though these steps will further our shared goals, they alone will not effectively dispel the environment that many Jewish students have felt to be unwelcoming. Thus, our collective and collaborative efforts will not end with these actions. The university, the undersigned organizations and Jewish students will meet before the end of the semester to discuss additional steps. We will work together to demonstrate that the University of Illinois is a place where people of all faiths, races, gender identities, ethnicities, national origins and viewpoints can live, learn and thrive.
…Adding… Rep. Jonathan Carroll…
This has been an issue for the past few years on UIUC’s campus as well as other schools around the country. I’m glad the school has agreed to take this more seriously, but to be very honest, I’m skeptical that the school will actually follow through. It took a PR campaign and lawsuit to get the school to agree to some changes, but as this story gets older, I’m concerned the school will ignore the blatant acts of anti-Semitism our Jewish students have been facing the last several years. I hope I’m proven wrong.
A Sangamon County judge on Monday ruled Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s administration has power under state law and the state constitution to issue executive orders that mandate public health measures at schools amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
The decision, issued by Sangamon County Judge Raylene Grischow after a roughly two-hour hearing, relates to two lawsuits — Mainer v. Illinois Department of Public Health and Pritzker v. Board of Education of Hutsonville — that arose from Pritzker’s June executive orders regarding schools.
The governor’s executive orders apply to all public and nonpublic schools from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade, and they allow schools to reopen as long as they follow IDPH public health requirements, which include capping the number of people in gatherings, mandatory face coverings and temperature screenings.
In explaining her decision, Grischow cited her Aug. 18 order in Pritzker v. Board of Education of Hutsonville in which she issued a temporary restraining order requiring the schools to follow the state’s public health guidelines set forth in Pritzker’s executive orders.
“My client disagrees. I disagree,” attorney Tom DeVore tells us. “I don’t think the standard applied by the court was consistent with the law… I think they were more concerned about masks, the use of masks, and other safety precautions versus who has the authority to issue those safety measures. My client believes that is for the legislature and we are going to appeal.
* While this has been expected for some time, it’s just awful seeing it play out in real life….
Political writer and columnist Bernard Schoenburg and statehouse reporter Doug Finke have accepted buyouts and will be departing the paper on Dec. 1. Finke has worked at the SJ-R since the 1970s; Schoenburg’s first byline appeared in the paper in 1990.
Their departures will leave the daily newspaper with two news reporters and an equal number of sports reporters, presuming Finke and Schoenburg are not replaced before their departures and current staff isn’t reassigned. The paper, which has no fulltime courts reporter or police reporter or city hall reporter or education reporter, has posted jobs for a statehouse/politics reporter as well as a cultural, diversity and inclusion reporter who will “focus coverage on culture, diversity and inclusion trends across central Illinois,” according to a job listing posted by Gannett, the SJ-R’s parent company.
Gannett is under heavy financial pressure. Stock in the company was trading at more than $6.50 a share when GateHouse Media, which had owned the SJ-R since 2007, bought Gannett in 2019 and dropped the GateHouse name. The stock closed today at $1.74 per share. A $1.8 billion loan from Apollo Capital Management, a private equity firm that financed the GateHouse-Gannett deal, that came with an 11.5% interest rate is due in 2024.
The company is over-leveraged and has completely lost sight of its news mission.
* Hello again! Please keep it Illinois-centric and be polite to each other. Many kind thanks…
Caught the touch and go training from SPI flying through the scene of Abraham Lincoln sculpture being removed from the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum pic.twitter.com/HlMt34z9ds
In July 2020, plaintiffs, Illinois county sheriffs, filed an amended complaint seeking a writ of mandamus against defendants, state officials sued in their official capacities, to compel the Illinois Department of Corrections (DOC) to accept all transfers of prisoners to its custody pursuant to several provisions of the Unified Code of Corrections. Plaintiffs also filed a renewed motion for a preliminary injunction requiring defendants to accept inmates to DOC pursuant to the Code. Plaintiffs contended the Governor, through Executive Order 2020-13, lacked the discretionary authority to limit transfers of convicted offenders during a public health crisis. Subsequently, defendants responded to plaintiffs’ motions stating, in relevant part, plaintiffs failed to establish a prima facie case for a preliminary injunction where the Governor acted within his authority under the Illinois Emergency Management Agency Act. Specifically, defendants pointed to Executive Order 2020-50, which rescinded Executive Order 2020-13 and required DOC to resume accepting transfers from county jails, subject to an intake process designed to ensure health and safety of transferees and DOC staff.
In August 2020, the circuit court entered a preliminary injunction requiring DOC to immediately begin accepting transfers of “all inmates” who would normally be sent to DOC pursuant to the Code, without including any protocols to prevent the spread of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). Defendants filed a notice of interlocutory appeal, challenging the preliminary injunction.
On appeal, defendants argue (1) this court should vacate the preliminary injunction requiring DOC to accept all transfers of inmates from all county jails in Illinois without regard for the health screening measures put in place by the Governor and DOC because (a) the circuit court committed legal error regarding the Governor’s emergency powers under the Act, (b) plaintiffs failed to show that they would suffer irreparable injury without an injunction, and (c) the balance of hardships weighed heavily against the injunction and (2) in the alternative, the circuit court’s statewide injunction is overbroad. We vacate and remand for further proceedings.
Q: The IFT is calling on ISBE and you to close all school buildings and have all schooling be remote for the foreseeable future due to the COVID surge. Is this something you will consider what is your response?
A: We’re always thinking about our school children and the parents and the teachers. And it’s right now not something that we’re doing. But I will say that we’ve ensured a set of parameters that are safe for schools. We need schools to follow those parameters. Most are.
I think we’ve got more than 60% of school children in Illinois who are currently remote learning, and about 30 some percent that are doing some form of hybrid learning in school and out.
And, you know, it’s not ideal, by any means but we have a covid storm that’s hitting and I think you know the school districts are doing the best they can.
Make no mistake: our members are working harder than ever - long hours, working in environments that risk their health, learning new ways to reach students, and doing everything they can to make learning successful this year. Our members from preschool to higher education want to be back with their students, but the stakes are too high to open school buildings for in-person instruction while the death toll and infection rates surge. We understand the pain that both parents and students are going through to adjust to this new reality. That’s why we urge the public to adhere to CDC guidelines by wearing a mask and social distancing. Public health officials have warned us that with the winter and holidays ahead, COVID-19 outbreaks will only worsen while the virus thrives in enclosed spaces. The sooner the virus is under control, the sooner we can return to a semblance of normalcy.
* The Question: Should schools go to remote learning during this surge? Take the poll and then explain your answer in comments, please…
* Let’s hope she has a mild case and can quickly recover…
Consistent with medical advice, I will be working remotely from my home in Illinois until cleared by my physician. All individuals that I had been in contact with have been notified.
Across the country and the Congressional District I serve, COVID case numbers are skyrocketing.
“The numbers are devastating right now,” said physician Robert Citronberg, executive medical director of infectious disease and prevention at Advocate Aurora Health.
“Our health care system cannot absorb doubling or tripling of those numbers as might happen if we have many super-spreader events arising out of Thanksgiving,” Citronberg explained at a briefing.
* Speaking of Thanksgiving, check out what happened in Alberta…
Officials say too many residents are disregarding public health guidance as Williamson County grapples with an escalating test positivity rate and death toll from the coronavirus.
“It’s people just not wanting to take it seriously. But how much more real can it get when it’s breaking records every day?” said Williamson County Commissioner Brent Gentry, who also sits on the Franklin-Williamson Bi-County Health Department’s board.
* The Tribune has a story about a suburban school board caught in the crossfire of vocal radicals…
When Brad Paulsen heads out on his regular walks through his Wheaton neighborhood these days, he dons his face mask, pulls on a golf cap and keeps his fingers crossed he will remain incognito.
Paulsen, an architect, father of two and school board president in Community Unit School District 200, is not typically antisocial. But since the district’s decision Wednesday that surging COVID-19 rates demanded a return to remote learning at the district’s middle schools and high schools, Paulsen has been bombarded with angry email messages from parents. One suggested if a student were to die by suicide, Paulsen and the school board would be to blame.
Just a few weeks earlier, when schools reopened for in-person instruction, Paulsen’s LinkedIn account was hit with a menacing message from an anonymous sender warning if their relative, a District 200 teacher, died from COVID-19, it would be Paulsen’s fault.
Social media rants lambasting the superintendent and the school board are even worse, he says, especially when the ballistic comments are posted by parents in his own neighborhood.
In-person classes at high schools and colleges statewide will be suspended for three weeks along with eat-in dining at restaurants and bars under sweeping new restrictions aimed at reining in the exponential growth of coronavirus cases in Michigan, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced Sunday.
The new public health order is to take effect Wednesday, and includes the cancellation of organized sports and group exercise classes, though gyms may remain open for individual exercise with strict safety measures, and professional and college athletics may continue.
Casinos and movie theaters, indoor ice rinks, bowling alleys and bingo halls also will have to temporarily shut down, and all businesses are asked to allow employees to work from home if possible.
Gatherings inside homes are limited to two households at any time and health officials strongly urge families to pick a single other household to interact with over the next three weeks.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Monday denounced as shocking and reckless a call from a Trump administration official for Michigan residents to “rise up” over new coronavirus restrictions she announced Sunday.
“It’s just incredibly reckless, considering everything that has happened, everything that is going on,” Whitmer said in a call with Capitol reporters.
The entire state of Iowa is now out of staffed beds, Eli Perencevich, an infectious-disease doctor at the University of Iowa, told me. Worse is coming. Iowa is accumulating more than 3,600 confirmed cases every day; relative to its population, that’s more than twice the rate Arizona experienced during its summer peak, “when their system was near collapse,” Perencevich said. With only lax policies in place, those cases will continue to rise. Hospitalizations lag behind cases by about two weeks; by Thanksgiving, today’s soaring cases will be overwhelming hospitals that already cannot cope. “The wave hasn’t even crashed down on us yet,” Perencevich said. “It keeps rising and rising, and we’re all running on fear. The health-care system in Iowa is going to collapse, no question.”
The Missouri Senate has postponed a special legislative session focused on limiting COVID-19-related lawsuits after a COVID-19 outbreak within its ranks.
Senate Majority Leader Caleb Rowden announced on Twitter Monday that “due to a number of positive COVID-19 cases” among senators and their staff, the upper chamber would postpone the special legislative session until after Thanksgiving.
I didn’t realize Mike Madigan was Speaker of the Missouri Senate. /s
The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) today reported 11,632 new confirmed and probable cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Illinois, including 37 additional deaths.
- Clinton County: 1 male 50s
- Cook County: 1 female 50s, 1 male 50s, 1 female 60s, 3 males 60s, 2 females 70s, 3 males 70s, 1 female 80s, 2 males 80s, 3 females 90s, 2 males 90s
- DuPage County: 1 female 90s
- Edwards County: 1 male 80s
- Iroquois County: 1 female 60s
- Kane County: 1 male 50s
- Lake County: 1 female 50s
- LaSalle County: 1 male 60s, 1 male 70s, 3 males 90s
- Madison County; 1 male 80s
- McDonough County: 1 female 70s
- Peoria County: 1 female 80s
- Pike County: 1 female 80s, 1 male 80s
- Wayne County: 1 male 80s
- Will County: 1 female 90s
Currently, IDPH is reporting a total of 585,248 cases, including 10,779 deaths, in 102 counties in Illinois. The age of cases ranges from younger than one to older than 100 years. Within the past 24 hours, laboratories have reported 90,612 specimens for a total 9,161,453. As of last night, 5,581 in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 1,144 patients were in the ICU and 514 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators.
The preliminary seven-day statewide positivity for cases as a percent of total test from November 9 – November 15, 2020 is 12.5%. The preliminary seven-day statewide test positivity from November 9 – November 15, 2020 is 14.7%.
*All data are provisional and will change. In order to rapidly report COVID-19 information to the public, data are being reported in real-time. Information is constantly being entered into an electronic system and the number of cases and deaths can change as additional information is gathered. For health questions about COVID-19, call the hotline at 1-800-889-3931 or email dph.sick@illinois.gov.
* As I told you last week, the Pritzker administration asked the 2nd District Appellate Court to “publish” its opinion on the Fox Fire restaurant case upholding the IDPH mitigation rules. Publishing the case would make the decision legal precedent.
Researchers from Stanford University and Northwestern University have used the mobile-phone data of 98 million Americans to model how the virus spread during the first wave of Covid-19 in the spring.
The study, published in journal Nature this past week, showed that restaurants, gyms, hotels, cafes and religious organizations carried the biggest risk of spreading infections.
* On to the Illinois Municipal League. I’m not sure why they’re complaining about lack of help with enforcement. Do they ask for state assistance to deal with shoplifters, too? Just enforce the law. How difficult is that to do?…
The Illinois Municipal League (IML) is calling on Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s Administration to convene a working group comprised of mayors and other local officials to better coordinate coronavirus response efforts at the community level as cases surge across Illinois.
Since April, mayors across Illinois have repeatedly asked to be included in the process of developing mitigations and enforcement measures. A lack of communication from the state as well as little support in enforcing mitigation measures has frustrated mayors who are seeking to protect their communities but have been met with resistance. A more collaborative approach will help ensure the state is better informed of local issues caused by the pandemic, including challenges related to mitigation compliance, and will help promote a more effective community-level response by ensuring local officials are apprised of the latest data driving mitigation efforts.
“We have consistently advised all municipal leaders to abide by health guidelines issued by the Illinois Department of Public Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. However, there is a clear need for additional collaboration,” said Brad Cole, IML Executive Director. “The governor has called for an ‘All-in’ approach to address this crisis yet has rebuffed requests to work hand in hand with local officials to implement solutions that protect our residents. Simply blaming mayors for rising cases does nothing to address the underlying issues preventing more effective mitigation results, including distrust of state mandates among residents and the need for state and county enforcement of mitigation measures. It is time for the state to work together with mayors, not just point fingers at them, to stem this rising tide.”
Most cities, towns and villages have a limited set of tools when it comes to implementing coronavirus mitigation measures. For instance, they have no control over food licenses. It falls on the individual county public health departments to revoke an establishment’s food license for failing to abide by mitigation measures. And county state’s attorneys have the sole authority to prosecute violations of state laws and orders.
Further, many mayors are limited in their enforcement authority because they oversee non-home rule communities, where they are only able to put in place measures specifically allowed by state statute. There are 1,081 non-home rule communities in Illinois, compared to 217 home rule communities, which have more discretion to set their own stricter regulations or impose those outlined in the governor’s executive orders.
While mayors have been told by the state to refer enforcement issues to the county public health departments or state police, there has been little follow up by those entities. This has led to uneven compliance across our cities, villages and towns where some individuals and businesses are abiding by mitigation efforts, but others are blatantly disregarding state and local orders while facing no consequences. Confusion over how data is analyzed by the state has also made it difficult for mayors to explain to residents why additional mitigation efforts are required and why they are only applied to certain professions or specific aspects of the service economy.
“These sorts of inconsistencies have caused some residents to question all mitigation efforts, making it even more difficult for local officials to receive compliance with safety regulations,” said IML President Ricky J. Gottman, mayor of Vandalia. “We will keep asking our residents and businesses to comply with state mandates, but we must work together to put in place effective mitigation strategies to protect our communities and the wellbeing of everyone across the state.”
Um, one big reason why there is “distrust of state mandates among residents” is because so many local officials constantly scoff at the state. Before he caved to reality, Springfield’s mayor was confidently saying that the IDPH mitigations wouldn’t work, without citing a single source.
Also, I’ve asked about this non Home Rule bit. Can’t they just enforce state law?
Sangamon County Public Health officials have suspended the food permits of five Springfield-area restaurants for defying pandemic restrictions and continuing indoor service.
A Sangamon County spokesman told WAND News the action was taken against Charlie Parkers, D&J Cafe, Fox Run, Sweet Basil Cafe and Casa Real.
WAND News learned from county officials that three of the businesses, D&J Cafe, Sweet Basil Cafe and Fox Run, were cited Friday. All received citations for allowing indoor dining.
Each business was fined $500.
…Adding… Contrast that whiny can’t-do IML statement with this one from the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus…
The 275 Member Mayors of the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus called upon residents and businesses today to commit to some common sense steps to help the Chicago region flatten the COVID-19 curve for the second time.
Acknowledging the need to combat the exponential increases in COVID cases across Chicagoland and the State in recent weeks, regional Mayors ask area residents and businesses to take the following actions for at least the next three weeks or until the rate of infection consistently declines:
• Continue to comply with regulations to wear face coverings whenever you are indoors at a public place or outdoors encountering people outside of your immediate household. The Center for Disease Control reinforced the importance of facemasks last week, saying they protect both the wearer and individuals they may encounter;
• When leaving home, continue to practice social distancing by always staying 6-feet apart from others;
• Continue to wash hands or use hand sanitizer often. Avoid touching surfaces frequently touched by others and keep your hands off your face;
• Consider limiting trips outside your home to going to work, attending school, and obtaining vital goods and services, such as medical care, food, or household essentials;
• Limit gatherings to no more than 10 persons – and remember it is safest to only associate with members of your own household;
• If possible, avoid all non-essential travel.
Most of the requested actions are strategies recommended to residents since the pandemic began. These strategies are still on the regional Mayors’ recommendation list because of their history of successfully reducing coronavirus transmission. Newer recommended actions such as limiting trips and gatherings are consistent with those proposed by area public health officials. While each of our 275 member municipalities is unique, they all agree that it is critically important that we come together in the days and weeks ahead to combat the coronavirus pandemic. Endorsing these strategies is one of the most coherent methods for dealing with the current increase of positivity results
“We are at a critical point in the fight against the pandemic. This second wave requires serious attention from all of us,” said Mayor Joseph Tamburino, Mayor of the Village of Hillside. “Everyone needs to step up right now to bend the curve downward, save lives and help our businesses remain open or in some cases, to re-open.”
“These are common sense actions that we strongly urge all residents to take,” said Highland Park Mayor Nancy Rotering. “It is incumbent upon each of us to take personal responsibility to stop the spread of this virus. The sooner everyone consistently follows these steps, the better chance we have of reducing the rate of infection, keeping our local economies going and avoiding a complete shut-down.”
As the cuts that would be required to bring Illinois’ budget to balance would harm education and human services programs and damage essential areas of the state’s economy, the Governor continues to believe that cuts alone cannot be the solution and revenue adjustments need to be considered as well. The Governor will work with the legislature to identify corporate and business tax loopholes that can be closed and tax adjustments that can be made that will minimize the impact to lower-and middle-class families while ensuring that Illinois can meet its financial responsibilities. Furthermore, the Governor will continue to work with the Congressional delegation to support additional federal funding to help Illinois bridge the loss of revenues brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.
* People have been trying for years and years to close corporate loopholes. But since corporations played a major role in the defeat of the “Fair Tax,” there might just be an opening…
Also available is a range of less-draconian actions that might, in combination, generate enough revenue to fill the gap, if they survive the political gantlet.
A group of Democrats proposes closing corporate tax loopholes. Sales, use, income tax and economic development credits and exemptions totaled nearly $8.5 billion in the 2018 fiscal year. In a press release, 14 House Democrats say “all are on the table.” Rep. Mike Zalewski estimates an “aggressive approach” to cutting some of those could net $1 billion.
Closing Corporate Tax Loopholes: $826.4 - $846.4 million
1. Repeal the Single Sales Factor - $96 million. Illinois changed its method for determining the corporate income tax, from a three-part formula to the single sales factor. Under the single sales factor, corporate income taxable in Illinois is determined solely on the basis of a company’s in-state sales. Under the prior method, in addition to sales, the value of a corporation’s property and payroll in Illinois were considered. Under the single sales factor, large, multinational companies who have a strong presence (facilities and employees) in Illinois, and are therefore the largest beneficiaries of state services, receive major income tax cuts. Small mom and pop shops, who principally make all their sales in the state, receive no benefit. According to a report issued by then Illinois Comptroller, Republican Loleta A. Didrickson, 32 companies were projected to gain at least $1 million per year in tax savings. The result, a net tax revenue loss to the state and local governments that the Illinois Department of Revenue estimated reached $96 million in FY 2001 ($63M state and $33M local) (This is the last year the Department of Revenue analyzed the loss to the state).
2. Reduce the Retailers Discount. The Retailers Discount was enacted in 1959 to reimburse businesses for the burden of computing and collecting the state sales tax that applied to their sales. Under the statute, retailers keep 1.75% of the sales tax they collect. While this discount served a legitimate purpose in 1959, its value is questionable today. With computerized collection and accounting systems prevalent, the cost of collecting sales taxes, especially for large retailers, is built into software packages and is negligible. Twenty-four states do not provide any discounts for sales tax collection. Of the 26 that still have these outmoded discounts, 10 have capped the maximum discount. Capping the Illinois discount at 1.75% of the first $1 million in sales is a practical solution. This preserves the discount for small businesses while greatly reducing the cost of this tax expenditure. This sensible change will save $80-100 million annually.
3. Eliminate public subsidies to the horse racing industry: Illinois currently gives this horse racing industry millions in tax breaks. Elimination of breaks would generate $48 million.
• Newsprint and Ink to Newspapers and Magazines Exemption: $41 million
• Manufacturing and Assembling Machinery and Equip Exemption: $164 million
• Sales of Vehicles to Automobile Rentors Exemption: $43 million
• Enterprise and Foreign Trade Zone Dividend Subtractions: $2.4 million
• Enterprise and Foreign Trade Zone High Economic Impact Business Exemption: $37
million
• Timely Filing and Full Payment Discount: $28 million
• Trade-in allowance: $20 million
• Real Estate Investment Trusts – For tax years ending on or after Dec 31, 2008: $40
million
• Redefining “business income” to include all income apportionable to Illinois by the U.S. Constitution: $29 million
• Sales sourcing rules – for corporate income tax – replace cost of performance rule with market state approach for service industries: $40 million special industry rules (financial organizations/transit companies): $60 million
• Eliminate tax benefit of related party transactions (dividends from subsidiaries with no business substance/insurance premiums paid to capture insurance companies): $40 million
• Discharge of debt: $4 million
• Expense disallowance for exempt securities income: $25 million
• Withholding on non-resident partners/subchapter S shareholders: $4 millions
• Corporate Franchise Tax Amnesty: $25 million
Some of those were accomplished in the capital bill.
Closing Personal Tax Loopholes: $670 - $715 million
1. Create a means test for the Illinois tuition tax credit: There currently is no income limit on the Illinois tuition tax credit. As a result, relatively affluent taxpayers have received by far the most benefits from this tax break. Taxpayers with incomes of $50,000 or more per year accounted for 77% of the tax relief in 2004. Taxpayers with incomes of $100,000 or more accounted for almost 40% of the credit. Limiting the credit to families earning $60,000 a year or less would preserve the credit for low- and moderate-income families while saving the state $40-$45 million annually.
2. Subject pension income earned over $75,000 to taxation: Illinois is one of only three states that exempts all pension income from taxation. Low- and moderate-income seniors work to make ends meet, and subsequently pay taxes on their wages. Affluent seniors, on the other hand, do not have to work and also avoid paying taxes on their pensions. Exclusion of all pension income costs the state over $800 million annually in new revenue. Subjecting pension income over $75,000 to taxation would generate $200 million in new revenue annually.
3. Eliminate or means-test the Property Tax Credit: The Property Tax Credit costs the state of Illinois over $400 million a year. The credit primarily benefits wealthy homeowners, as only 20% of individuals earning $25,000 a year or less own a home. Creation of a means-test for this tax credit would preserve the benefit for low- and middle-income families while saving the state an estimated $200-$240 million annually.
4. Coordination of credits/exemptions: Multiple forms of tax credits/exemptions could duplicate policy purposes. Consolidating all of them into one credit/exemption could eliminate duplication and produce more targeted benefits. This could generate up to $200 million.
Monday, Nov 16, 2020 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
It’s been more than 600 days since the Clean Energy Jobs Act (CEJA) was first introduced, but communities across the state that developed this bill are still waiting for their lawmakers to take action.
Since its introduction in February of 2019, support for CEJA has continued to grow. 82% of Illinois voters support the bill, and 74% of voters say that legislators must pass it this year, not delay it until 2021.
CEJA was recently updated to include stronger utility reforms, end automatic rate hikes and double down on our commitment to equity for Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) communities through meaningful wealth-building opportunities. CEJA isn’t just a set of ideas, it’s a fully drafted bill. You can read about it at ilcleanjobs.org.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to ravage our state’s economy, we need solutions that will create thousands of new jobs by unlocking millions of dollars in private investment, without raising taxes or hiking rates. CEJA can’t wait.
Since there won’t be a fall veto session that was supposed to start Tuesday, and the governor doesn’t seem willing to call a special session, some are looking for joint committee hearings to provide oversight to the one-man rule approach of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s COVID-19 response strategy.
Citing COVID-19 concerns, leaders canceled the fall session for the Illinois legislature.
“There is a strong majority of members who would prefer the House delay convening to a later date; this is primarily motivated by concerns about the rising COVID-19 rates and proximity to upcoming holidays,” House Speaker Michael Madigan’s Chief of Staff Jessica Basham said in a letter to members. “I’m advised that there are similar concerns among Senate members, who were also surveyed over the weekend.”
The governor doesn’t expect them back until January. But there are a growing number of lawmakers wanting to get back to legislating instead of one-man-rule.
Really? Let’s see the roll call. The only Democrat they named in the story was Rep. La Shawn Ford, who appears to be their go-to House Democrat. He’s the sole reason they could run this recent headline…
Bipartisan demand for leaders to call hearings over Pritzker’s handling of pandemic response
Several House committee chairs have said they can’t hold public hearings because of the pandemic, and virtual hearings were not approved as they were in the Illinois Senate. The Illinois Senate voted in May to allow virtual hearings.
The full House rejected the idea of remote committee hearings and floor action back in May. The only way House members can currently participate in hearings is if the Senate allows them to participate in theirs.
Michael Sacks, a top Democratic donor and supporter of Joe Biden, questioned efforts to push Michael Madigan out of the speakership at a time when Democrats need him most.
“We have a raging pandemic, a precarious economy, a huge budget hole and we might be coming into one of the toughest budget-making sessions we’ve ever had. The idea that we don’t have all of our best players on the field protecting social services, education, working families and other things Democrats care about is nonsensical,” Sacks told Playbook in an exclusive interview. […]
Top Illinois Democrats have blamed Madigan in recent days for not capturing the 13th Congressional District and for the graduated income tax’s failure. They say Madigan’s connection to an influence-peddling investigation into ComEd is what crushed Democrats’ hopes of winning.
Sacks disagreed, saying Trump’s supporters toppled any blue wave Democrats had hoped for anywhere. Congressional Democrats sustained losses in places like New York, Florida, California and New Mexico. And former Minnesota Lt. Gov. Michelle Fischbach, a Republican, defeated Democratic Rep. Collin Peterson, a Democrat in that state who voted against impeaching Trump. […]
In the 13th District, Democratic turnout was up, but so was Republican. Betsy Dirksen Londrigan’s race against Republican Rep. Rodney Davis saw Davis receive 187,583 votes to Londrigan’s 126,811. In 2016, Davis received 179,567 to his Democratic opponent’s 148,517.
Sacks isn’t wrong about down-ballot races nationwide, either. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, in 5,876 regularly scheduled legislative races in 44 states, “the big surprise is that only two chambers — the New Hampshire House and Senate — changed hands. The GOP won both.”
There seemed to be one safe bet when it came to the 2020 election results: Democrats would easily hold on to their majority in the House of Representatives. Not only that, but the conventional wisdom held that Democrats would pick up more than the 235 seats they won in the 2018 midterm elections.
While Democrats will have a majority next Congress, Republicans vastly outperformed expectations and nearly pulled off an election shocker.
As of this writing, CNN has projected that Democrats have won in 219 seats. Republicans have been projected the winners in 203 seats. There are 13 races outstanding, per CNN projections.
Of those 13, the Democratic candidates lead in a mere two of them. (One of these 13 is going to a runoff, where the Republicans are heavily favored to win.)
According to the AP count, President Trump is losing Illinois by 17.1 percentage points, which is his same margin as 2016. The House Republicans were saying before the election that if Trump could keep his losing margin under 20 then they’d have a shot at staying in the hunt.
* About a week before the election, Gov. Pritzker’s operation began running this ad telling voters that President Trump wanted them to vote “No” on the graduated income tax…
By that time, a ton of Democrats had already voted and a comparatively few Republicans had yet to cast a ballot. So, there’s a school of thought which believes the Trump ad may have “reminded” at least some Republicans to vote against the Fair Tax. And while they were at the polls, they kept voting Republican down the ticket.
I’m not saying that the governor is responsible for Republicans doing better than expected here because the GOP did that nationally. I’m just saying he may not have made suburban Democrats’ jobs any easier.
With the announcement by Rep. Bob Morgan, D-Deerfield, earlier this month that he will not vote to re-elect Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan in January, the opposition numbered eight House Democrats, with at least a few more privately leaning their way.
They’ll need 13 or 14 Democrats, depending on final general election results, to deprive Madigan of the speaker’s gavel. So, they may need some help to get over the hump.
And there’s one person outside the House who may have enough votes to tip the balance either way.
And, no, it’s likely not Gov. J.B. Pritzker. Not yet, anyway
Pritzker controls no votes in the House. He can’t just push a button and make something happen in that chamber.
Perhaps if he had followed through on his 2018 promises to supplant the moribund state party with a true statewide political organization for all Democrats at all levels, he might have some buttons to push. But he didn’t, and the pandemic intervened and here we are.
Whatever the case, a governor directly confronting the House Speaker has never worked here. Others have tried. All have failed. A governor’s opposition would, as it has in the past, give Madigan something external and concrete to push back against in order to distract from his internal problems.
And if Pritzker’s effort to dislodge Madigan failed, so would the remainder of his legislative agenda. Not to mention that Pritzker certainly hurt himself when he not so subtly threw resources Sen. Kimberly Lightford’s way during her unsuccessful run for Senate President almost a year ago. Once bitten, twice shy.
There is definite pressure on Pritzker to act, though. As the saying goes, “governors own,” so he’ll wear the jacket in 2022 if Madigan is still standing and remains as spectacularly unpopular as he is today.
Maybe Pritzker could quietly do something at the very end to make it happen if the opposition is still slightly short, but don’t expect anything before that unless something major happens with the federal investigation into the House Speaker’s operation. But if Pritzker swings and misses, Madigan will still be around, Pritzker won’t get anything accomplished and the voters will not be pleased.
The dude spent a zillion dollars to get elected governor only to find himself in a dozen trick bags. Welcome to Illinois!
The one person outside the House who could make a real and immediate difference is U.S. Rep. Chuy Garcia. As I’ve told you before, Garcia, the Chicago Teachers Union and Madigan came to an understanding not long after Garcia, with the CTU’s backing, lost the city mayor’s race in 2015. Madigan’s 13th Ward carried Mayor Rahm Emanuel to victory, but that took an extraordinary amount of work in Madigan’s Latino-dominated area. Better to just cut a deal.
Since then, one after another of Congressman Garcia’s close allies have been elected or appointed to the General Assembly.
There are probably no better examples of this than in Madigan’s own neighborhood. Garcia ally Celina Villanueva was appointed to the House in the summer of 2018 when Madigan loyalist Rep. Silvana Tabares was appointed to the Chicago City Council in the neighboring 23rd Ward. Rep. Villanueva then ran unopposed in a special election to replace resigned Sen. Martin Sandoval (Madigan’s senator) and Garcia’s congressional aide Edgar Gonzalez was appointed to Villanueva’s House seat. In between, Madigan successfully supported another Garcia staffer for a Cook County Board slot over Sandoval’s daughter.
Congressman Garcia has significant influence over at least three Chicago Democratic House members (Gonzalez, Aaron Ortiz and Delia Ramirez). But if he makes a strong statement either way on Madigan, several other progressives in the chamber could very well follow his lead.
Garcia, by the way, is also a member of Madigan’s state party central committee. A few committee members have spoken out against Chairman Madigan, but Garcia has a stronger political organization and a larger public platform. He could make a real difference there, too,
But a deal is a deal and, in the long term, Garcia has the better end of it. Madigan gets peace and Garcia gets more of his people into influential positions every time there’s a path (or close to it, like when Madigan tried unsuccessfully to block Eva-Dina Delgado’s appointment to the House this year after Garcia and the CTU supported someone else).
And that probably explains why Congressman Garcia isn’t returning my phone calls and texts these days to ask what he’s planning to do about all of this.
…Adding… Congressman Garcia didn’t respond to the Sun-Times, either…
Five members of the [Democratic state central committee] — including a congresswoman and a newly elected countywide official — are openly calling for Madigan to step down.
Four others — including the Cook County clerk — see no need for new leadership.
What the other 27 are thinking is a mystery, since they didn’t respond to the Sun-Times’ requests for comment.
Despite making substantial progress on Illinois’ fiscal challenges in Fiscal Year 2020, the ongoing coronavirus pandemic has resulted in unexpected and dramatic revenue losses, and Illinois will also continue to face significant financial challenges until it finds a long-term solution to its long standing structural deficit, the annual Economic and Fiscal Policy Report from the Governor’s Office of Management and Budget concludes.
As a result of these recent challenges and with the option for a graduated income tax now off the table, the Governor’s Office of Management and Budget is projecting sizeable deficits in the General Funds budget for fiscal years 2022 through 2026. Without changes to the current trajectory of the state’s finances, year-end accounts payable will continue to grow year by year, the report states.
We can still affect what happens a couple of weeks from now by making sure there aren’t new people getting infected, making sure somebody doesn’t get infected tomorrow by wearing our mask and by keeping our distance and limiting… If we keep doing everything we’re doing and not changing, then no measure that we can do at the state level is going to have, going to allow us to have enough beds. Right?
And so the power, everybody’s saying, ‘What are we going to do?’ What are you going to do? Individuals need to take the responsibility to control this virus. And I’m really wanting people to step up and stop looking for somebody else to do the job that we individually have the power to do.
Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White is announcing Driver Services facilities statewide will be closed to the public for in person transactions effective Tuesday, Nov. 17 and will reopen on Monday, Dec. 7, 2020, due to the worsening COVID-19 pandemic. White is encouraging the public to take advantage of online services.
In addition, White announced that expiration dates for driver’s licenses and ID cards will be extended until June 1, 2021. This June 1, 2021 extension also includes those who have February, March, April and May 2021 expiration dates. As a result, expired driver’s licenses and ID cards will remain valid until June 1, 2021. CDL (Commercial Driver License) holders and commercial permit holders are excluded from this extension due to federal requirements.
“After careful consideration, we have decided to close all Driver Services facilities until December 7, 2020, due to the worsening COVID-19 pandemic,” said White. “The health and safety of employees and the public remains paramount and face-to-face transactions potentially increase the further spread of the virus. We have extended expiration dates to assist people during this difficult time. I am also encouraging customers to consider using online services which are available for many office transactions.”
As White noted, many transactions with the Secretary of State’s office may be conducted online at www.cyberdriveillinois.com, some of which include:
• Renewing a license plate sticker;
• Renewing a valid driver’s license for qualifying drivers;
• Renewing a valid ID card for those age 22-64 (seniors 65 and older have free, non-expiring IDs);
• Obtaining a driver record abstract;
• Filing Business Services documents, such as incorporations and annual reports; and
• Customers with issues involving administrative hearings may contact adminhearings@ilsos.gov.
Those who are eligible for online driver’s license renewal will receive a letter from the Secretary of State’s office with a PIN necessary for online renewal. Those whose driver’s licenses or ID cards expired between Feb. 1, 2020 and Jan. 31, 2021, who qualify for online renewal should receive their PIN letter in December 2020 or January 2021. Those whose driver’s licenses or ID cards expire after Feb. 1, 2021, will receive their PIN letter approximately 90 days before their expiration date.
White noted that 19 CDL (Commercial Driver License) facilities will remain open for CDL written and road exams. These CDL facilities are:
Belleville, 400 W. Main St.; Bradley, 1111 Blatt St.; Charleston, 1010 E. St.; Danville/Tilton, #5 Southgate; DeKalb, 1360 Oakwood St.; Elk Grove Village, 650 Roppolo Dr.; Marion, Mascoutah, 9221 Beller Dr.;
1905 Rendleman St.; Moline/Silvis, 2001 Fifth St., Ste. #10; Olney, 1302 S. West St.; Peoria, 3311 N. Sterling Ave., #12; Princeton, 225 Backbone Rd. East; Quincy, 2512 Locust St.; Rantoul, 421 S. Murray Rd.; Rockford, 4734 Baxter Rd.; Salem, 1375 W. Whittaker St.; South Holland, 41 W. 162nd St.; Springfield, 2701 S. Dirksen Pkwy.; and West Chicago, 1280 Powis Rd.
“Commercial truck drivers provide essential services by ensuring goods can be transported safely and efficiently throughout the state and country during this pandemic,” White said.
CDL driving tests are by appointment only by calling 217-785-3013.
Lastly, White announced that seven facilities will be offering drive-through services for license plate sticker transactions ONLY. These facilities were selected due to the configuration of the buildings which allowed for drive-through transactions. The seven drive-through facilities are: Chicago North, 5401 N. Elston Ave.; Chicago West, 5301 W. Lexington St.; Rockford-Central, 3720 E. State St.; Macomb, 466 Deer Rd.; Springfield, Dirksen 2701 S. Dirksen Parkway; Tilton, #5 Southgate Dr. and Chicago South (opens Nov. 19), 9901 S. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr.
“During the COVID-19 pandemic, we have been the only government agency open statewide offering in-person transactions,” said White. “We have remained committed to serving the public. Protecting the health and safety of our residents is my top priority, and this is the guiding principle of our decision-making.”
All other Secretary of State departments are open to serve the public. Check www.cyberdriveillinois.com for more information.
“Illinois is at a critical juncture. We face a global health crisis unlike any we have seen, bringing with it major challenges for hard-working families and small businesses. We need responsible budgets that meet the new challenges posed by this pandemic, while maintaining a commitment to our children’s future, safe communities, and other critical services that are no less needed.
“At such a crucial moment, I believe we need Speaker Michael Madigan’s leadership working for us in the Illinois House of Representatives.
“These are the challenges Illinoisans have overwhelmingly entrusted to Democrats. I believe Speaker Madigan’s strong, tested leadership will help us address them.”
* The governor announced today that he would be extending the state’s eviction moratorium by another 30 days…
But landlords and property owners are a crucial part of Illinois housing cycle, just as much as renters, and they deserve protection, too.
So with input from smaller landlords and property owners, this new moratorium will ensure that the rents are paid by tenants who may have been taking advantage of the eviction moratorium but are in fact able to pay to make their monthly rent payments in line with the CDC eviction ban on renters, who have earned no more than $99,000 in annual income or $198,000 as joint filers for this calendar year are covered under this extension.
Renters who are unable to pay will be required to submit a declaration form to their landlord certifying that they are unable to pay their rent due to the substantial loss of income or an increase in out of pocket expenses stemming from the pandemic. This form will be available on the Illinois Housing Development Authority website for easy access.
Please pardon all transcription errors.
*** UPDATE *** Press release…
The following statement can be attributed to Michael Mini, executive vice president of the Chicagoland Apartment Association:
“We are grateful that Governor Pritzker has fine-tuned his residential eviction moratorium rules so landlords are not taken advantage of by tenants who withhold rent payments without cause or demonstrated financial losses due to COVID-19. In tens of thousands of instances, landlords are working with tenants in offering extended grace periods and manageable payment plans. The amended eviction moratorium announced today by Governor Pritzker provides for greater accountability by non-paying bad actors who have refused to communicate with their landlords to demonstrate their need for assistance, enabling landlords to better assist tenants truly in need.
The pandemic indeed threatens the financial viability of both tenants and landlords across Illinois as we all face unprecedented pressures. We need more federal funding to ensure renters experiencing hardships can keep paying their rent and property owners can cover their operating costs and maintain safe living conditions for their residents. We join the call in urging members of the Illinois delegation to proactively push for another federal government relief package.”
An obscure but crucial figure in the feds’ years-long investigation of public corruption in Illinois pleaded guilty to an unrelated fraud scheme Friday, six years after he secretly recorded House Speaker Michael Madigan with hopes of future leniency from a judge.
See Y. Wong admitted he scammed a bank and pleaded guilty by video to wire fraud. He did so four months after a federal subpoena sent to Madigan’s office indicated Wong’s undercover work could still be relevant to the probe roiling state politics.
In that subpoena — delivered the day the feds charged ComEd in a bribery scheme that implicated Madigan — the feds sought documents related to Chinatown properties that appear to be part of the recorded conversation Wong had in August 2014 with Madigan and then-Ald. Daniel Solis (25th).
Madigan has not been criminally charged and has denied wrongdoing. Solis later helped the feds build a racketeering case against Ald. Edward M. Burke (14th), who was first criminally charged Jan. 2, 2019. Burke’s lawyers say Solis struck a so-called deferred-prosecution agreement with the feds the next day.
Federal prosecutors first charged Wong in March, days before the coronavirus pandemic took hold in Chicago and upended the federal court system. Their seven-page charging document, known as an information, first revealed the scam that apparently prompted Wong to cooperate. It revolved around the Canal Crossing condominium development in Chinatown.
Lawyers suing scandal-scarred Commonwealth Edison on behalf of the power company’s customers are accusing a consumer-advocacy group of serving as “ComEd’s lapdog,” court records show.
But the Citizens Utility Board says that is not fair — and CUB has now taken legal action itself to try to win back money for the roughly 4 million homes and businesses served by ComEd across northern Illinois.
State officials created CUB 37 years ago to act as an independent watchdog for customers of the power company and other state-regulated utilities.
Lawyers in a class-action suit in Cook County Circuit Court allege CUB instead is trying to shield ComEd, which has admitted to bribing Illinois politicians as it won electricity-rate increases and other lucrative legislation in Springfield during the past decade.
Illinois Farm Bureau President Richard Guebert Jr. described how Illinois farmers and rural residents will suffer if voters approve a state constitutional amendment in November.
During a virtual press conference Tuesday, Guebert joined three other organization leaders of a statewide coalition against the Progressive Tax Amendment.
“After seven years of a depressed farm economy, we don’t need another tax increase,” Guebert told FarmWeek. “It’s hard enough to keep the bills paid and to be as profitable as possible.”
The proposed tax only applied to income above $250,000, so economically depressed farm-owners wouldn’t pay an extra dime, but you already knew that.
“The new tax structure is supposed to pay for our public schools, social services, public safety, and the list goes on and on,” [Guebert] wrote. “However, we know it will be spent in two places: our state’s exorbitantly high pension costs and debt obligations. The government created these two problems, not us taxpayers. We, taxpayers, have done our jobs; we are law-abiding, taxpaying citizens. We should not have to pay to fix the politicians’ mess.”
* As long as we’re talking about taxpayers, farmers get a ton of tax breaks.
Let’s start with their sales tax exemptions. Inputs like seeds, fertilizer and livestock feed and stuff like, um, bull semen, are exempt from sales taxes (click here.) Farm chemicals, farm machinery and equipment, all-terrain vehicles, repair or replacement parts and leased leased equipment are also exempt from taxation (click here).
Most property is assessed at 33 1/3 percent of its fair market value.
Farmland is assessed based on its ability to produce income (its agricultural economic value). A farm building is assessed at one-third of the value that it contributes to the farm’s productivity.
There are even lower rates for other types of farmland (click here).
* The Question: Should the state end its agriculture tax breaks? Explain your answer in comments, please.
[Poll has been removed because it’s obviously being manipulated.]
Friday, Nov 13, 2020 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
“Among all the states, Illinois jumped to the head of the pack when it comes to the environment in 2016 with its Future Energy Jobs Act, a law creating a welcoming market for installing solar energy. But because of delays in acting on a successor law to provide new funding, the solar energy industry is leaving the state in what is being called a falling off of the “solar cliff.”
Illinois is estimated to have lost close to 3,500 solar jobs already, and 1,000 more jobs could be gone by the end of the year…
Illinois has worked hard to become a leader in green energy, attracting jobs in the industry and improving the environment. The state has become an important home to businesses installing solar energy and making use of “community development” projects, in which property owners without good access to sunlight can share projects with other property owners.
Why was the surge hospital at McCormick Place taken down? Clearly there was no one using the space for large gatherings & it certainly could have been mothballed in place. Somebody got rich on this deal. Friends of @GovPritzker and the Illinois Democrat machine perhaps? 🤔#twill
Um, it was taken down because, thankfully, we didn’t need it. And keeping it in place would’ve cost an absolute fortune. It’s kinda funny, when you think about it, that Wehrli would be demanding to give more money to McCormick Place workers whose unions are closely allied with Speaker Madigan. Could Grant Wehrli have been a secret Madigan agent all along???
Of course not, but it makes about as much sense as that silly word salad he tweeted out today. None of it is justified.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said plans have already been drafted for a 3,000-bed COVID-19 hospital utilizing halls A, B, and C at McCormick Place set to open on April 24.
Speaking at the Pentagon, General Todd Semonite said McCormick Place was among 114 sites the Corps of Engineers examined in all 50 states. Semonite said the proposed conversion of the Chicago convention center would house patients in varying degrees of illness.
As hospitals were overrun by coronavirus patients in other parts of the world, the Army Corps of Engineers mobilized in the U.S., hiring private contractors to build emergency field hospitals around the country.
“If the alternate-care facility is needed in the future, this would be a state expense,” says Rebecca Clark, a spokeswoman for Illinois’ emergency management agency. “In addition, the McCormick Place equipment has been prepositioned throughout the state to help hospitals and other congregate-care settings enhance surge capacities.”
I checked with the governor’s office and was told that they had deployed the McCormick Place equipment to IDPH regions. Region 8, which Wehrli represents, has 631 beds available that were once at McCormick Place.
So, not only does Wehrli want to enrich Madigan’s pals, he also wants to deprive his own constituents of medical equipment. /s
* Onward…
Doctor, Perhaps you can explain to us why in a state with 85-90% mask wearing compliance, COVID cases have skyrocketed. If wearing masks works, then why haven’t they? https://t.co/iT5YyWCEZE
The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) today reported 15,415 new confirmed and probable cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Illinois, including 27 additional deaths.
Currently, IDPH is reporting a total of 551,957 cases, including 10,504 deaths, in 102 counties in Illinois. The age of cases ranges from younger than one to older than 100 years. Within the past 24 hours, laboratories have reported 106,540 specimens for a total 8,871,640. As of last night, 5,362 people in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 990 patients were in the ICU and 488 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators.
The preliminary seven-day statewide positivity for cases as a percent of total test from November 6 – November 12 is 13.2%. The preliminary seven-day statewide test positivity from November 6, 2020 – November 12, 2020 is 14.5%.
All but six Illinois counties are at the warning level. Ninety-six counties, plus the city of Chicago, are currently reported at a warning level – Adams, Alexander, Bond, Boone, Brown, Bureau, Calhoun, Carroll, Cass, Christian, Clark, Clay, Clinton, Coles, Cook, Crawford, Cumberland, DeKalb, DeWitt, Douglas, DuPage, Edgar, Edwards, Effingham, Fayette, Ford, Franklin, Fulton, Gallatin, Greene, Grundy, Hamilton, Hancock, Hardin, Henderson, Henry, Iroquois, Jackson, Jasper, Jefferson, Jersey, Jo Daviess, Johnson, Kane, Kankakee, Kendall, Knox, Lake, LaSalle, Lawrence, Lee, Livingston, Logan, Macon, Macoupin, Madison, Marion, Marshall, Massac, Mason, McDonough, McHenry, McLean, Mercer, Monroe, Morgan, Moultrie, Ogle, Peoria, Perry, Piatt, Pike, Pulaski, Putnam, Randolph, Richland, Rock Island, Saline, Sangamon, Schuyler, Scott, Shelby, St. Clair, Stephenson, Tazewell, Vermilion, Wabash, Warren, Washington, Wayne, White, Whiteside, Will, Williamson, Winnebago, Woodford, and the city of Chicago.
*All data are provisional and will change. In order to rapidly report COVID-19 information to the public, data are being reported in real-time. Information is constantly being entered into an electronic system and the number of cases and deaths can change as additional information is gathered. For health questions about COVID-19, call the hotline at 1-800-889-3931 or email dph.sick@illinois.gov.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS 219 SOUTH DEARBORN STREET CHICAGO,ILLINOIS 60604 NOTICE OF PARTIAL TEMPORARY SUSPENSION OF IN-COURT PROCEEDINGS
Dear Dirksen Courthouse and Roszkowski Courthouse Occupants:
In the last several days, there have been marked increases in the numbers of positive COVID-19 test results and hospitalizations in the Northern District of Illinois. Yesterday and earlier today, Illinois Governor Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lightfoot responded by issuing advisories and recommendations for restrictions on travel and in-person gatherings. As you have seen in many recent letters from me, our court is not immune from the Coronavirus. A number of employees, visitors, and security personnel have tested positive.
Together with the District Court’s Executive Committee and the Restart Task Force, I am ordering restrictions on activities in our courthouses as follows: Effective at 4:30pm on Friday, November 13, 2020, the Clerk’s Office in Chicago and Rockford will close to in-person assistance until Tuesday, January 19, 2020. Clerk’s Office staff will accept filings via CM/ECF, e-mail, mail or the drop box in the lobby of the Courthouses. In addition, beginning Monday, November 16, 2020, all civil case proceedings will be held virtually. Jury trials will remain suspended until after January 19, 2020. To limit the number of individuals in the Courthouses at any time, all hearings in all civil cases will be conducted virtually, either by either via phone or video. We are drafting an order confirming these restrictions with a greater level of detail and will issue it shortly.
* And yet Crain’s Chicago Business just published this bonkers crackpot column today…
It’s time for the governor to take a new approach that allows businesses to reopen fully. The people of Illinois must be allowed to return to their jobs so that they can begin the difficult task of rebuilding their lives.
Those organizations also share a registered agent, who's also the registered agent of another former employer of the dude from the Illinois Business Alliance. pic.twitter.com/PyFbHcwK4K
Anyhow, this is just a reminder that there are people in Illinois churning out content for legacy media publications from a network of NGOs that pretend to be independent from each other. It's been going on for years, it's dishonest, and @CrainsChicago shouldn't facilitate it.
…Adding… Maybe Crain’s should completely cave and hire this guy full time…
Until the Illinois legislature meets and votes to change current law, governor pritzker has absolutely NO authority to do anything that he is saying or attempting. Stand up and stay open!
Democratic U.S. Rep. Lauren Underwood won her bid for a second term Thursday, narrowly defeating Republican challenger Jim Oberweis in the west and north suburban and exurban 14th Congressional District, The Associated Press declared. […]
It was the second time Oberweis, 74, failed in a bid for the seat, losing in 2008. It joins a string of losses at the federal level for the investment and dairy magnate that included unsuccessful bids for the U.S. Senate in 2002, 2004 and 2014. Oberweis also lost a 2006 bid for governor and was unsuccessful in a past bid for the state GOP chairmanship.
As a result of his bid for Congress, Oberweis could not seek reelection to the state Senate seat he has held since 2013. Jeanette Ward, a Republican seeking to replace Oberweis in Springfield, conceded her race against Democrat Karina Villa.
This was actually the third time Oberweis lost a 14th Congressional District race. This year, the 2008 general election and the 2008 special general election on March 8. The special was prompted when Denny Hastert resigned from Congress. It was the first time a Democrat had won the seat since the Great Depression.
*** UPDATE *** Sigh…
U.S. Rep. @LaurenUnderwood (IL-14) officially won her re-election bid against @JimOberweis yesterday by a margin of ~4,600 votes now that they’re all counted.
More than one-third of Springfield’s firefighters are in quarantine as a COVID-19 outbreak continues to spread through the department.
Seventy-three firefighters are quarantined, including 19 who have tested positive for the virus.
All fire stations remain open and are providing service to residents.
But two of the city’s 12 fire engines will not be in operation until further notice, according to city officials. The engines in question are each part of a multi-company station house.
With a new wave of COVID-19 sweeping the nation and concerning trends here in Illinois, Governor JB Pritzker launched a new awareness campaign today to encourage residents to take safety precautions throughout the upcoming holiday season to protect themselves and their families — and ultimately save lives.
The Illinois Department of Public Health is recommending that residents stay home as much as possible and only leave for essential activities. To provide safer ways to celebrate, ‘Healthy Holidays to You’ highlights what doctors and scientists consider top methods to reduce your risk of contracting or spreading the virus: limiting gatherings to your immediate family or keeping them virtual, maintaining 6 feet of distance from others and wearing a mask, whether you’re indoors or out.
“Ahead of the holiday season, IDPH has provided recommendations for keeping you and your family safe from the virus,” said Governor JB Pritzker. “We are making every effort to remind people what epidemiologists and other infectious disease specialists say are the best ways to reduce the risk of contracting COVID-19. Traditions are so important to all of us – but this year we all need to celebrate a bit differently.”
“This year’s holiday season is going to be difficult and challenging for many of us,” said IDPH Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike. “This campaign was designed to emphasize the importance of making safer decisions and checking in on loved ones during this time in order to stay safe and strong for each other.”
Developed by Illinois-based ad agency O’Keefe Reinhard & Paul, the holiday campaign pays tribute to beloved holiday songs and traditions with its suggestions for safe practices throughout the season. “Over the wifi and through the zoom to grandmother’s house we go” and “if you’re going to jingle, jingle six feet apart” are a couple of the light-hearted advisories with serious messages that the television spots and billboards will feature across the state. The scenarios brought to life in the campaign demonstrate proven ways to reduce the risk of spreading the virus, according to Illinois Department of Public Health epidemiologists and researchers modeling COVID-19 in Illinois.
The campaign will reach Illinoisans statewide in both English and Spanish through a variety of traditional and online media channels, including cable, broadcast and connected TV; streaming audio and radio; billboards and bus shelters; digital display and video; print and social media. Like other coronavirus-related expenses, costs are reimbursable by the federal government.
How likely is it you’ll encounter at least one person who is infected with the coronavirus if you go to a bar in Denver? What about a 100-person wedding in Baltimore? Or a Thanksgiving dinner with 25 guests in Los Angeles?
The answers to these questions — and many more — can be found on the free, intuitive and now peer-reviewed COVID-19 Risk Assessment Planning Tool. Built by a team of researchers at Georgia Tech, the tool is designed to help policymakers, event planners and individuals easily grasp the risks associated with gatherings of different sizes throughout the United States and, increasingly, across the world. […]
The COVID-19 Risk Assessment Planning Tool was conceived in March by Joshua Weitz, a quantitative biologist at Georgia Tech who wanted an easy way to quantify the risk of attending events of various sizes in different locations. […]
“In a way it’s like a weather map,” said Clio Andris, a professor of city and regional planning and interactive computing at Georgia Tech who helped Weitz build out the tool. “It can tell you what the risk is that it will rain, but it can’t tell you if you’ll get wet. That depends on if you carry an umbrella, or if you choose not to go outside at all.”
A judge Thursday denied a request to stop Illinois officials from rescoring applications for recreational marijuana licenses, allowing the disputed process to continue.
Sangamon County Judge Adam Giganti refused to grant a temporary restraining order against state regulators. The judge ruled that the plaintiffs didn’t show they would be irreparably harmed by letting the licensing do-over go ahead, and failed to show that they were likely to prove their case.
The suit was filed in October against Gov. J.B. Pritzker and state administrators by three companies that received perfect scores to qualify for a lottery to win cannabis licenses — SBI IL LLC, Vertical Management LLC and GRI Holdings LLC.
Their attorney, John Fitzgerald, argued that Pritzker was caving in to “political expediency” by giving losing applicants a second chance. He said it was in violation of the state law that legalized commercial sales of marijuana this year and set forth how to award 75 new recreational licenses.
