* 6:08 pm - It hasn’t been officially announced yet, but the Illinois Federation of Teachers’ executive board just voted to endorse Dan Hynes for governor.
That’s a significant boost to the campaign, especially ahead of the IL AFL-CIO’s endorsement session early next week.
The teachers union has been upset at Quinn for numerous issues, not least of which is the governor’s stated goal of messing with their pensions.
Three other unions also endorsed Hynes today: Amalgamated Transit Union Local 241, United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1546, and the International Brotherhood of the Boilermakers, Iron Ship Builders, Blacksmiths, Forgers, and Helpers Local 1. According to a Hynes campaign press release, that’s about 40,000 people.
The two most well-known Democratic contenders running for a North Shore congressional seat split sharply today on the war in Afghanistan and extending federal tax cuts.
* 4:17 pm - Mark Doyle has withdrawn from the treasurer’s race. This isn’t much of a surprise to subscribers. As I told them earlier this week, Doyle, a Democratic campaign operative, had serious petition problems.
Doyle’s withdrawal leaves Robin Kelly and Justin Oberman in the Democratic primary.
UPDATE: Doyle’s withdrawal was posted on the Illinois State Board of Elections’ website. It has since disappeared. I’ll get back to you.
UPDATE 2: The board’s “Latest withdrawn” page no longer displays Doyle’s withdrawal, but when you look at Doyle’s individual page (nothing directly linkable because the ISBoE’s website completely sucks) you see this…
UPDATE 3: I was able to reach Doyle, who confirmed that he had, indeed, withdrawn. “I have neither the resources nor the money” to keep up the fight, Doyle said.
[ *** End of Updates *** ]
Also, Sen. Don Harmon has withdrawn from the 7th Congressional District Democratic Committeeman’s race. The incumbent there is Congressman Danny Davis. Joseph Sneed and Thomas Simmons have also withdrawn, leaving Davis, Brian Henderson and Edward James as the remaining candidates to date.
* In other news, state Rep. Julie Hamos announced the endorsement of Teamsters Joint Council 25 in her 10th Congressional District race and the Illinois Painters District Council #30 and the Sprinkler Fitters Local 281 today endorsed Raja Krishnamoorthi for Comptroller.
A coalition of political reform groups today launched an uphill effort to change the way legislative districts are drawn in Illinois, suggesting that power be taken away from political bosses and giving it to an independent board.
Dubbed the “Illinois Fair Map Amendment,” the would-be reformers are attempting to change the Illinois Constitution to establish a 9-person board to draw districts. The idea is to make the process more transparent and to prevent political leaders from carving out portions of the state to sway partisan leanings of districts.
Under the proposal, the panel that draws the maps will be required to release the plans for public viewing before they are voted on by the legislature. If approved, the legislature would have to approve maps by a 2/3rds margin, but if they rejected them more than twice the board would have the power to chose one of the proposed maps to automatically become law.
Further, the proposal attempts to prevent gerrymandering by requiring districts to follow geographic and municipal boundaries as much as possible. Further, area voting history cannot be taken into consideration when creating boundaries.
Click here for the proposal’s language and click here for the fact sheet. [Fixed links.]
* We spent a lot of time yesterday talking about Gov. Quinn’s false claim that Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias had signed off on a $500 million short-term borrowing plan and that Dan Hynes was the lone holdout. Giannoulias hadn’t signed off and Hynes said the governor’s office changed the plan several times and then set an arbitrary and almost immediate deadline for approval without providing any specifics.
Anyway, the governor’s office, which has not exactly been honest on this topic, responded to a few points in the coverage. One of those responses was to something I had written…
Back in October, Gov. Quinn was talking about borrowing $900 million short-term for healthcare and college scholarships. Behind the scenes, however, that number fluctuated wildly almost day to day and finally settled on $500 million.
The guv’s response…
Governor’s office has adjusted the dollar amount to accommodate the concerns of the Comptroller and Attorney General offices.
I asked the comptroller’s office for comment and here it is…
The Comptroller’s Office has consistently sought clarity from the Governor’s Office as to the details of their various borrowing proposals which they have been unable to provide. We don’t know what the Governor’s office is talking about and it seems increasingly apparent that they don’t either.
Oof.
The attorney general’s office said last night that they had simply asked the governor’s people to match their short-term borrowing request to statutory requirements.
So, once again, more distortions from the governor’s office.
The thing is, if Quinn had just waited until Giannoulias was really on board, he had a pretty good hit to use against the comptroller. But he didn’t wait, and he blew it. Badly. No excuse for that.
By the way, I just called the treasurer’s office and there’s nothing new to report from them.
* Meanwhile, some folks are complaining that the governor will deliver his State of the State address a few weeks before primary day…
His State of the State address could be a State of the Campaign address as well, some lawmakers say. Quinn delivers it Jan. 13 — less than three weeks before he tries to win the Feb. 2 Democratic primary election.
“It would appear to me that it’s nothing less than for the governor to take advantage of his office,” said Sen. Larry Bomke, R-Springfield.
Meh. He’s the governor. He’s entitled to give a SOTS address in January if he wants.
Hynes didn’t specify a philosophical opposition to the [slots at tracks] idea, but said, “It’s just not part of my plan.”
That may sound like inconsistent policy, but it’s consistent politics. Hynes’ campaign to wrest the governor’s office from Gov. Pat Quinn, a fellow Democrat, is based largely on Hynes’ asseration that Quinn has had a shifting, seat-of-the-pants approach to governing. [Yesterday] morning, Hynes presented Quinn’s apparent openness to exploring the racetrack-slots idea as another example of that.
“One thing I don’t want to do is budget on the fly,” said Hynes. “ . . . This week it’s slots at the tracks. What’s it going to be next week?”
Good point, but we need to get something done somewhere. I don’t really blame Quinn for trying to find an opening.
* In other campaign news, I received a rather weird e-mail from the Dan Seals for Congress campaign this afternoon…
Dear Friend,
Our opponents continue to spread outright lies about our campaign. One opponent sent out a campaign e-mail on Tuesday attacking Dan and another candidate. This other candidate then sent out an e-mail today. We’ve now received multiple e-mails and phone calls from people who, based on her e-mail, think that Dan made these false claims..
It is simply not true.
As we mentioned before, our opponents are bound to do anything. It’s time to stop the “he said, she said” political pettiness. Enough is enough already.
Apparently, Elliot Richardson sent out an e-mail making claims about Julie Hamos and then Hamos shot back in an e-mail, but didn’t mention Richardson’s name and just blamed the hit on an “opponent.” Some people evidently assumed that Hamos was referring to Seals, and that’s why Seals “responded” today. But that Seals e-mail certainly doesn’t clear up the issue. If anything, it just muddies things even more.
* Related…
* Hinz: Dan Hynes finally gets it right — on job-creation plan: But the plan doesn’t just propose expenditures. Mr. Hynes would make the existing EDGE tax credit and enterprise-zone programs contingent not just on jobs but jobs that pay higher wages. And he’d require companies that get incentives to pay the state back if they fail to meet the objectives of the deal.
* Quinn and Hynes trade shots over budget plan: “The problem is that the proposal changed four times over three weeks,” Hynes said. “And then yesterday we were told: Just sign off and we’ll work out the details later.”
* Democratic US Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias is going up on TV for the first time. Here’s the ad…
As I’ve told you, rival Democrat David Hoffman is already on the air [refresh your memory and watch it again by clicking here]. He’s reportedly spending in the neighborhood of $250K a week for two weeks with his ad, and the Giannoulias people say they’re essentially matching that number, but that their ads are also running Downstate. I should have the competitives soon, so I’ll let you know. The ad starts running tonight, but kicks in to higher gear tomorrow.
It’s noteworthy that this spot is about how he stepped in to stop a bank that was attempting to “liquidate” an Illinois business. That’s probably a subtle response to Hoffman’s ad, which CQ Politics pointed out includes these lines…
“Let’s take that fight to the U.S. Senate,” Hoffman says in the ad. “The bankers, the lobbyists and insiders have owned Washington for too long.”
The reference to bankers is an obvious jab at the Giannoulias, who used to manage his family’s Chicago bank.
Also, this ad is about jobs. Not enough candidates are talking about jobs right now.
…Adding… Script…
[Open to Hartmarx Plant]
Hartmarx Worker 1: I work here at Hartmarx
Hartmarx Worker 2: 32 years
Hartmarx Worker 3: 46 years
Hartmarx Worker 1: 43 years
HM Worker 3: Banks were looking to liquidate.
HM Worker 1: We were going to lose our jobs.
Alexi Giannoulias: I wasn’t sure if we could help the workers, but I knew we had to try.
HM Worker 1: One man, speaks from the heart.
HM Worker 2: Alexi really stood up with us.
[On Screen: Giannoulias to Wells Fargo: Back Off Hartmarx. Chicago Sun-Times, 5.7.09]
Alexi Giannoulias: We sent a message to this bank: If you want to do business in Illinois, you have to save these jobs.
HM Worker 3: There’s almost 600 jobs here that were saved.
Alexi Giannoulias [stand by your ad]: I’m Alexi Gianoulias and I approve this message.
HM Worker 3: We need more people like Alexi in politics; a person that cares
* If you’re an angry Republican and you live in the 10th Congressional District, you might love candidate Dick Green’s new TV ad…
I’m not sure I’ve ever heard people repeatedly yelling “Yeah!!!” at the end of a campaign ad before, but it may be right for these “town hall” times. More info…
The first Republican is on the air in the race for Rep. Mark Steven Kirk’s (R-Ill.) suburban Chicago seat. The ad buy is significant for businessman Dick Green (R), who is relatively unknown in the district with the GOP primary exactly two months away on Feb. 2.
Green, who pumped $230,000 of his own funds into his campaign last quarter, is up with a $100,000 cable buy over the next three weeks, according to his campaign. […]
There are several candidates running to for the GOP nomination, and the most competitive of the bunch are Green, fellow businessman Robert Dold and state Rep. Beth Coulson.
* The Question: Rate it?
…Adding… You should always watch an ad a couple of times before you rate it. Try watching it without the sound off first, since viewers get the vast majority of their information from the visuals, not the audio.
* It’s not often that I praise a state entity, but one surely deserves it today.
As most of you know, we started posting a whole lot of videos on the blog during session days last spring. The videos, most of which contained timely and important news, were warmly received and got tons of views.
The problem was that people at the Statehouse - particularly those with mobile devices - couldn’t watch them if they were using the WiFi network run by the Legislative Information System.
I want to post even more videos next spring (I’m adding an additional intern for that purpose), so I called LIS a couple of weeks ago and asked them if they would please, pretty please reconsider their policy. I said I understood they were worried about bandwidth problems, but that YouTube, at least, was now much more bandwidth-friendly.
I’m happy to report that LIS did, indeed, change its policy and that videos are currently watchable on its WiFi network.
Hooray!!!
LIS will be monitoring the load on its system, but I’m hoping it won’t be too bad and we can keep the video access forever.
Now, if we could only convince the Illinois State Board of Elections to revamp its horrific website and drag itself into the 21st Century I’d be a truly happy man.
The president of the Illinois Senate cast doubts Wednesday on thousands of slot machines sprouting up at Arlington Park and other horse tracks.
“I don’t think there’s a need for that right now,” Chicago Democrat John Cullerton told reporters at a Capitol news conference.
His comments came a day after the state’s racetrack owners pushed the idea as an alternative to legalized video gambling in local restaurants and bars. A network of video gambling terminals is supposed to help pay off billions worth of construction projects lawmakers approved this year.
State Senate President John Cullerton says he’ll again push for a higher tax on cigarettes. A dollar increase passed the Senate earlier this year, but the proposal stalled in the House.
CULLERTON: Maybe I can go over and help lobby, if the Speaker will let me come over to the House, I can go walk, walk and talk to some of the members and see if I can convince some of them to vote for it. […]
He says fewer smokers would save Illinois more money, by reducing Medicaid costs attributed to smoking-related health problems. Cullerton says he expects there will be enough votes to get a cigarette tax increase passed.
Bud Kelley is 77 years old and has never smoked his first cigarette.
But that hasn’t stopped the affable Kelley, who will step down at the end of the year after 34 years as executive director of the Illinois Association of Tobacco and Candy Distributors, from working to allow others to have that choice.
“I know it bothers some people, and I’m not saying it’s good for your health,” Kelley said. “But it should be up to you and me as a businessman to have freedom of choice.”
“It’s a great industry,” he said. “Tobacco was our first currency. It’s been around a long time, and it’s going to be around. Prohibition isn’t going to work. We’ve tried that once.”
I’ve known Kelly since I started writing about Illinois politics almost 20 years ago (whew, I’m getting old). He’s a darned good lobbyist and tells it straight. He’ll be missed.
* Related…
* Illinois Senate to study discipline gap - Analysis indicates that suspensions of black students have jumped 75% in past decade; similar punishments for whites fell in same period: Senate President John Cullerton told his staff Tuesday to write a resolution creating the task force, spokeswoman Rikeesha Phelon said. It will look at suspension and expulsion numbers, the reasons behind them and how they affect students, Lightford said. Gov. Pat Quinn was noncommittal. A spokeswoman said he believes school should be “free from discrimination” and added that he looks forward to working with lawmakers on the issue.
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* I’m not sure why anyone would release a poll that showed themselves at one percent, but whatever…
To: Jacob Meister Campaign Team
From: Dave Fako, Fako & Associates, Inc.
Re: Meister for Senate Benchmark Survey
The U.S. Senate Democratic Primary election is wide open, without a dominant frontrunner and Giannoulias in a weak position.
• Nearly half (49%) of Democratic primary voters are uncommitted in the election for U.S. Senator.
• Giannoulias holds a marginal lead in the primary with 33% of the vote. A significant majority (61%) of Alexi’s support is weak and vulnerable.
• Despite a late entry into the race, Meister starts in a similar position as Hoffman and Jackson. Meister holds 11% name recognition and earns 1% in the initial trial heat of the election, indicating significant growth potential.
• Hoffman’s name ID is very low (25% name recognition) and he gets 7% in the trial heat. Robinson-Jackson is recognized by 32% of the Illinois’ Democratic primary voters and starts with 10% of the vote in the primary election.
Fako is a good pollster, and he knows Illinois, so these results are trustworthy. It breaks down thusly…
Giannoulias 33%
Jackson 10%
Hoffman 7%
Meister 1%
Uncommitted 49%
Interesting…
• Giannoulias has a very weak job performance grade as State Treasurer. Only 36% of Democrats rate his performance positively while 30% rate it negatively. One-third of all Democratic primary voters cannot rate his performance as Treasurer.
The high negative kinda surprises me, but the “cannot rate” doesn’t. Statewide officials below secretary of state are usually unknown quantities to voters, especially during their first terms. Heck, Comptroller Hynes has struggled to bring up his name ID and he’s in his third term.
Meister also did an “informed” trial heat, meaning push questions. He doesn’t tell us what those push questions were, but this is how it ended up…
• In the informed test, Meister captures twice as many undecided voters as the other candidates. His message persuades nearly one-third (30%) of all uncommitted voters to
back him. Among initial undecided voters, Hoffman only gets 16%, Giannoulias takes
14% and Jackson only moves 9%. One-third of initial undecided voters remain
uncommitted in the informed trial heat.
That still leaves Giannoulias solidly on top.
MOE is +/- 4.03%, poll conducted November 17–19, 590 likely Democratic primary voters.
…Adding… Giannoulias’ campaign manager, Tom Bowen, has posted some of his campaign’s own poll numbers in comments. According to Bowen, Giannoulias’ job approval numbers are 60-17, far different than the Meister poll. The Giannoulias poll was taken Nov 12-16, of 600 likely voters, and had an MOE of +/- 3.9 percent.
* Related…
* Bernard Schoenburg: Senate candidates’ Afghan views are widely varied
Illinois college graduates who borrowed money to meet expenses are leaving school owing an average of $20,102 — up from $18,584 the previous year, according to a new study.
Chicago’s 75-year, $1.15 billion parking meter windfall would be nearly drained in just one year to provide token property tax relief and stave off tax increases, thanks to a $6.1 billion 2010 budget approved Wednesday.[…]
Despite complaints that Chicago’s future was being mortgaged, the City Council voted 38-to-12 to approve Mayor Daley’s plan to drain reserves generated by asset sales to solve the city’s worst budget crisis in modern history.
The Chicago City Council voted 38-12 today to approve Mayor Richard Daley’s $6.1 billion budget proposal largely intact, but not before aldermen offered a smattering of complaints.[…]
Ald. Thomas Allen, 38th, announced he would vote against Daley’s budget for the first time in his aldermanic career. Allen said the spending plan would fail to uphold the council’s pledge to maintain at least $400 million in parking meter lease money in a long-term reserve fund to replace the parking meter proceeds the city lost.
The Chicago City Council Wednesday signed off on Mayor Richard Daley’s budget for next year. That followed three hours of debate, and relatively tepid criticism from some of the twelve aldermen opposed to the plan.
Up to 100 jobs at the Chicago Park District could be eliminated from the payroll next year if unions do not accept furlough days, General Superintendent Timothy Mitchell said Wednesday at a district budget hearing.
However, race, income, or any other measure of diversity is irrelevant as long as a college-prep course is the exception for a Chicago high school student. We have a system that, in effect, puts high-achieving seventh graders on track for college and assumes that everyone else will choose between joining the Latin Kings and working at a fast food restaurant. Would parents in Winnetka stand for this? Why do we?[…]
College isn’t for everyone, but the fact that the Chicago school district has two high schools that are harder to get into than Harvard indicates that something is seriously wrong.
For the owner of a home with an assessed value of $100,000, the increase would amount to about $61, assuming the value of the home stayed the same. It would generate about $5 million for the city’s coffers.
While local law enforcement agencies are happy to receive grant money to pay for increased patrols this time of year, the Kane County State’s Attorney’s Office says a resulting increase in DUI cases could put a strain on the system.
In all, there have been 30 burials since Oct. 1 — even though the cemetery didn’t reopen officially until November — but in two cases cemetery staff began digging only to find caskets in the ground, cemetery officials said Wednesday. And in one case a bone, believed to be human, was found in the ground.
* Gov. Pat Quinn went off on Comptroller Dan Hynes today, claiming that his rival in the Democratic primary was dragging his feet on approving a $500 million short-term borrowing plan. Quinn also claimed that Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias had signed on…
“I’m ready to go, Alexi Giannoulias is ready to go, it’s time for Dan Hynes to stop dragging his feet and tell his people to sit down with our budget people,” Quinn said. “Now to be lollygagging along and meandering along instead of getting the job done is inexcusable. The people of Illinois expect every constitutional officer to do his or her job without politics and this is very important.”
“I talked to my budget director on Monday and on Tuesday, and I said, ‘What is the problem here with the comptroller’s office?’ ‘They’re still studying the matter.’ I know personally from my own experience as state treasurer it takes about an hour, maybe a half hour, to get this done. Now let’s get it done for the people.”
The only problem is that Treasurer Giannoulias hasn’t signed off on anything and hasn’t even seen the proposal…
“We haven’t seen anything from the governor’s office yet,” said spokesman Scott Burnham. “We haven’t been given any documents and if and when that happens, we’ll review it and make a decision based on the merits. The treasurer has previously expressed concerns about continuing to borrow, the state can ill afford to go into debt, but we also have a backlog of bills to health care providers that provide critical services.”
Oh, for Pete’s sake. I’m told Quinn’s office just reached out to Giannoulias’ office today.
You can listen to the audio of the governor’s rant by clicking here.
The governor has long been irked at Hynes for daring to run against him in the primary. Whatever. That’s politics.
But Quinn’s temperament really needs to be questioned when he does something as goofy as this. I mean, did he not think anybody would check out his story? What is wrong with him?
*** UPDATE *** It’s even worse than I thought, and I thought it was pretty bad.
Back in October, Gov. Quinn was talking about borrowing $900 million short-term for healthcare and college scholarships. Behind the scenes, however, that number fluctuated wildly almost day to day and finally settled on $500 million.
But that’s not the only thing that fluctuated. There are two kinds of short-term borrowing, failure of revenue and cash-flow. For weeks, Quinn wanted to do a failure of revenue bond, but then about two weeks ago he changed to cash-flow, so all the work that had been done by the attorney general’s office to make sure all the legalities were met was, at that point, for naught.
And it gets worse.
The governor’s office was apparently unable to provide the attorney general’s office with a list of expenditures for this fiscal year that was separate from last fiscal year. It’s too complicated to get into here, but the AG, for legal reasons, needs a separate list. Instead, after some back and forth, the AG’s office was told they’d have to get the numbers themselves from the comptroller’s office because the governor’s office couldn’t do it. That’s just bizarre and completely unprecedented.
And it gets worse.
The governor’s people gave conflicting accounts to the attorney general’s office about how much federal stimulus money was expected, but hadn’t yet arrived - the whole reason for the cash-flow borrowing plan. The accounts given by Quinn’s office varied by about $200 million.
And it gets worse.
Late Monday, Quinn’s office gave the AG a deadline of 6 o’clock Tuesday night to approve the borrowing plan - without the numbers and other information AG Madigan’s office needed to certify the borrowing as legal and proper.
Then, sometime yesterday, the AG’s office asked the governor’s people if the comptroller and the treasurer had given their approval. The AG’s folks were told that the treasurer had signed off - something we now know was untrue.
The problem, of course, is that the attorney general cannot act until both the comptroller and the treasurer approve the borrowing, so the 6 o’clock Tuesday deadline was absolute nonsense.
The governor’s office is planning to do a much bigger borrowing plan early next year to help the state catch up on its $4.5 billion in past due bills, so the interest and financing costs of this $500 million proposal seems a bit unnecessary in that context. As one person described it, this is like taking out a $25 payday loan when your house is being foreclosed. I think I may have an idea what may be going on here, but I think I’ll wait on that and fill in subscribers later in the week.
In short, this appears to be a complete foul-up from beginning to end and the governor and his people have displayed a gross lack of competence and truthfulness.
But, other than that, everything is fine.
*** UPDATE 2 *** From the governor’s office…
The source told you the Governor’s just reached out today to discuss short-term borrowing with the Treasurer’s office: Talks have been underway between the Office of Management and Budget and Treasurer’s staff, and Comptroller’s, for weeks on this issue.
State Treasurer has not signed off on borrowing plan yet: The Treasurer’s office has not been an obstacle to the plan going forward and has expressed an open mind about approving the short-term borrowing.
The sentence above was probably inartfully worded. The reaching out was a formal contact of the treasurer’s top attorney. As for the second part, saying the treasurer has an “open mind” is not the same as saying, as the governor did today, that the treasurer “is ready to go.” In fact, it’s completely different. More distortions.
*** UPDATE 3 *** This is kind of a long update, but it supports the attorney general’s office account. A quick e-mail from the comptroller’s office…
The Governor’s Office has proposed at least 4 different borrowing ideas in the last 3 weeks.
The Governor’s office has yet to satisfactorily explain specific details of the plan or how we can pay back another $500 million on top of the $2.25 billion we’ve already borrowed and the current $4.4 billion backlog (we also have to pay back $276 million to the rainy day fund).
We’ve asked the Governor’s office to tell us which of the outstanding bills he wants paid — $250 million would go to Medicaid (doctors, hospitals and nursing homes already are being paid within 30 days under the federal stimulus). That leaves $250 million to pay a backlog of $4.4 BILLION. The Governor’s office says agree to the borrowing, we will give you the details later. Well, since the plan keeps changing by the day, how can we do that? He’s telling vendors their problems will all be solved with this borrowing. They won’t be solved. It will just further delay payments because we will have another $500 million we will have to pay back before the fiscal year ends on June 30.
We’ve worked closely with the Gov’s office and his agencies to prioritize critical payments and will continue to do so. In fact, we recently paid more than $20 million the Gov’s chief of staff asked to be paid.
And here’s a timeline of events, according to the comptroller starting on October 27th. By the way, “IOC” means Illinois Office of the Comptroller” and “OMB” means “Governor’s Office of Management and Budget”…
Quinn emerges from leaders meeting and tells reporters he wants to borrow $900 million to keep state government afloat through the lean winter months. Says the traditional slowdown in tax collections between November and February could cause the backlog to grow even larger. “It’s a cash management device,” Quinn said. (Bloomington Pantagraph, Oct. 27, 2009) “You need to make sure we manage our cash” (Associated Press, Oct. 28 from Chicago Tribune) Says it will be paid back before the end of the fiscal year (Chicago Public Radio Oct. 28, 2009) Of the $900 million some $250 million would be dedicated to Medicaid (Illinois Issues Oct. 27)
Quinn says state will run out of money before the end of the year without emergency borrowing, says state can short term borrow nearly $1 billion for only 1 percent interest (Channel 7/ABC . Oct. 28, 2009)
Two weeks later……….
Nov 10, 2009
OMB officials make first telephone contact with IOC regarding borrowing. Indicate that they intend to issue $900 million in short term notes under “ failures in revenue” meaning a 30 day notice must be published with a corrective plan addressing said failures, in accordance with state law. Suggests possible two phase loan of $450 million each directed to MAP grants and Medicaid and other unspecified priorities. Law permits borrowing to be paid back over 12 months. IOC indicated that MAP grants were not due for payment until March or April and asked if plan was to reserve money until payments due. No response.
Nov 12, 2009
OMB Bond Director meets with IOC staff. Failures in Revenue borrowing discussed and OMB states intent to publish 30 day notice/ Corrective Plan by following day in order to finalize loan in late December. IOC expresses concerns about payback plan and asks for information on what bills will be prioritized under plan. $200 million in Map grants, $250 million in Medicaid referenced. Group health care also mentioned but no dollar amount. OMB provides tentative schedule of other bond sales planned during FY10.
Nov 18th, 2009
Bond Director calls IOC. Says Failures in Revenue borrowing no longer planned due to difficulties in projecting revenues/spending in FY 11. Wants limited borrowing of $250 million to be directed solely toward healthcare providers. Money must be paid back at end of June 2010. IOC asks questions about plan details and expresses concern with repayment given $2.25 billion in existing loans to be paid back between March and June. No deadline referenced.
Nov 19th, 2009
Bond Director calls again. Apologizes and says new plan is to borrow $250 million for Medicaid and $250 million more for general purposes. IOC again asks for details about where $250 million should be directed given $4.4 billion in unpaid obligations. IOC also again expresses concerns about repayment in context with existing loans. No deadline referenced. IOC asked about Quinn plan to bail out RTA/CTA and whether that was part of borrowing plan. Response was that another $10 million had been promised to Transit entity but when IOC said that we already owed RTA $180 million in unpaid obligations, there was no response.
Later that day Quinn announces $ 70.8 million in new spending allocations from lump sum appropriations.
Nov 23rd, 2009
Bond Director calls again to discuss concept of selling state payables, known as factoring, to financial institutions to provide relief to vendors who may qualify for such a program. Prior borrowing plan only mentioned in passing.
Dec 1st, 2009
Bond director says concurrence needed on borrowing by the end of the day to meet self imposed OMB Christmas Eve deadline for finalization. Only prior reference to any critical dates was in context with abandoned 11/10/2009 borrowing plan. No prior communication as to significance of 12/1/2009 as decision date. Attempts by IOC to once again obtain specific plan information unsuccessful.
* A supporter of Adam Andrzejewski’s GOP gubernatorial campaign e-mailed me earlier today to remind me that I hadn’t yet posted his new TV ad. Here it is…
* Cook County Board President Todd Stroger was not a happy man yesterday when the board overwhelmingly overrode his veto of the partial sales tax rollback. He lashed out at Gov. Quinn, who has been patting himself on the back for signing the reduced override threshold bill into law…
“Governor Quinn says he supports the rollback and this would probably stimulate Cook County. Well the state takes six and a quarter. I suggest they take a quarter off. Let’s make a resolution and send it to the governor. Maybe he’d like to stimulate all 102 counties instead of just Cook County.”
He also repeated his threat to challenge the new state law in court.
“This is just a piling-on, what happens when the mob mentality happens,” Stroger said, comparing himself to the three men lynched for a crime they did not commit in “The Ox-Bow Incident,” a 1943 movie starring Henry Fonda. “It’s the same thing. Just get enough people riled up and they’ll hang the first person they see.”
Commissioner Jerry “Iceman” Butler, said Stroger’s damaged credibility with commissioners likely hurt his push to keep the sales tax in place.
“No matter how much truth you tell them or how many facts you put on the board, they do not want to hear it because your credibility has been damaged. Even though you’ve fired all your cousins, you’ve still been damaged,” he said, an apparent reference to former county CFO Donna Dunnings, a cousin whom Stroger fired last spring.
The name “Stroger” has come to mean “toxic.” He has no credibility left.
Reducing the sales tax would force the independent board that oversees health care to shut two of three county hospitals and “many if not all of our neighborhood clinics. … Some people will die needlessly for lack of the health care our system provides today.”
Stroger said the lion’s share of new revenue from the sales tax increase is going to the health care system. That contention is disputed by the Civic Federation, a non-partisan government budget watchdog group, which determined only $46 million of the new tax revenue went to the health care system in the previous year.
“We are the government of last resort,” “Never in government before has a penny, the value of a penny, been worth so much, and we are talking about half a penny.” [said Commissioner Joseph Moreno, D-Chicago.]
A lot of this is psychological. The tax hike meant the sales tax burden hit ten percent and people simply freaked out. Suffredin is right…
They cut the county’s share of the sales tax from 1.75 to 1.25 percent and dropped the overall sales tax below 10 percent in the city of Chicago and other municipalities - the highest in the nation for major metropolitan areas - thus removing what Evanston Democratic Commissioner Larry Suffredin, the prime sponsor, labeled a “psychological barrier” for local consumers.
Everyone in Cook County is now going to save 50 cents on every $100 they spend. If you spend $10,000 on stuff during the next year, you’ll save $50.
He also points out…
Still, people are calling this “Crook County,” and the feeling is that every half-cent they can save is a half-cent less that the crooks can steal.
Yep.
* Meanwhile, the Sun-Times uses the override to look at the upcoming Democratic primary…
If pre-Barack Obama racial voting patterns hold, O’Brien might be expected to sweep the Northwest and Southwest Sides and the suburbs, leaving Preckwinkle, Stroger and Circuit Court Clerk Dorothy Brown, who’s still fighting a petition challenge, to divide the South and West sides.
Maybe, but I think Preckwinkle will do a lot better on the lakefront than pundits are currently realizing. O’Brien’s history of old-style politics won’t play well there at all. Preckwinkle’s message is aimed right at that demographic, and her campaign manager is smarter than the rest of the campaign managers put together. Her biggest question mark is money.
One Northwest Side committeeman predicts Daley will ultimately back the most electable African-American candidate — he thinks that’s Preckwinkle — so as not to anger African-American voters in advance of his next race for mayor. Could Daley, Madigan and the others officially stay neutral while quietly backing one candidate? Some committeemen let their workers circulate petitions for both Brown and O’Brien.
* The Chicago Tribune’s questionnaire for gubernatorial candidates poses just one question about job creation, and it’s way down the list. Odd, considering the state’s unemployment situation. Some candidates offer a few specifics, like Sen. Bill Brady…
I am proposing a $2,100 tax credit to businesses for every new job they create.
…Form the Illinois Jobs Creation Council to facilitate meaningful and ongoing dialog between business and labor in order to find ways to make Illinois more competitive with the frictional costs of doing business.
I will immediately put in place a Council of Economic Advisors composed of economists, university researchers, economic forecasters, business, and labor leaders to make policy recommendations that will make our state more productive and competitive.
Speaking in Rockford to launch a two-day tour to tout his “Clean Start for Illinois” plan, Hynes’ proposal calls for deferring taxes on qualified small businesses for three years, eliminating state taxes on new software and patent royalties to spur innovation and refocusing current business tax breaks and incentives to modernized job-producing industries.
You can see the plan in its entirety by clicking here. You should take a look. Some of it is quite good, but there are plenty of missing details.
As I told you yesterday, Hynes also slammed Gov. Quinn for dithering on the capital bill. Quinn responded…
“I’ve been working on job creation since I was elected state treasurer of Illinois,” Quinn said. “I worked night and day back in the early 90s on putting deposits in financial institutions, linked deposits, that created jobs all over our state, in agriculture, in small business, in housing. We helped women-owned business owners, we helped disabled people, minority business, I know a lot about creating jobs. I don’t think he knows much about it at all.”
“You know, so, people on the sidelines can complain all they want, all I know is I got the job done after 10 long years,” Quinn said of Hynes’ criticism.
The guv sure does get irritable with Hynes, doesn’t he?
But Hynes makes some good points about the delays in job creation. The governor is doing a fly-around today to cut ribbons on new projects around the state, including in Chicago, Urbana, Edwardsville and Murphysboro. That Murphysboro stop is the subject of a Pantagraph article…
When Gov. Pat Quinn arrives in Murphysboro Wednesday to break ground for a new building at Southern Illinois University, he’ll be just a short drive from three school districts still owed state money from seven years ago.
But, Quinn hasn’t made any plans to stop by and distribute any checks in Benton, Du Quoin or Johnston City.
Rather, the Chicago Democrat said Tuesday that money for the long-sought statewide construction program will only be trickling in for at least the next two months because of other pressures on the state budget. […]
And, though [Quinn] said some money will be raised for construction projects, the bulk of that cash won’t be rolling in until sometime next year.
The ripple effect from the state’s budget crisis keeps growing. […]
For 22 years, Norman has worked for Asi, a 34-year-old not-for-profit agency that provides in-home services for the elderly. It depends on the state of Illinois for 95 percent of its funding and over three hundred employees here have missed their last three paychecks because the state has not reimbursed Asi since last summer. […]
Even though they haven’t been paid since mid-October, most of ASI’s office and field staff continues coming to work. Executive director Rebecca Cruz has written letters to the department of aging asking desperately for reimbursement and in return, was threatened by another state agency. […]
Meanwhile, Addie Norman is afraid to quit $10.40 an hour job because she’s afraid that in this economy she wouldn’t find anything else. And there’s another reason she hasn’t quit.
“All my clients seem to need me. So, I don’t want to leave them. That’s why I haven’t quit,” said Norman.
As I’ve said many times before, these social service agency workers are our angels. And we’re screwing them.
* Meanwhile, some folks in the south suburbs are worried that Gov. Quinn is focusing on the proposed Illiana Expressway to the detriment of the Peotone airport…
Airport advocates, among them U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-2nd), fear the governor is shifting his attention away from the airport project and onto the Illiana, an unfunded project that lags far behind the airport in terms of investment and development.
Additionally, a Quinn source leaked to Sun-Times columnist Michael Sneed recently that Quinn is eyeing the Illiana as his “legacy” project - a jobs creator that would forever be linked with his name. Within a few days of that report, U.S. Rep. Debbie Halvorson (D-11th), a longtime supporter of the Illiana project, announced she would seek $5 million in federal funds to pay for further Illiana studies.
Quinn spokeswoman Ashley Cross declined to address the “legacy” issue and said the governor isn’t favoring one project over another.
* Related…
* Hynes: Innovation key to increasing Illinois jobs: llinois Gov. Pat Quinn [yesterday] told reporters in Chicago that he thinks the state should “take a look” at a controversial proposal by the horse racing industry to have slot machines at the tracks as a means of helping pay for a huge new infrastructure program.
* Illinois video gambling: Municipal bans fail to hurt plan’s dollar estimates, state says
* Legalized video gambling still at least a year away, regulators say
In the ads, McKenna - who headed the Illinois Republican Party for five years - maintains he is the “only outsider businessman running” in the seven-person GOP primary. Opponents have disputed McKenna’s contention that he is an outsider, and there are two other “businessmen” in the race who have never held elective office, Adam Andrzejewski of Hinsdale and Dan Proft of Chicago.
* Democratic US Senate candidate David Hoffman also has a new TV ad. I’m checking around to see how much money is behind it. Rate this one, too…
The message isn’t bad, but, man, could they have used a take where he didn’t blink his eyes so much? It’s kinda distracting to me.
But a group of credit agreement lenders who hold more than $4 billion in Tribune debt objected to another extension and asked for permission to submit their own reorganization plan focused on Tribune subsidiaries.
* Are high school juniors skipping out of state testing?
Huberman said the new policy was dictated by a 2007 U.S. Supreme Court ruling and by a federal judge’s more recent decision to void a 1980 desegregation consent decree that allowed CPS to use race to decide admissions to coveted schools.[…]
“This has absolutely nothing to do with any one racial group — white or otherwise — paying private school tuition. This is about the best system that we could come up with that is lawful, that will continue to ensure we have an inclusive system,” Huberman said, after joining Mayor Daley at an unrelated news conference.
* Dan Hynes threw a big punch at Gov. Pat Quinn today. He claimed the governor played politics with the capital bill so long that the state missed the construction season…
“Pat Quinn had the opportunity — and the responsibility — to put the people of Illinois back to work, but he failed,” the three-term Democratic comptroller said in his prepared remarks.
“Pat Quinn had a choice. He could have signed the capital bill immediately, created jobs and given the economy a jump start. Or he could use this essential legislation as a political chip, holding its passage over the heads of lawmakers reluctant to pass his misguided 50 percent income tax increase on middle class families,” Hynes said.
“Pat Quinn chose to play politics. So in this time of economic uncertainty and record unemployment, after yet another construction season has ended, not one job has been created from the capital bill. And future jobs are in doubt because the funding mechanism doesn’t seem to work.”
Hynes is right that Quinn tied up the capital bill after explicitly promising not to try and hold it hostage to other issues, like his tax hike. Speaker Madigan and others warned the governor not to break that pledge, but he did it anyway. Hynes wants him to pay the price for it.
The “not one job has been created from the capital bill” line might not be accurate. I don’t know. I’m asking the guv’s office for some info, and I’ll let you know what they say.
Speaking of the funding mechanism which “doesn’t seem to work” (according to Hynes), more communities are opting out of video poker. Arlington Heights is about to say thanks, but no thanks, and McHenry County is doing the same. As I noted below, the horse racing industry is offering to host the video terminals at their tracks, but the idea is a long shot at the moment. They gotta do something, though.
*** UPDATE 1 *** We’re finally getting some hard numbers on when video poker will start and how these opt-outs are impacting the cash flow. The answers: About a year and no big deal yet…
It’ll be at least a year before legalized video gambling machines will be online in bars, restaurants and truck stops across Illinois, state gambling regulators said today.
News of the delay in video poker came as regulators also said that the number of communities opting out of video gambling is not large enough yet to impact revenue projections. The state estimates it will rake in anywhere from $288 million to $534 million once video gambling is fully implemented.
Eric Noggle, a senior analyst for the revenue forecasting group, said the communities that have opted out only represent about 10 percent of the state’s population. That number would have to creep closer to 20 percent before revenue projections would have to be reevaluated.
*** UPDATE 2 *** From the governor’s office…
The assertion by Comptroller Hynes that no jobs have been created by the state’s capital construction program is incorrect.
We estimate that approximately 4,000 jobs have been created or retained to date by the early phases of the Illinois Jobs Now! capital program. In fact, approximately $360 million has been awarded to capital projects to date.
Governor Quinn signed the first components of the Illinois Jobs Now plan into law in April to ensure that projects started and jobs were created this year.
That was the “jump start” capital program from April, however, not the capital bill signed in the summer.
*** UPDATE 3 *** Is the train starting to move on video gaming at tracks? Maybe…
llinois Gov. Pat Quinn a few minutes ago told reporters in Chicago that he thinks the state should “take a look” at a controversial proposal by the horse racing industry to have slot machines at the tracks as a means of helping pay for a huge new infrastructure program.
“As far as the race tracks go . . . they have a proposal and we ought to take a look at it,” Quinn said in the news conference, which was piped to the Statehouse in Springfield. “I don’t think categorically I’m going to say `no’ to that.”
It may not sound like much of an endorsement, but in the on-going debate over expanded gambling, it’s a major opening of a long-shut door — and another indication of just how nervous Quinn and other leaders are about the failure of the state’s new video poker law to generate the kind of anticipated revenue they had hoped for.
[ *** End of Updates *** ]
* As expected, the Cook County Board voted to override President Stroger’s veto of the partial sales tax rollback. From Tony Peraica’s Twitter page…
The County Board proved today that it is not the City Council or the State Legislature, but that it is truly a legislative body. Congrats!
* From a press release by Democratic comptroller candidate Clint Krislov…
I am pleased to announce that the objection to my ballot petition will be withdrawn, ending any doubt that I will be on the ballot for the Democratic Nomination for State Comptroller.
That said, it has now been a week since my lawyer notarized the withdrawal, and the State Board of Elections has not yet received it from the Miller campaign. Although I presume Mr. Miller will actually file his withdrawal, it’s unfortunate that they chose such a slow way to file it, unlike the haste with which they filed his objection
Which brings me to the main reason for this press conference.
The current batch of challenges is just one part of what’s wrong with Illinois politics, but it’s an important problem. Owing to the shortness of time for this primary, and the fact that Illinois is one of the few states in which candidates may challenge each other’s petitions, this year we have a record number, more than 180 at someone’s count, of people trying to pre-empt voters’ choice of candidates.
1. Converting the ballot process into intramural Dodgeball to the Death, is not good. How do we hope to get good people to run for office, knowing they will be tied up in baseless accusations of fraud, forgeries or “pattern of fraud”, lodged against each other, and each other’s family and friends; all with no downside risk, done solely to drain resources, and eliminate competition. And, while the objection in my race is an annoyance that will pass, look at the judges races, with lawyers baselessly accusing each other and each other’s families of being criminals. This is wrong, and it is something I will address, both inside the campaign and by other avenues.
2. We need candidates with courage. Candidates, like Mr. Miller, who conduct these objections under the name of some campaign worker, do not display the courage we need in a Comptroller. How can we expect someone to stand up to the special interests in Springfield, if they’re too timid to even put their own name on their own challenges.
3. Can’t Count. Finally, Mr. Miller’s challenge should never have been filed. As we asked the election board to dismiss the objection, because as bogus as it was, it never even challenged enough signatures to drop me below the necessary 5000 signatures. If he can’t count to 5000 reliably, what’s he going to do when he’s dealing with a budget in the billions?
* Yesterday was Cyber Monday, when online sales really start to kick off during the holiday season…
Cyber Monday sales rose 14% this year compared to 2008 and consumers also bought nearly 30% more items per order versus last year, according to research firm Coremetrics.
Also, the firm said shoppers bought 10% more items per order online than they did in stores on Black Friday.
Gatehouse takes a look at estimated state sales tax revenue from online sales. It’s puny…
Estimated state sales tax collections on retail sales to households
* 2005 — $47 million
* 2006 — $57 million
* 2007 — $68 million
* 2008 — $73 million
* 2009 — $78 million
Illinois doesn’t automatically collect sales tax on online purchases. Hence, the low numbers.
* Rep. John Fritchey’s prodigious social media usage was profiled by Chicagoist this week. Fritchey adds his own two cents at his blog…
But the point that I tried to convey in the article is that I think the key to maximizing both the intention and the value of social media in the political arena is to use it to let the public see more of who you really are as opposed to simply repackaging the canned messaging that they get all too often from their elected officials.
I know elected officials with Facebook pages and Twitter accounts who likely couldn’t turn on their laptop if their lives depended on it; they have staffers handle everything. In my mind, that not only defeats the whole purpose, it actually sends just the opposite message from the one you want to convey.
He’s right. All of that is very important.
It’s also important that you not say something stupid online, like Jim Ryan’s campaign did the other day. As I told subscribers this morning, JRyan’s campaign found itself in hot water - again - with the Illinois State Rifle Association. From a Rifle Association press release…
The ISRA-PVF is today calling upon Illinois gubernatorial candidate Jim Ryan to retract claims that he received the group’s endorsement during his failed 2002 run for governor against Rod Blagojevich. Such misleading claims have surfaced on Ryan’s social networking internet sites in recent days. Additionally, individuals have made reports to the ISRA-PVF that Ryan campaign staffers have made similar endorsement claims when questioned about Ryan’s stands on issues important to law-abiding Illinois firearm owners.
The fact of the matter is, the ISRA-PVF declined to make an endorsement in the 2002 race for Illinois governor as neither the Republican candidate, Jim Ryan, nor his Democratic opponent, Rod Blagojevich, were deemed suitable for endorsement.
Ryan’s campaign then issued a kinda/sorta apology on its Facebook page…
Our campaign staffers in 2002 recalled working closely with ISRA on several issues and remembered being endorsed. If we erred in our recollection, we apologize. We have deep respect for gun owners in Illinois and for the ISRA. We look forward to working with them in the governor’s office, with or without an endorsement.
That would’ve been pretty easy to check. Sheesh.
* Speaking of ill-advised remarks, Greg Blankenship takes me to task for referring to Dennis Byrne as an ultra conservative today on the blog. He may be right about a possible mislabel, but his analysis is a bit off…
Maybe it’s just a knee jerk reaction to someone who disagrees with Miller. I guess disagreement means your some kind of extremist or something. I’ve asked in the comments section for a definition of an ultra-conservative is. Let’s see if I get answer.
As I noted in comments, I might define an ultra conservative as someone who labels suburban women voters as “out-of-touch suburban ditzes.” Just sayin, buddy. lol
* Tony Peraica is live-Tweeting the Cook County Board’s override vote of President Stroger’s veto of the partial sales tax rollback proposal. Have a look.
Here’s some other stuff on Twitter today…
* QuinnStories: Check out our first installment of Quinn Stories, a behind-the-scenes documentary on Governor Pat Quinn: http://ow.ly/Hvbt
* kmrasmussen: QuincyNews poll finds bad re-elect numbers for Rep. Phil Hare. 66% believe stimulus hasn’t helped western IL http://bit.ly/7jOwGz#twill
* And here’s today’s online video, from the Quinn campaign. It’s about the governor’s holiday card drive for the troops. Watch it…
What are you seeing out there on social media today?
* Related…
* Cop Blog, CTA Tracker Among Top Local Web Searches - Google Compiles Lists Of Unique Searches For Chicago, 30 Other Cities: The Chicago Police officers’ blog Second City Cop made the list with an assortment of transit, education and other local Web sites, is one of the most popular Google searches in the Chicago area this year.
* WUIS launches ‘alternative’ digital station: The station, called “Xponential Radio,” first arrived on the airwaves in mid-October and can be received using an HD radio or listening online at www.wuis.org, according to Bill Wheelhouse, WUIS general manager.
* 11:45 am - As I’ve told you before, Joe Laiacona is running against Rep. Deb Mell (D-Chicago) in the Democratic primary and challenged Mell’s nominating petitions because she wasn’t registered to vote at the address she used on her sheets. A hearing officer recommended that Laiacona’s challenge be rejected last week and the full Chicago Election Board heard the case today. Mell won.
I just got this e-mail from Laiacona’s attorney Rich Means…
Argued this morning before Chicago election board. We lost and are considering appealing to the circuit court.
More background here. Rep. Mell, of course, is the daughter of Ald. Dick Mell and the sister-in-law of Rod Blagojevich.
Despite no charges yet filed, a federal probe into alleged hiring fraud under impeached ex-Gov. Blagojevich remains active, Gov. Quinn’s office confirmed Monday.
This is the statement released by Quinn’s office late yesterday…
“There is an ongoing federal criminal investigation into unlawful acts by persons associated with the Blagojevich administration. The U.S. Attorney’s office asked the state not to do anything that might interfere with the investigation, and the state continues to honor that request.”
Quinn was reacting to a press release yesterday by Dan Hynes…
Last week, the Chicago Sun-Times reported that at least 70 Blagojevich appointees were holding onto their jobs despite Pat Quinn’s pledge to fumigate state government, including George Rada and Surami Garcia, who got their well-paying jobs by sidestepping veterans preference laws and then lying about it to investigators.
The report prompted the paper to editorialize “Why are we still paying their salaries?” It’s a fair question, and today Illinois Comptroller and Democratic candidate for governor Dan Hynes challenged Pat Quinn to answer it directly. Hynes further called on Quinn to fire Rada and Garcia immediately, and to give a full accounting of the status of the 70 or so Blagojevich appointees whose hiring has been called into question by federal prosecutors.
“I cannot fathom for the life of me why these two people, who managed to leapfrog 17 veterans for jobs at a time our nation is at war, no less – and then lied about it to investigators – continue to draw state paychecks and benefits at taxpayer expense,” Hynes said. “Pat Quinn owes the people of Illinois an explanation.”
The lawyer for those two employees, Rada and Garcia, was not pleased with Hynes’ statement…
Representing both Garcia and Rada, Draper called Hynes’ demand that the pair be fired a “cheap shot” and said neither should be penalized for possible wrongdoing under Blagojevich when they had no knowledge of it as job applicants
Draper said that Garcia was actually fired, but got her job back when she appealed the case to the state’s civil service commission.
US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald has been silent about the probe into Blagojevich’s hiring practices since he asked Attorney General Lisa Madigan to give him her files and stop her own investigation…
That had led to speculation the case has taken a backseat to the more sensational allegations lodged last December against Blagojevich, who is accused of trying to sell Illinois’ then-vacant U.S. Senate seat, among other corruption charges.
It’s possible that with the US Supreme Court taking a close look at the alleged over-use by federal prosecutors of the “honest-services fraud” law, the feds may end up charging Blagojevich or people around him with more stuff soon to buttress their case against the former governor.
Thoughts?
* Related…
* Illinois Continuing Legal Education Discusses Recent Media Events And Legal Professionalism: Illinois CLE presents a topical CLE event titled Tales from the Media II: Blagojevich, Interrogation Memos & More. The program is scheduled for Thursday, January 21, at the UBS Tower & Conference Center, One North Wacker Drive, Chicago. It will begin at 8:30 a.m. and adjourn at 12:45 p.m.
* Gov. Quinn has appointed countless blue ribbon panels since he took over the state’s top job in January. He created an ethics commission, a budget commission, a cemetery commission among others. He’s now looking at a new one…
Gov. Pat Quinn says he may consider a special commission to look at the racial disparity in how Illinois schoolchildren are disciplined. […]
Quinn said Monday he read with “interest” a report by The Associated Press that shows blacks account for half of all student suspensions even though they make up only one-fifth of the enrollment.
But he doesn’t like the idea of the General Assembly setting up a special commission to look at Quinn’s proposed Thomson prison sale…
Illinois Governor Pat Quinn says the state doesn’t need a panel to study the impact of selling the Thomson Correctional Center to the federal government.
That’s despite Republican calls to form a commission.
The GOP idea is most likely just a stall tactic, but they do bring up some valid points about the sale, including how local security will be handled. It would also be nice if somebody looked at what price we ought to be setting for that facility, and how a sale would impact the rest of the state’s prison system, which some (including AFSCME) contend is under-staffed and over-crowded. The Pantagraph makes a good point…
The proposed sale of the state’s nearly vacant Thomson Correctional Center to the federal government once again highlights the lack of long-range strategic planning when it comes to our state’s prison facilities.
By the way, Dennis Byrne’s column today has an interesting tidbit about Thomson. Normally, I wouldn’t post such an extreme statement, but Byrne is an ultra-conservative by nature, so I thought it was worth a look in that context…
Ironically, in opposing the Thomson transfer, Republicans have placed themselves on the side of the detainees, who would rather stay at Guantanamo. Zak (who for security reasons was only identified by this name), an Arab-American appointed by the U.S. government as a liaison to the detainees, told England’s Sunday Telegraph that the detainees would rather stay in Guantanamo than spend a life sentence, or years waiting for execution, in America. “They know (they) will not receive the same privileges as here,” Zak said. “Given the choice of being sentenced forever in Guantanamo or moved to supermax, it is, ‘No, can I stay in Gitmo?’ Here they can be outside, they can smell the sea.”
Illinois’ public health chief Dr. Damon Arnold is joining advocates and state lottery officials to raise awareness about AIDS.
Tuesday is World AIDS Day, and the Illinois Lottery will unveil a new Quality of Life scratch-off ticket called “Red Ribbon Bonus Bucks.” All proceeds will fund HIV/AIDS-prevention education and awareness across Illinois.
The state has the nation’s seventh highest number of reported AIDS cases, totaling 30,000 since 1981. Arnold is attending a news conference Tuesday in Chicago to highlight the toll and the new Lottery program.
* Springfield church among five Illinois sites to premiere AIDS documentary
Subsidies under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act began in March covering 65 percent of premiums for COBRA coverage, which is a continuation of health benefits offered by a previous employer’s plan to the departing worker.[…]
The stimulus funding made what before was considered unaffordable coverage for the unemployed possible.
While commissioners today are expected to successfully override Stroger’s veto of a half-penny-on-the-dollar rollback, the lobbying is expected to continue until they vote. Some commissioners have flip-flopped on the issue.
The political war over Cook County’s unpopular sales tax increase outwardly has pitted county board President Todd Stroger against a majority of county commissioners who want to roll it back.
But behind the scenes, the battle has involved labor unions that have stood with Stroger against the business community, which has been howling from the start about the July 2008 tax hike. Both sides have pushed their positions strongly in the tax controversy.
* Illinois political docket: Cook County tax showdown
Mayor Richard Daley’s administration today proposed using $1.5 million in new annual revenue expected from a lawsuit settlement to boost spending in next year’s budget.
Daley is facing a huge budget deficit of more than $500 million, while he dips into reserves from the parking meter lease deal that were supposed to last the city for years.
He’s cutting city services as he puts workers on furlough.
Yet his slush fund remains untouched, except for the projects he wants to spend it on.
Video gambling will not be allowed in Arlington Heights, despite gambling at Arlington Park and Trackside, the village board indicated Monday during its committee meeting.
Meeting as a committee, the village board expressed support Monday for a new, 3 percent tax on electric and natural gas usage as well as a property tax increase of 5.74 percent in the fiscal year that begins in May.[…]
In total, 25 positions would be eliminated, most through attrition.
City officials told bar owners Monday that a 1 percent sales tax will be added next year on “immediately consumable” beverages and food — and package liquor — to help stave off layoffs of police and firefighters.
* Canal to be poisoned to stem spread of Asian carp
* We’ve wasted millions on electric barrier boondoggle
That’s the first — pretending Asian carp aren’t already in Chicago — of two main reasons I don’t want the corps anywhere near poisoning the rebounding fisheries on our urban/suburban waterways.
Census tracts — not race — will play a key role in deciding admission to Chicago’s coveted magnet and selective-enrollment schools under a new proposal up for a Chicago School Board vote on Dec. 16.
A new admissions policy for elite Chicago public schools is little more than a plot to free up seats for middle-class white families tired of paying private school tuition, black aldermen charged Monday.[…]
The new policy followed a federal judge’s decision to void a 1980 desegregation consent decree that let CPS use race to decide admissions to the coveted schools. Now, census tracts, neighborhood income levels and other socio-economic indicators will be determining factors.
Over the last 15 years, aldermen have made at least four attempts to slap a ceiling on the number of dogs to eliminate noise and stench, only to be reined in by colleagues who don’t want to find themselves in the doghouse with dog lovers.[…]
Ald. Ray Suarez (31st) had hoped to break that losing streak by rounding up 27 co-sponsors. But, the avalanche of opposition at today’s License Committee hearing made it clear that he, too, would get the leash.
