* 12:41 pm - Just 87 members are present in the House today. Listen or watch here.
* 12:45 pm - IL AARP takes a swipe at the guv for eliminating or cutting increases in funding for “programs and services that are essential to the welfare and safety of thousands of older adults in Illinois”…
Caring enough about seniors to offer them free rides should also translate into making sure that older Illinoisans have fully funded programs and services so they can live independently and with dignity in the communities of their own choice.
* 12:51 pm - The House was led in prayer today by Rep. Tim Schmitz, who was sent a prayer used in the Indiana House of Representatives several years ago…
Almighty God, You who created the heavens and the earth, light and darkness, the waters and the dry land, the stars and the moon, the plants and the animals, Adam and Eve in six days, help these hardworking legislators that they might successfully complete their work in sixty-one. Then after You have done that, please enlighten the governor as to the wisdom of their accomplishments so that they might rest securely in the knowledge that he won’t undo all the good they have done.
Amen.
LOL.
* 12:56 pm - The Illinois Federation of Teachers has sent a letter to Senate President Emil Jones…
We urge you to immediately reconvene a regular session of the Senate to act on the overrides.
Read the full letter here. Read the IFT’s letter to Speaker Madigan here.
* 12:57 pm - The House appears to be adjourning until tomorrow.
* 1:01 pm - GOP US Senate candidate Steve Sauerberg trumpets his polling numbers…
The polling, conducted by Southern Outreach, an Atlanta-based firm, shows Durbin struggling to break 50% in the uninformed ballot matchup against Sauerberg. In a head to head with Dr. Sauerberg, Durbin leads 52% to 35%. Outside of the Chicago-metro area, Durbin fails to garner 50% and only leads Sauerberg 47% to 40%.
The independent Rasmussen Reports recently polled the race at 61-27 for Durbin.
*** 1:07 pm *** The House has adjourned and will go to committees at 2 o’clock. The big action will be tomorrow. I doubt I’ll have more updates here for a while, but check back anyway.
*** 1:25 pm *** Uh-oh…
As GateHouse Media Inc. stock sank more than 20% in early trading Tuesday — briefly touching $1 a share — Morningstar released a trenchant report declaring shares of the acquisitive community newspaper publisher “could be worthless.”
“Because of the company’s exposure to a challenging advertising environment, a debt-heavy balance sheet, and declining cash flows, we think the equity shares could be worthless,” stock analyst Tom Corbett wrote. […]
Morningstar also said GateHouse is close to violating one or more of the covenants on its huge debt. “Should that happen, its debt could become due immediately, resulting in a possible liquidation scenario,” Corbett wrote.
GateHouse owns the State Journal-Register, Peoria Journal Star and a bunch of other Illinois papers. It’s trading at $1.05 right now. Oy.
*** 3:02 pm *** The House Executive Committee moved a drastically scaled back capital plan to the floor this afternoon. The proposal would reportedly be worth about $5 billion $1.8 billion - far less than the governor’s $34 billion plan. But the House version will require no new money. The billion dollars in state cash $360 million - to be used to leverage about $4 billion $1.8 billion in federal money - will come out of the state’s Road Fund. More in tomorrow’s Capitol Fax.
