Isabel’s afternoon roundup (updated)
Tuesday, Mar 5, 2024 - Posted by Isabel Miller * The Senate voted 37-20 to pass SB15, which would elect the Chicago school board… [From Rich: As Senate President Harmon explained today, ten elected members would represent the entire city for two years with ten members appointed. Then, after two years, those ten districts would be cut in half and all twenty members plus the chair would be elected. There’s more to it, but that’s the basic gist.] * Press release…
…Adding… Senate Republican Leader John Curran…
* The bill passed out of committee on a 9-4 partisan vote earlier today… * WTTW…
* Sun-Times…
* Here’s the rest…
* Capitol News Illinois | Funeral home director subject to ‘scary, filthy freak show’ complaint surrenders license: Moran Queen-Boggs funeral home director Hugh Moran signed a consent order on Friday, March 1, a copy of which was obtained by Capitol News Illinois. In it, he agreed never to reapply for his funeral director or embalmer license in the state. * SJ-R | SIU School of Medicine scholarship challenged on race, gender identity discrimination grounds: The scholarship in question, the Tracey Meares Scholarship, is eligible to U.S. citizens in their fourth year of medical school in “good academic standing.” Where EPP founder and Cornell law professor William A. Jacobson takes issue are the race and gender identity-based criteria. Per the SIU School of Medicine website, the scholarship is open to students who are Black, Hispanic or Native American and those identifying as LGBTQ+. The award winner receives a $1,000 stipend to cover housing and travel costs throughout a four-week resident rotation. * Crain’s | Rivian laid off about 100 Illinois workers: The Illinois layoffs are just a tiny fraction of its workforce here. Rivian employs more than 8,000 people in Normal, about 7,000 of whom are hourly workers who produce electric trucks, SUVs and delivery vehicles. But it also has engineers and designers at the facility, the company’s only production plant. * Daily Herald | Hoffman Estates latest suburb asked to adopt Gaza cease-fire resolution: Schaumburg village board members heard from nine people last week asking they pass a cease-fire resolution, but ultimately chose not to act on a request, saying it was not relevant to the operations of the town. The decision led some advocates to verbally assail board members, leading them to recess their meeting. * WCIA | Champaign Board of Education meeting erupts in heated discussion, ends with member resignation: After approving new business and listening to public comment, discussion began between board members, which quickly turned heated between Board Member Betsy Holder and Board President Gianina Baker. Holder requested more transparency within the district, wanting to specifically know what the district is spending money on. She pointed to a $38,000 monthly legal bill that she was told was “confidential information.” * WCIA | Champaign School Board member resigns, citing ‘mistrust, missteps and misinformation’: Near the end of the March 4 meeting, Jamar Brown, Champaign Unit 4 School District Board Vice President, read a statement reflecting on many positive moments during his first term on the board. However, he called out his experience with his second term on the board as one filled with “mistrust, missteps and misinformation”. Brown noted that he saw a number of attacks pointed at the Champaign School District, but said what was “more alarming was the self-inflicted wounds we were doing to ourselves.” * Tribune | Support staff at Crystal Lake D47 file unfair labor practice charge after district hires staffing firm: Crystal Lake Association of Support Staff, or CLASS, the union representing Chaix and more than 100 paraprofessionals across 12 schools in District 47, filed an unfair labor practice charge with the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board in October after district administrators retained a recruiting firm to hire temporary employees. The union said the move was made illegally and without giving them notice. * SJ-R | Springfield’s first cat cafe holds soft opening. Everything you need to know: The Cat’s Pyjamas, Springfield’s first cat café officially opened its doors to the public last Saturday and Sunday. After completing building repairs, the business welcomed a combined 130 patrons in a soft open during the weekend. * AP | Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and Threads logins restored after widespread outage: The outage comes just ahead of Thursday’s deadline for Big Tech companies to comply with the European Union’s new Digital Markets Act. To comply, Meta is making changes, like allowing users to separate their Facebook and Instagram accounts so personal information can’t be combined to target them with online ads. It’s not clear whether the outage is connected to any preparations Meta might be carrying out for the DMA. * D Magazine | Here’s Why Jalapeño Peppers Are Less Spicy Than Ever: “As more growers have adopted drip irrigation, more high-tech farming tools to grow the peppers, they’ll tend to be milder,” Walker told me first, as a sort of throat-clearing exercise before the real explanation. “But there’s more to it than that.” The truth is more like a vast industrial scheme to make the jalapeño more predictable—and less hot. * Sun-Times | CTA bus driver, passenger rescue 14 residents from burning South Shore homes: “We started banging on doors and yelling ‘fire fire fire!’ at the top of our lungs and just trying to wake as many people up and alert as many people as we possibly could,” Adamopoulos said, adding that he didn’t think about his own safety as he ran toward the flames. “The only thing I was focused on was getting the people out.”
|
Pat Quinn to back GOP-sponsored constitutional ethics amendment (Updated)
Tuesday, Mar 5, 2024 - Posted by Rich Miller * Media advisory…
Rep. Spain’s proposed constitutional amendment is here…
* I asked Rep. Spain to explain his proposal…
…Adding… Press release…
|
Live coverage
Tuesday, Mar 5, 2024 - Posted by Rich Miller * You can click here or here to follow breaking news. It’s the best we can do unless or until Twitter gets its act together.
|
« NEWER POSTS | PREVIOUS POSTS » |