* Thomas More Society press release…
On October 21, 2019 the Thomas More Society filed a complaint against Illinois’ Reproductive Health Act with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights. The new Illinois law requires health insurance policies to cover elective chemical and surgical abortions. According to the complaint, this mandate — which compels businesses and individuals to pay for even late term abortion coverage and offers no religious exemptions — violates the federal Weldon Amendment and Affordable Care Act
“This abortion-coverage mandate is a blatant violation of the religious and conscience rights of many who live or work in Illinois,” explained Thomas More Society attorney Michael McHale. “While the secular forces behind this mandate often erroneously object to any influence of religion on the state, here they had no hesitation in wielding state power against our sincerely held, common-sense religious beliefs to avoid paying for health insurance coverage of abortion.
The law, now known as Illinois Public Act 101-13, mandates every health insurance policy in Illinois that provides pregnancy-related benefits to provide coverage of elective abortions, and to do so without cost-sharing beyond that required for pregnancy-related benefits. It does not include any exemptions for religious individuals, religious organizations, or even churches.
The Thomas More Society, a national nonprofit public interest law firm and major force in the Constitutional defense of religious liberty, filed the complaint on its own behalf and on behalf of Flossmoor dentist, Dr. Richard Mantoan and his dental practice, Southland Smiles, Ltd. Both companies sponsor small group health insurance plans for their employees and offer a number of policy options purchased through BlueCross Blue Shield of Illinois. The new mandate requires both businesses to purchase health insurance policies that cover abortions.
The complaint details how the Illinois abortion-coverage mandate violates the federal Weldon Amendment, putting Illinois in jeopardy of losing billions of dollars of federal funding. The Weldon Amendment ensures that federal appropriations to the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education may not be issued to any government that discriminates against a “health care entity,” including an insurance plan sponsor, on the basis that it does not provide health insurance coverage of abortion.
“This is exactly what the Weldon Amendment prohibits,” McHale said. “Illinois cannot force those of us who do not believe in paying for abortions to either pay for abortion coverage or drop our insurance. Doing so will require Illinois to forfeit federal funding for essential programs such as Medicaid.”
“Additional provisions of this radical abortion policy will force Illinois taxpayers to foot the bill,” added McHale, referring to the federal Affordable Care Act’s provision requiring a separation of abortion costs from other health care expenses. “It’s a direct violation of federal law. We should expect better from our lawmakers.”
“We are confident that the Office for Civil Rights will take our complaint seriously,” declared McHale. “Federal law clearly prohibits this brazen attempt to encroach upon our rights conscience. We urge immediate intervention to halt this illegal mandate.”
The complaint is here.
* React from Brigid Leahy, Senior Director of Public Policy, Planned Parenthood of Illinois…
The Thomas More Society’s complaint against the Reproductive Health Act is the latest tactic in an ongoing campaign to end access to safe and legal abortion. The Thomas Moore Society couldn’t stop the Reproductive Health Act in the state legislature, so they are desperately turning to the Trump Administration for help in cutting off access to abortion in Illinois.
The Reproductive Health Act ensures that everyone can make a personal decision when it comes to reproductive health care, including birth control, pregnancy-related care, and abortion. Having adequate coverage for care means people have the ability to make the decision that is best for them. Everyone should have coverage for a full range of reproductive health care, including abortion with access to safe medical care. Providing insurance coverage helps ensure that they will be able to see a licensed, quality health provider. Ten years ago, insurance plans routinely covered abortion just like other health care services. But, in recent years, it has become harder for Illinoisans to get insurance that covers abortion. The Reproductive Health Act addresses this issue by requiring state regulated insurance plans that cover pregnancy-related care to include coverage for abortion. This requirement is similar to a Maine law that passed earlier this year. In addition, California, New York, Oregon, and Washington require all state-regulated private health plans to include coverage for abortion.
* Personal PAC’s Terry Cosgrove…
It’s no surprise that extremists aligned with President Trump, such as Peter Breen and the Thomas More Society, who want to make abortion and birth control illegal for all women, are doing everything imaginable to enforce their right-wing religious views on everyone in Illinois.
* The RHA’s chief House sponsor, Rep. Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago)…
Once again exhibiting their complete disconnect from reality and the truth, the Thomas More Society has found a special ally in their efforts to limit access to reproductive health care in Illinois – the Trump Administration. Having been soundly defeated in the legislature – even after engaging in misrepresentations and exaggerations about the impact of the RHA, it was inevitable that they would turn to their friends in the Trump-Pence Administration, still using the tired lies we rejected this session. While we advanced access to care in Illinois, Trump appointees in Washington have attempted block people from accessing the reproductive health care, including abortion care, they need. This is just a speed bump. It will not succeed.
I asked for some examples of the group recycling “tired lies” and she sent me these two…
- The health care right of conscience act remains intact and religious objections are respected.
- The preposterous fear-mongering over abortion late in pregnancy. This is the biggest red herring of all and completely disrespects both pregnant people and health care professionals in their suggestions that it is anything but a medical tragedy when there is no other option but to end the pregnancy. Nobody does this on a whim. No doctor and no parent. It’s infuriating.
…Adding… Sen. Melinda Bush (D-Grayslake)…
This complaint is just one more ineffective attempt to deprive women of their right to quality health care.
Illinois expanded access to care with the Reproductive Health Act despite opposition from anti-women groups like the Thomas More Society, who seek to force their extremist politics onto others and limit access to safe and legal abortion.
As we proved when we passed the RHA, Illinois will not let the Thomas More Society or the Trump Administration get in the way of women’s health. Reproductive care is health care.
34 Comments  
|
* Press release…
Governor JB Pritzker and the Illinois Department of Transportation released the department’s annual Multi-Year Plan of road and bridge projects across the state, which is the first to capture the historic impact of the Rebuild Illinois capital plan.
Using rigorous and objective criteria, IDOT evaluated the condition, frequency of use, and crash and fatalities across the state’s transportation system in planning the historic improvements. Over the next six years, $23.5 billion will be invested in maintaining, preserving and expanding 4,212 miles of roadway and 9.2 million square feet of bridge deck statewide.
A full list of road and bridge projects coming across the state can be found here.
“All together, these road and bridge projects will create and support hundreds of thousands of jobs over the next five years for hardworking Illinoisans in every part of our state,” said Governor JB Pritzker. “Illinois has some of the most important roads in America – let’s make them outlast and outperform those across the nation.”
“In my nearly 30 years at this agency, today might be the most important day in our history,” said Omer Osman, Acting Secretary of the Illinois Department of Transportation. “This Multi-Year Plan gets us on the path to fixing our roads and bridges, putting policies into action that ensure our transportation system in Illinois is reliable, safe and provides economic opportunity for generations to come. It is the blueprint for how we Rebuild Illinois.”
This new Multi-Year Plan represents a shift in Illinois’ approach to its roadways and bridges. Previously, the state waited to rebuild until projects had deteriorated so much that they presented safety hazards; under guidance from the Federal Highway Administration, Illinois will now prioritize maintaining its system over time, which is also a more cost-effective way to manage long-term capital needs. To achieve that, this plan dedicates more than 75% of the funds to reconstructing and preserving roadways and bridges, 16% to strategically expanding the system in areas where data have shown the investment will be highly effective and the remainder for necessary traffic and safety improvements.
Of the major categories of state investments in the plan, $7.58 billion will go toward roadway reconstruction and preservation, $4.99 billion for bridge replacements and repairs, $1.59 billion for safety and system modernizations like interchange reconstructions, $3.08 billion for strategic expansion of the system and $2.11 billion for system support like engineering and land acquisition.
The additional state investment in Rebuild Illinois has also allowed the department to maximize federal dollars, bringing in tens of millions annually that would have otherwise been left on the table each year.
The FY20-25 Multi-Year Plan serves as a baseline plan in the Rebuild Illinois capital program. Updated plans, based on revenue and evaluation metrics, will be released each year and adjustments to projects will be made on an annual basis through the MYP.
Needless to say, they’ll need to focus on that “rigorous and objective criteria” a lot in the coming years. It certainly hasn’t started out on a great foot.
* District 1…
Highway District 1 encompasses six counties in northeastern Illinois and includes the city of Chicago, suburban Cook County, and the five collar counties of DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry and Will. The state highway system in District 1 consists of 2,720 miles of highways and 1,448bridges, supporting more than 76million miles of travel daily.
The program for state and local highways will average $3.91 billion annually for the FY 2020-2025 period. Approximately $6.63 billion will be provided during FY 2020-2025 for improvements to state highways in District 1.
…Adding… Gov. Pritzker was asked about this today…
Illinois Chamber of Commerce CEO Todd Maisch said state funding is there for five years under the Rebuild Illinois plan. However, he said the federal government, which sends tax dollars to Illinois for infrastructure, wants to see a ten-year infrastructure plan.
“We think there should be different options on the table other than just the gas tax,” Maisch said.
Pritzker joked that the reporter was announcing his bid for a second term while he was just in his first year in office. In other words, he didn’t answer the question. But the gas tax has now been indexed to inflation and not all of the money is being used to pay off bonds, so it does have some sustainability.
4 Comments
|
* Fran Spielman…
Mayor Lori Lightfoot acknowledged Friday she will have no choice but to raise property taxes — which were more than doubled by former Mayor Rahm Emanuel — if her agenda falls flat in the General Assembly’s fall veto session.
Lightfoot’s heavy-lift requests for a graduated real estate transfer tax and a casino gambling fix — either through city-state ownership of a Chicago casino or a revised tax structure — face long odds in Springfield amid a blockbuster corruption scandal that has spread from Chicago and the [west] suburbs to Springfield. […]
“It’ll be very difficult to avoid a property tax increase if we do not get help from Springfield. … There are limited tools that a mayor can use to generate substantial revenue. Property tax is really chief among them,” the mayor told the Sun-Times.
“It’s certainly my hope to avoid a large property tax increase. I’ve heard that message loud and clear — whether it’s people coming up to me on the street, our budget town halls, people who filled out the surveys. They don’t want a property tax increase. That has become a real sticking point for people. But if we don’t get those two things, our options are severely limited.”
There’s more so click here.
*** UPDATE *** Greg Hinz…
Mayor Lori Lightfoot is aiming at another group to help her close a yawning city budget gap: restaurants and their customers.
A few hours after unveiling a $40 million tax on rides from Uber, Lyft and other ride-sharing firms, Lightfoot’s office confirmed that she’ll also seek a $20 million new tax on restaurants.
The quarter-percentage-point levy would apply to all food and beverages sold at retail establishments. Combined with levies by other governments including Cook County and the Metropolitan Pier & Exposition Authority, the tax on restaurant bills would rise to as much as 11.75 percent.
30 Comments
|
* WBEZ…
Federal investigators are looking into allegations that Commonwealth Edison hired multiple politically connected employees and consultants in exchange for favorable government actions, including electricity rate increases, WBEZ has learned.
A source involved in the investigation said authorities believe many of the clout hires at the state’s largest electric utility got paid but did little or no work, and some of them have ties to Illinois House Speaker and state Democratic Party Chairman Michael Madigan of Chicago.
In another previously undisclosed development, agents investigating those hires are also probing the role played by Jay Doherty, a longtime lobbyist for ComEd and president of the City Club of Chicago, the source said. The City Club is a prominent public affairs speaking forum that’s a regular stop for Illinois’ top politicians. […]
On Thursday, the lobbying firm of Michael Kasper, a top legal aide and advisor to Madigan, informed the state that it had ended its relationship with John Hooker, a lobbyist with decades-long ties to ComEd.
Go read the rest.
Hooker crafted ComEd’s Statehouse comeback from the abyss with Mike McClain. He later lobbied for ComEd through Kasper’s firm. He has no other listed affiliations on the state lobbyist list.
Doherty is still listed as a registered ComEd lobbyist as of 1:58 this afternoon.
*** UPDATE *** Attorney General Kwame Raoul is scheduled to speak at the City Club next week. I asked his press office if he still planned to attend in light of today’s WBEZ report…
Yes, we still plan to speak before the City Club on Monday. We are looking forward to the opportunity to share updates from our office with attendees, as well as the media.
35 Comments
|
CTU strike bits and pieces
Friday, Oct 18, 2019 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Did Tribune photographer Abel Uribe capture this year’s version of the “Rahm Emanuel likes Nickelback” CTU strike sign? Judge for yourself…
Hilarious.
…Adding… With a hat tip to Chicago Bars, here’s the answer from a candidates debate…
Marin also asked the candidates if they drink Malort, a booze that’s popular with some millennials and hipsters. None of the candidates stood up for the liquor.
“Only under duress,” Lightfoot said. “That is the worst-tasting alcohol ever.”
* Meanwhile…
Sources said the two sides met for a few hours and broke for a CTU rally. The mayor’s frustrated forces were also told CTU President Jesse Sharkey had a dinner to attend and union officials had a conference this weekend.
As subscribers know, that conference would be the Illinois Federation of Teachers convention in Rosemont, which starts today.
But…
“I’m concerned that there’s not a sense of urgency to get a deal done,” Lightfoot said Thursday in a joint interview with CPS CEO Janice Jackson on “Chicago Tonight.” Lightfoot said CTU cut short bargaining Thursday morning after about three hours.
Responding on “Chicago Tonight,” CTU President Jesse Sharkey strongly refuted that claim and others.
“I lost track of the falsehoods,” Sharkey said about Lightfoot and Jackson’s interview. “It’s riddled with things that are not true.”
Sharkey says he spent all day at the negotiating table until he left for a rally, and even then, the CTU had its “entire rank and file negotiating team working on proposals. We had our lawyers there trading proposals back and forth,” he said. “We put in a hard day at the table.”
* Politico…
While thousands of Chicago Public Schools teachers took to the streets Thursday to strike for a contract that meets their demands, negotiators from both sides of the table tell Playbook they’ve made progress on one important issue — class size.
CPS has agreed to identify “schools in crisis in class-size needs,” according to a source within the Chicago Teachers Union. The school district also called for a joint CPS-CTU committee that would identify class size numbers regularly — maybe monthly — in schools with a greater need. On the table is about $9 million to cover such an effort, “a drop in the drop of the bucket” of CPS’ proposed $7.7 billion budget, the source said. “It’s the beginning of a discussion… It’s huge.”
But this is from the Sun-Times…
Both sides said small steps were taken as negotiations continued through Thursday evening
* Nice touch…
But a clever riposte…
* More thundering from the man who yells at clouds…
No matter how this strike ends, and it will, eventually, the Illinois political class should read another book to the people of Chicago, its suburbs and the rest of the state:
“The Road to Serfdom,” by F.A. Hayek, about free people losing liberty to authoritarian control.
And just who are the serfs in Illinois?
The property taxpayers, who are the serfs of the new Democratic machine. Because we serfs live to serve the masters, don’t we?
* This same lone teacher crossed the one-day CTU picket line in 2016, so I’m thinking he probably wasn’t too difficult to locate. Just sayin…
* Keep up with the strike news today via these posts…
* Sun-Times Live Updates
* Tribune Live Updates
62 Comments
|
Lightfoot unveils congestion tax
Friday, Oct 18, 2019 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Tribune…
Mayor Lori Lightfoot will seek to more than triple the tax charged on most solo ride-share patrons heading in and out of downtown Chicago as part of her plan to reduce congestion and raise much-needed money to shrink a massive estimated $838 million shortfall in the 2020 budget.
Lightfoot’s plan to bring in new revenue and curb traffic congestion would hike the tax on solo riders using services like Uber and Lyft elsewhere in the city by 74%. That’s despite the fact most outlying neighborhoods don’t face nearly the heavy traffic problems seen in the downtown area.
* From the mayor’s press release…
Based on peak congestion locations and times, the City is proposing a new variable Ground Transportation Tax (GTT) structure. Under the current GTT, a flat rate of $0.60 is assessed per trip citywide, and a $5.00 flat rate is assessed per trip in special zones (the airports, Navy Pier and McCormick Place). As part of an effort to incentivize shared rides to combat both congestion and rising vehicle emissions in Chicago as well as encourage use of higher efficiency modes of like transit downtown, the City proposes the following progressive structure:
Decreasing the GTT on all citywide shared ride-hailing trips from $0.60 per trip to $0.53 per trip.
Increasing the GTT on all citywide single ride-hailing trips from $0.60 per trip to $1.13 per trip.
Assessing a downtown zone surcharge, placing an additional $1.75 per trip for single rides and $0.60 per trip for shared rides.
No changes are proposed to the current $5 special zone fee, the $0.10 per trip accessibility fee or the $0.02 per trip administrative fee. […]
Representing areas among the highest density of trips citywide, the proposed structure will target ride-hailing trips in the downtown zone, a map of which can be found attached, during the hours of 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. on weekdays, when congestion is most prevalent. To ensure continued, reliable access for customers citywide—particularly for the south and west sides—the city’s progressive structure will offer a discount on shared trips in the neighborhoods. Shared trip requests on south and west sides can range upwards of 50 percent of all requests, in comparison to less than 30 percent on the north side and downtown.
The mayor’s congestion study is here.
Thoughts?
…Adding… From comments…
“Lock Box” doesn’t interfere with putting the revenue into the general fund?
That’s a good question. Checking now.
…Adding… From a rideshare spokesperson, here are what $10 rides will look like after added fees…
Chicago Central Business District $13.00
Chicago Transit Deserts $11.25
Seattle Proposed $10.75
Rhode Island $10.70
Washington DC $10.60
Boston $10.20
Los Angeles $10.10
38 Comments
|
|
Support CapitolFax.com
Visit our advertisers...
...............
...............
...............
...............
...............
...............
|
   
|
Hosted by MCS
SUBSCRIBE to Capitol Fax
Advertise Here
Mobile Version
Contact Rich Miller
|
