///BREAKING/// Former Chicago Ald. Edward Burke, 80, sentenced to 2 years in federal prison in a corruption case that rocked city politics and ended the Democratic stalwart’s storied and controversial six-decade career. pic.twitter.com/PcxScppS6n
…Adding… That sentence seems at odds with what the judge said at the beginning of today’s proceedings and toward the end…
Kendall tells him she intends to fashion a sentence that prevents Burke and others from committing like crimes, promotes respect for the rule of law, and avoids any unwarranted sentencing disparities (all of which is how she is supposed to proceed).
Kendall says it seems askew to think that Danny Solis will get "absolutely no" prison time for his own misdeeds. "It is uncomfortable for me to see that when the government steps up and says you must send a strong message" that Solis is not even getting a conviction.
The sentencing guidelines called for a maximum of 8 years behind bars.
* But…
Kendall says she's never seen so many letters of support. "So many of these actions were unsolicited, small, altruistic acts of kindness. …I have never seen anyone go to so many funerals. He goes to all of them."
…Adding… The BGA points out that the sentence is less than half of what the defense had requested…
Former Chicago alderperson Ed Burke today was sentenced to two years in prison and fined $2 million for his conviction on 13 charges, including racketeering, conspiracy, extortion and bribery. The sentence is a relatively light one, sparing Burke the lengthy prison stay of up to 12 ½ years requested by federal prosecutors.
Federal sentencing guidelines, which are not mandatory, called for between 78 and 97 months, based on the financial cost of his crimes, according to presiding judge Virginia Kendall. The defense had requested between four and five years in prison.
In response to the sentencing, Better Government Association President David Greising stated, “Today’s light sentence calls into question the principle of equality before the law. Despite Ed Burke’s betrayal of public trust, the powerful and connected of Chicago lined up to plead for leniency. Judge Kendall herself said she was influenced by this. But to those who believe in accountable government, it was a disappointing spectacle, putting personal allegiance ahead of the public interest, and should have had little weight on imposing a just sentence. ”
Numerous high-profile political figures wrote letters to the court requesting a lenient sentence, including former and current alderpersons. “Ed Burke was convicted for gross abuses of public trust while serving as one of Chicago’s most powerful alderpeople,” said Greising. “The sentence indicates the vestiges of that power persist.”
The Better Government Association’s policy team has advocated for banning lobbyist contributions to city elections and an end to the use of so-called “aldermanic prerogative” to block zoning changes in an alderperson’s ward. The organization also supports a long-stalled ethics ordinance update that the mayor’s administration has refused to support.
Greising called on City Council to make a statement by quickly approving reforms as a signal of their intent to clean up city government. “City Council has an opportunity to show that abuses of power like Ed Burke’s will no longer be tolerated in their body,” said Greising. “With or without the mayor’s support, the council should move forward on ethics reform.”
…Adding… Burke could use his campaign funds to pay off the fine…
I don't know. But politicians who were around in 1998 - when the state changed the law - can convert whatever they had on June 30, 1998 to personal use.
* Ed Burke’s sentencing hearing is still in progress as I write this. But you can check out these threads from Jason Meisner and Jon Seidel for live updates.
* Sens. Julie Morrison and Celina Villanueva…
State Senators Julie Morrison and Celina Villanueva responded Friday to the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling that upheld a federal law restricting firearm possession for domestic violence abusers.
“This decision reinforces the intent behind laws like Illinois’ Firearms Restraining Order Act, which I championed to prevent tragedies by keeping guns out of the hands of people who demonstrate threatening behavior,” said Morrison (D-Lake Forest). “When a credible threat to the physical safety of another person is identified, it is imperative that action is taken swiftly — the consequences of not intervening are too great. I commend the U.S. Supreme Court for upholding these lifesaving protections, and I remain committed to advocating for tangible solutions to keep our communities safe.”
“Domestic violence situations can escalate quickly when firearms are involved, and these restrictions are a vital component in the effort to reduce and prevent domestic violence-related homicides,” said Villanueva (D-Chicago). “There is still more work to do when it comes to protecting survivors and their families in Illinois, but I am glad to see these restrictions upheld at the federal level. I am hopeful that this will continue, on a state level, for us to move forward with Karina’s Law.”
Governor JB Pritzker and the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity(DCEO), local officials and IRONMAN leadership today announced that Rockford will host the IRONMAN 70.3 triathlon beginning next year in 2025 through 2027. Supported by a $800,000 grant to the Rockford Area Convention & Visitors Bureau (Go Rockford) as part of the state’s $15 million Tourism Incentive Grant Program, this is the first time the IRONMAN will be held in Illinois. The race is expected to generate upwards of $45 million in economic impact over three years.
“I’m thrilled to welcome the IRONMAN 70.3 triathlon to Illinois,” said Governor JB Pritzker. “My administration’s Tourism Incentive Grant Program attracted this major event to Rockford, and we look forward to showcasing Illinois’ natural beauty and world-class hospitality to the thousands of athletes and spectators that will join us over the next three years.” […]
The triathlon will consist of a 1.2-mile swim on the Rock River, a 56-mile bike loop that takes athletes through the area north of Rockford and a 13.1-mile run that will take runners from Davis Park on a two-loop journey on the east and west banks of the Rock River. The event is expected to draw in nearly 3,000 athletes and 15,000 visitors during each race. The race is also expected to fill an estimated to 7,000-12,000 hotel room nights.
*** Statehouse News ***
* Daily Herald | The Springfield recap: Highlights from this legislative session: Illinois politicians enacted a law that will support small businesses struggling to hire employees, foster opportunities for formerly incarcerated individuals, improve public safety and significantly reduce the costs of reincarceration. Soon small businesses will be able to receive a much higher tax credit for hiring formerly incarcerated individuals to offset the costs of on-the-job training. This hard-earned victory took years to achieve and came to fruition through grit, collaboration, and the leadership of dedicated policymakers.
* Shaw Local | New Illinois program will give incentive to taxpayers who donate to foundation endowments: The Illinois Gives Tax Credit Act will incentivize up to $100 million over the next five years, starting Jan. 1. The funds will be equally distributed among the certified community foundations in the state, including The Community Foundation for McHenry County. Each community foundation will be able to take a maximum of 15% of the $100 million, Alliance of Illinois Community Foundations Executive Director Amanda Standerfer said.
*** Statewide ***
* Fox Chicago | Illinois blood center calls for donations amid shortage: Versiti Blood Center of Illinois issued an emergency appeal on Monday in response to the decreasing state-wide blood supply. Almost 5,000 blood donation appointments at the center were canceled or missed in June. […] Some blood types only have a day’s supply of blood left, which puts local patients in need of blood at risk.
* Tribune | CPD pushes to boost its ‘clearance’ rate in homicide cases, with some success: As part of the city’s new contract with the Fraternal Order of Police, CPD’s detective bureau restructured the schedules of homicide detectives across the city in an effort to boost the clearance rate by giving investigators more ownership of a case. Antoinette Ursitti, CPD’s chief of detectives, said the staffing change has made “a profound effect” on the bureau. As of June 20, the department had a clearance rate of more than 65% — a marked increase from the 51.7% clearance rate the bureau recorded in 2023 and well higher than its overall clearance rate of 44% between 2012 and 2022.
* WTTW | Chicago Police Department Revises Plan to Handle Protests Around DNC After Reform Groups Object: Alexandra Block, director of the Criminal Legal System and Policing Project at the ACLU of Illinois, who represents the coalition, said the revised policy represents a “substantial improvement” over the original policy, even though concerns remain. “The coalition does not endorse this policy,” Block told WTTW News on Friday, in advance of a formal summary of their response to the new policy being filed next week with the federal judge overseeing the consent decree. “But it is a policy that we made better.”
* Mass Transit | RTA of Northern Illinois Board of Directors votes in favor of integrated day pass for unlimited rides on CTA, Metra and Pace: The approved agreement sets the pricing parameters for the day pass for unlimited rides on CTA and Pace and on selected fare zones for Metra on weekdays, ranging between $10 and $16. There will be one systemwide price on the weekend days of $10. Riders will be able to purchase this pass using the Ventra App at a discounted price in comparison to purchasing two existing passes separately (the CTA/Pace 1-Day Pass and the Metra day pass). The fare revenue difference will be funded by the RTA of Northern Illinois and distributed to CTA, Metra and Pace.
* Crain’s | Ex-employee sues National Association of Realtors over alleged smear campaign: A former employee of the National Association of Realtors is suing the Chicago-based trade association, claiming that after she was fired over complaining of workplace discrimination, a retaliation campaign ensued, including cyberstalking her and attempting to ruin her career. Roshani Sheth claims that after the NAR fired her on the heels of her internal complaint about sexual harassment — including men in the workplace ogling her breasts and commenting about her body — the organization declined to even confirm her prior employment at the association when potential future employers checked her references.
* CoStar | San Francisco Firm Seeks Sale of Historic Office Building in Chicago After High-Profile Loss: Shorenstein Properties has hired JLL brokers to seek a buyer for the 16-story building at 1 N. State St., which is more than 58% vacant, according to a marketing brochure. The offering does not include separately owned retail space on the lower two floors of the tower that was completed in 1912. It’s a challenging time for deals around the country: Shorenstein in December not only sold the third-tallest building in Los Angeles, the Aon Center, for $153.5 million, far below the $268.5 million it paid in 2014, it recently handed the second-tallest building in Minneapolis, Capella Tower, back to its lender after failing to sell the property and pay off its loan from a $225 million purchase in 2018. Shorenstein also faces a potential loss on the smaller tower it bought in Chicago for nearly $80 million in 2016.
* Tribune | Ann Lurie, one of Chicago’s most prolific philanthropists, dies at 79: Her name and that of her husband Robert, who died in 1990, are affixed most prominently to Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. But there have been dozens of other beneficiaries in Chicago and across the world, fueled by Robert Lurie’s success in business but also by Ann Lurie’s deeply altruistic nature. “When I was young, my mother encouraged me to ‘do a good deed daily,’” she said some years ago. “Following her advice as a teenager gave me a great deal of personal pleasure, and now, many years later, it still feels good.”
* Crain’s | After a rocky path to approval, Northwestern breaks ground on new stadium: University and city of Evanston officials gathered, along with members of the Ryan family, for the groundbreaking ceremony today, which included remarks by Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss, who cast the deciding vote in November to narrowly grant approval for the new football stadium. “The Ryan family is proud to enable this generational, transformational project that will catapult Northwestern to the forefront of athletics facilities while creating a powerful year-round asset for the Northwestern and Evanston communities,” Ryan, whose $480 million donation kick-started the stadium project, said in a written statement.
* Daily Herald | Why Des Plaines may become latest suburb to lift limits on beekeeping: If new rules are approved, Des Plaines would join a slowly growing list of suburbs that have changed course in recent years and now allow people to keep honeybees in backyard hives. The council’s change of heart comes a little more than a year after it softened restrictions for keeping chickens in coops at home. Bees and chickens often are linked as municipal issues, and several aldermen pointed to the earlier decision as a positive development and a reason to allow beekeeping.
*** National ***
* Columbia Journalism Review | When they won’t even say ‘no comment’: The rising tide of nonresponses coincides with the rise of social media, which enables the subject of any news story to bypass pesky journalists by putting out his or her own messages. It also parallels the growing hostility toward the press, at least among some political figures. Florida governor Ron DeSantis’s former press secretary, Christina Pushaw, sometimes posted media requests to her social feeds before bothering to communicate with the reporter; she then all but invited her followers to deride the reporter for seeking her input. Reporters seeking comment from Twitter’s press office in the months following Elon Musk’s purchase of the platform received an automated poop emoji. At least it was a response.
* The Cut | Liz Phair Remembers It All: In the years since, between follow-up albums — Whip-Smart, Whitechocolatespaceegg, Liz Phair, and Soberish — and a memoir, Phair is going back to her roots by celebrating the 30th anniversary of Exile in Guyville with a tour, swinging by Kings Theatre in Brooklyn on November 24. A germaphobe with a father who was an infectious-disease doctor during the AIDS epidemic, Phair says she needed a “really strong sense of purpose” to hit the road again. “When the pandemic came, in my mind I’d been waiting for this, which doesn’t help — sort of like, Oh, God, it’s here,” she admits. “Concurrently, I’m humbled and amazed and grateful that Guyville, this little record that could, is still relevant and powerful to people 30 years later. I’ve watched it be recognized here and there in ways that just stun me.”
* Crain’s | How a cyberattack took 15,000 car dealers offline: The Hoffman Estates-based company is one of just a handful of dealer management system providers that underpin auto retailers’ ability to access customer records, schedule appointments, handle car-repair orders and complete transactions, among other tasks. CDK has confirmed it’s been the subject of a cyber-ransom event, and Bloomberg reported that the company was planning to pay the tens of millions of dollars that the group behind the hacks had demanded in order to restore service.
* Instead of treating the COVID dollars as temporary, some school districts, like CPS, put that money right into the operating budget, with predictable results…
Administrators, teachers and parents in the Chicago Public Schools system and districts throughout the region are grappling with the end of federal pandemic aid, a looming fiscal cliff because of the steep decline in the one-time funding. There’s worry that the loss of funds will stem the progress that’s been made since 2022. And additional funds are sorely needed to increase academic proficiency at districts like CPS that have large numbers of low-income students and English language learners.
The loss is acute at CPS, which spent nearly two-thirds of its $2.8 billion in COVID dollars on salaries and employee benefits. The district aims to preserve positions that enhance classroom learning, primarily in higher-needs schools, while cutting other costs such as central office staff, says Chief Education Officer Bogdana Chkoumbova. […]
Other districts in the Chicago area took different approaches to spending the federal COVID dollars, allocating less on salaries and benefits to avoid layoffs down the road.
That was the case in District 129 in West Aurora, where the administration spent only 26% of COVID funds on salaries and dedicated 46% to capital outlays such as personal protective equipment and upgrading the heating and cooling systems. It received nearly $43 million in federal funds.
* Association of Illinois Soil & Water Executive Director Michael Woods sent this message on May 30…
Dear SWCD colleagues, stakeholders, and supporters,
Illinois’ 103rd General Assembly has finalized the FY25 budget. While many are celebrating, we on the frontlines of soil and water conservation are yet again disillusioned by a frontal attack that has landed at our doorsteps. As a recap, the governor proposed returning the state’s investment into Soil and Water Conservation Districts to pre-2000 funding levels ($4.5 million) for his FY25 budget, the director of the Illinois Department of Agriculture declared in the IDOA appropriations committee that this was the funding level proposed and that increased funding would have to be a legislative member-led initiative. Thus, AISWCD—on behalf of the state’s SWCDs—in partnership with many supporters (Illinois Soybean Association, Illinois Environmental Council, IEC, Illinois Stewardship Alliance, and others) banded together to engage our elected officials in the statehouse on several occasions. Many legislators (in both parties) declared their support and discontent with the proposed funding levels. Sadly, our supporters in the Senate were not able to adjust the funding levels as requested in the final $53.1 billion budget. And, our advocates in the House furthered the Senate by approving the FY25 budget late on Tuesday. It has now advanced to the governor’s office to be signed into law with a roughly 48% decrease in SWCD operational funding. […]
While the outcome we had advocated for did not come to fruition, we will find a path forward to ensure that the state’s essential Soil and Water Conservation Districts remain on the frontlines in protecting the state’s most vital natural resources…soil and water. […]
At this time, we must take the high road and find a path forward, and not dwell in the actions to cut SWCD funding and the attack on intergenerational equity and sustainable investing. Rather we must find a path forward to ensure that we: 1) diversify our treasury to become less dependent on volatile funding; 2) maintain service to our stakeholders to ensure the acceleration of locally-led efforts to conserve, protect, and restore the land and water across the state; and 3) engage those that value the frontline, boots-on-the-ground conservation agriculture essential to protect the stability and sustainability of Illinois.
At the federal level, the Biden administration has showcased a deep understanding and appreciation for conservation by investing an unprecedented amount into agricultural conservation across the nation. As we each are aware, these conservation commitments often fall short, and implementation—the real crux of field level conservation—lags far behind the promises in light of reduced technical assistance (operational) funding for frontline Soil and Water Conservation District staff. Nevertheless, now is the time we shall rise to the occasion and strive to elevate the same level of federal support through understanding at the state level. While the state’s return to pre-2000 funding for SWCD has taken place with the FY25 budget, we cannot allow these actions to decline our individual and collective ability to put in motion our shared mantra of healthy soil and clean water.
It is once again on us as the state’s Soil and Water Conservation District directors, staff, and stakeholders to ensure that we elevate the message across the state. Ensure that Illinois puts in motion the essential efforts to meet objectives of the Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy (NLRS), achieve grassroots conservation essential to protect the states vital natural resources, and raise the bar of climate resiliency across the state. […]
In closing, I remind you that now is the time for decisive, collective action. It’s time to demonstrate that the Illinois SWCD system will stay the course and respond to the immediate conservation crisis while shaping a recovery which prioritizes social and environmental outcomes through intergenerational investments of your time and talents, as we seek the treasures of those that truly value our individual and collective service today for tomorrow. The actions we collectively take over the coming weeks, months, and perhaps even years will lay the foundations for a more stakeholder-driven and sustainable environment — one that aligns conservation of our natural resources with the constituents and commitments of our state’s General Assembly and highest leadership.
“We’re quite disillusioned with basically a frontal attack, you know, that has landed at our doorsteps.” He says, “We’re extremely disappointed that they’ve cut almost 50% of our funding to the direct line, boots-on-the-ground soil and water conservation districts that serve all 102 counties across the state.”
He says the 4 million dollar cut to SWCD operational grants will have an impact on farmers.
“And if we do not have frontline boots on the ground staff,” he says, “they are not able to work with our producers, our communities, our stakeholders all across the state to help them find access to the various cost share programs or just being aware on how do they put conservation into play on the field.”
The operation budget for soil and water conservation districts across Illinois was cut nearly in half, according to Michael Woods, executive director for the Association of Illinois Soil and Water Conservation Districts. Those funds pay salaries for SWCD technical staff, the folks who leverage millions of dollars in federal conservation funding for farmers and landowners, serving as a conduit for funneling those dollars to conservation-minded landowners. […]
The reduction comes as the Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy deadline looms next year. Set in 2015, the NLRS goal is a 45% reduction in both nitrogen and total phosphorus loads, with interim targets set at a 15% nitrogen decrease and a 25% total phosphorus decrease by 2025. Results in 2023 showed nutrient loss numbers trending in the wrong direction, with nitrogen loads up 4.8% and phosphorus loads up 35%.
Woods calls their 2025 operations budget “pre-2000 funding levels.”
Their total budget allocation for 2025 is $7.5 million, and breaks down like this:
- $4.5 million for SWCD operations (salaries for local technical assistance employees)
- $3 million for cost-share initiatives implemented by SWCDs
For comparison, in 2024, the SWCD portion totaled $11.5 million, and all other allocations remained the same.
Soil and water conservation districts (SWCDs) in Illinois are the only locally based infrastructure that protect Illinois’ soil and water. Cuts to these programs have cost taxpayers money through dirtier water and soil erosion, as well as harm to the environment and public health. To protect Illinois’s valuable soil and water, legislators and the governor should fully fund these programs and work harder to bring federal dollars to Illinois conservation programs.
While the state legislature voted to fully fund SWCDs in 2017, Gov. Bruce Rauner announced that he would only pay out a portion of the enacted budget. These cuts have left SWCDs with only one-third of their promised budget so far this fiscal year. Funding for SWCDs has been cut 70 percent since 2002, despite the proven effectiveness of these programs. In 2015, bipartisan support for these programs kept them open, despite the Rauner administration’s drive to zero out the budget for all SWCDs. […]
Illinois has also left millions of dollars in federal funding on the table that could have supported conservation and agriculture. As an example, Illinois has not received federal funding from the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program since 2006. This program matches every dollar that Illinois dedicates to a local landowner with $4 from the federal government. Not participating in the program has meant the loss of at least $50 million to the state. A smaller example of funding loss is the failure of Illinois to apply to the federal government for funding to enact the Food Safety Modernization Act. Illinois was one of only a handful of states not to receive funding — solely because we did not apply.
Illinois has made many short-sighted decisions with respect to its budget and our state resources. This is one of those decisions. Failure to protect these programs now will cost taxpayers in the future, leaving future Illinois residents with unsafe drinking water and less productive soil.
For Liz Rupel, lead organizer with the Illinois Stewardship Alliance, the 2024 legislative season was “a mixed bag” when it comes to conservation in agriculture. While some conservation bills passed this legislative session, including increased funding for socially-disadvantaged farmers, more money for cover crop assistance programs, and funding toward planting native wetland and prairie plants, other bills that could have an impact did not pass, she said.
One of the “most devastating setbacks,” she said, is budget cuts for an important agricultural conservation program. The Soil and Water Conservation District’s operating budget was slashed in half. The organization provides technical assistance to farmers who implement conservation practices, like planting cover crops to prevent dust storms or installing or restoring a wetland on their property to prevent flooding.
The land use programs director with the Illinois Environmental Council (IEC) says the organization is concerned about budget cuts to Illinois Soil & Water Conservation Districts.
Eliot Clay tells Brownfield the 4-million-dollar decrease will have an impact.
“There was a really big setback in Illinois.” He says, “The real world implications of this are going to be people not being able to retain their jobs with the districts, and districts just not being able to hire people in general.”
He says the work of soil & water conservationists is even more important because adverse weather events are increasing.
“We’re now seeing, you know, multiple dust storm warnings and advisories issued in central Illinois over the last two years, including a really devastating one that occurred on I-55 last year that led to a number of people losing their lives,” he says.
A majority of Illinoisans oppose the Chicago Bears’ latest stadium proposal, according to an exclusive new survey conducted for Crain’s — but, deeper down in the data, team leaders may find reason to hope the public is persuadable.
By a 2-to-1 margin, Illinois voters oppose the team’s lakefront stadium plan, one that would include $1.2 billion of public financing. A majority of voters do not support any public funding going to the stadium, which the Bears envision as being part of a broader reboot of the city’s Museum Campus.
* Crain’s is always looking for a silver lining on this topic, but the numbers are nothing to write home about…
* Take note of the “Does not matter” and “Makes no difference” responses…
Monday, Jun 24, 2024 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
Uber is leading the charge to close critical transportation gaps, ensuring reliable access to its services in places that need it most, such as underserved areas like Englewood. This is a part of Uber’s broader commitment to augment and expand the reach of Chicago’s transportation ecosystem, focusing on overcoming the first-mile/ last-mile hurdles that have long plagued residents in farther afield neighborhoods. Uber aims to extend the public transit network’s reach, making urban transportation more accessible and efficient for everyone. Discover the full story on how Uber is transforming city transportation for the better.
As the two-year anniversary of the demise of Roe v. Wade approaches, an increasing number of medical providers around the country are crossing state lines — including into Illinois — for comprehensive abortion training as large sections of the nation either ban or severely restrict pregnancy termination. […]
State abortion bans or restrictions impact the training of an estimated 44% of obstetrics and gynecology residents nationwide. […]
Since the end of Roe, Planned Parenthood of Illinois has seen a roughly 60% increase in trainees at its clinics, with many traveling here from other states.
“There’s a big-time increase in demand for training,” said Dr. Virgil Reid, associate medical director with Planned Parenthood of Illinois. “We have recently reached a point where we had to put a pause on saying yes to new training requests from universities and other organizations around the country that frankly are desperate to get their doctors — their residents — training in this work.”
The latest data from Illinois officials shows abortions performed in the state soared to more than 56,000 in 2022 as the number of out-of-state patients seeking the procedure in Illinois grew 50% year over year to 16,849 patients.
Abortion providers in Illinois are averaging a monthly increase of more than 1,100 abortions since the Dobbs ruling, according to an analysis published last year by the Center for Interdisciplinary Inquiry & Innovation in Sexual & Reproductive Health, or Ci3, at the University of Chicago. […]
The Chicago Abortion Fund, a nonprofit organization helping pregnant people secure money, transportation and lodging support associated with traveling for abortion care, has similarly seen an increase in demand for its services.
Since the Dobbs decision, the fund spent nearly $7 million on patient assistance, up from just $200,000 in 2019, Megan Jeyifo, executive director of the Chicago Abortion Fund, said at the City Club event. Back then, the fund helped fewer than 200 people a year. It’s now up to 200 to 300 people per week, totaling more than 12,000 patients a year from across 40 states, Jeyifo said. Through donations and grants, the Chicago Abortion Fund has been able to support 100% of its callers since July 2019.
After the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling in 2022, the following year Illinois had 37,300 abortion patients who traveled from other states to have the procedure, according to a study and the New York Times.
The figure was 41 percent of the 90,540 abortions performed in Illinois in 2023.
In 2019, just 8,500 abortion patients traveled to Illinois from six states, including Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Indiana, Kentucky and Tennessee.
But in Illinois 37,300 abortion patients in 2023 came from 15 states, including six Southern states, which ban the procedure, according to the study conducted with the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that supports abortion rights.
Two years ago, the United States took a giant leap backward. After decades of expanding personal liberties, the Supreme Court ripped them away from women—erasing nearly 50 years of established privacy rights and putting politicians in charge of women’s very personal decisions. The reverberations of the Dobbs case have been enormous—women whose pregnancies endanger their lives forced to flee anti-abortion states, couples required to effectively terminate IVF thus ending their chance to have children, and entire hospital systems shutting down all OB-GYN services in fear of their doctors and nurses being jailed for providing reproductive medical care. Now, women who seek safe, legal abortions are being hurled back to the retrograde reproductive laws of the 1950s, where back alley abortions threaten their lives. The Dobbs decision is a slippery slope that could end in a nightmare state for women. This November, we have a chance at the ballot box to restore reproductive rights and make things right.
In the ’60s and ’70s, my mother stood up for women’s rights at a time when women could be fired from their jobs for being pregnant, were denied the right to advance in the workplace, discriminated against in college admission, and even prevented from getting a credit card without their husband’s approval. My mother was fighting for abortion rights when I was in grammar school, and she let me tag along to protests and marches when I was too young to be left at home alone. Those experiences shaped my life. I learned early on that showing up, speaking out, and voting for change could make all the difference. It did, and it still does.
When Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, any illusion abortion rights supporters had of the permanency of our hard-fought progress was shattered. Every aspect of reproductive health care is now being undone. […]
This is why I founded Think Big America—to fight back. In the last two years, we have seen that when people have a choice, they vote overwhelmingly to protect reproductive freedom. I want to see that again in 2024. Think Big America stands with the people of Florida, Nevada, Arizona, and Montana who are working to guarantee abortion access for over 16 million women in those states.
I’m in this fight because restoring a woman’s right to bodily autonomy is a human right. This November, we can reestablish this fundamental freedom at the state and federal levels.
Think Big America, a nonprofit organization affiliated with Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, on Monday starts running its first paid advertising campaign of the 2024 election cycle across three “reproductive rights battleground states” where the group is supporting ongoing abortion access ballot initiative campaigns.
The 60-second digital ad, released on the second anniversary of the Dobbs decision, is meant to depict “the stark reality pregnant women face in a post-Dobbs America,” according to a spokesperson for the nonprofit group, which shared details of the ad buy first with ABC News.
The spot, part of the group’s six-figure spending targeting and aimed at independent voters, will run on YouTube and connected television platforms in Arizona and Nevada, two states where measures related to protecting abortion will likely be on their November ballots, and in Florida, where an abortion-related ballot initiative is confirmed to appear in front of voters.
“Two years ago, Donald Trump’s Supreme Court not only ripped away abortion access for tens of millions of women, they turned the clock back 50 years on reproductive healthcare,” said Pritzker in a statement.
Two years ago today, the United States Supreme Court released the Dobbs Decision. As we await the end of the Court’s term and an anticipated impact on emergency medical care, we also mark two years of work by the Dobbs Working Group and colleagues in the House and Senate to establish safe access to reproductive and gender-affirming care for the tens of thousands of patients coming into our state for treatment. Over the last two years, we’ve been busy constantly monitoring for new threats from surrounding states and doing everything we can to ensure that patients in Illinois retain access to care while ensuring the safety of providers and patients seeking care from out of state. We passed several bills to ensure our protections are as complete as possible, including a state level bill protecting access to emergency abortion care in the event the Supreme Court drops another late June challenge to access to care. The Dobbs Working Group will continue to monitor for challenges and opportunities to collaborate with national partners to craft policies to expand protections.
Monday, Jun 24, 2024 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
Lawmakers in Springfield recently negotiated a back-room deal that could radically change the way small businesses and consumers use their credit and debit cards to give corporate megastores a multi-million dollar giveaway.
This new law could:
- Force separate cash payments on sales tax and tips
- Reduce consumer privacy by exposing more information on your purchases
- Create costly operational nightmares and paperwork burdens for small businesses
This first-of-its-kind, untested mandate would create chaos, removing credit and debit cards as the safe, secure and hassle-free way to pay in Illinois — all so giant, out-of-state corporations can look a little better to their shareholders.
As you’ve probably heard by now, Illinois Republican Party Chair Don Tracy announced his resignation last week, apparently effective the day after the Republican National Convention concludes on July 18.
The announcement came after far-right activists forced out the state party’s vice chair, Mark Shaw, and the resignation of the party’s finance chair, Vince Kolber. Both Shaw and Kolber had made unsuccessful bids for the Republican National Committeeman post days earlier, but were rejected by state convention attendees.
After he first won the chairmanship job in 2021, Tracy said, “Regardless of our differences… Republicans are the only hope for turning Illinois around.”
By last week, Tracy was finally forced to admit the obvious.
“When I took on this full-time volunteer job in February 2021, I thought I would be spending most of my time fighting Democrats,” he wrote in his resignation letter. Now, however, “we have Republicans who would rather fight other Republicans than engage in the harder work of defeating incumbent Democrats by convincing swing voters to vote Republican.”
It has always been thus. This is what I wrote almost six years ago, in late 2018: “The far right has been obsessed with gaining control of the Illinois Republican Party for as long as I can remember. They’ve only really held the party’s reins once, in 2002 when Gary MacDougal was handed the chairmanship after then-House Republican Leader Lee Daniels was forced to step down during a federal investigation into campaign work on state time that eventually nailed his chief of staff.”
But MacDougal didn’t last long: “Before the year was out he was replaced by then-Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, the only Republican to win statewide during that year’s sweeping Democratic victories. Topinka spent the next few years in almost constant battle with her right flank. But she prevailed and the far right has been shut out ever since.”
When I wrote that story in 2018, Jeanne Ives and the far right were attempting to oust then-party chair Tim Schneider six months after helping broker a deal that made their guy, Lake County Republican Chair Mark Shaw, a state party co-chair with Schneider. Fast-forward to this month, when that very same Mark Shaw was deemed as aloof from the “grassroots” and had to go and Ives is a member of the state central committee.
Party elders have done whatever they could to keep the party out of the hands of the insurgents. The fear was the insurgents would alienate the “donor class,” the wealthy Republicans who only wanted to deal with people who looked and talked like them.
Also, people who spend their lives yelling “No!” and trying to tear things down rarely, if ever, learn to say “Yes” and build things up. It’s no accident that the state party has had 10 different chairpersons in the past 23 years. When you look around the country, though, it’s kind of amazing that the Republican powers that be have held on this long.
Most members of that once-powerful donor class have passed away, retired and/or left Illinois. Kolber, the resigned party finance chair, has contributed more than $1.3 million to campaigns in the past 10 years. The state Republican Party’s latest quarterly report showed that Chairman Tracy, his family’s company and his family members accounted for 76% of all the ILGOP’s individual contributions — $109,600 out of $144,013.
One of the lesser-known, but highly important aspects of state parties is their access to a federal postage discount. By paying for their direct mail through the state parties, candidates can save a lot of money. But that requires a level of trust that the parties will spend the money as intended, which is another reason the people who run things want one of their own in there.
But now, it looks like those perpetually aggrieved outsiders could soon take over the party apparatus.
Palatine Township Republican Chairman and state central committeeman Aaron Del Mar wants to be Tracy’s replacement. Del Mar ran as Gary Rabine’s running mate in the 2022 Republican primary. Rabine finished fifth with less than 7% of the vote.
Del Mar appeared earlier this month on Ramblin’ Ray Stevens’ WLS Radio show where he cracked two jokes about Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s weight. Still, that put him in sync with former President Donald Trump, who also recently mocked Pritzker’s weight.
Needless to say, Trump lost Illinois by 17 points in both 2020 and 2016. But, hey, welcome to what looks to be the new Illinois Republican Party.
* The column sparked a harsh back and forth between former Republican Rep. Grant Wehrli of Naperville and current Rep. Blaine Wilhour of Beecher City…
* ICYMI: Why the Sun-Times traveled to Toronto to learn about immigration…
Nearly half of Toronto’s 2.7 million population identifies as immigrants.
The city’s diversity is visible on its streets. A stretch of a neighborhood includes Asian, Caribbean and Latino retail shops and restaurants. Pedestrians of Canadian, Sudanese or Indian backgrounds mingle while eating Mexican sushi or jerk poutine.
As the United States has doubled down on restrictive immigration policies, particularly around asylum, Canada is viewed as the friendlier neighbor where politicians see immigrants as a possible solution to labor shortages.
“One should see them as nation builders,” Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow told the Chicago Sun-Times about immigrants. “They’ve helped build Canada, they helped build Toronto.”
* Governor Pritzker will join the 2024 SelectUSA Investment Summit “Innovation Ecosystems: Shaping the Future of Tech” panel at 8:10 am. Click here to watch.
The Sun-Times has live updates of Ed Burke’s sentencing, which will begin at 10 am.
*** Isabel’s Top Picks ***
* Capitol News Illinois | State highway shootings decline as critics sue over ‘dragnet surveillance’: Illinois State Police say an automated license plate reader program has helped the agency identify witnesses or suspects in 82 percent of highway shooting cases this year, including all eight that resulted in a death. But as the state looks to further expand its network of more than 400 cameras this year, it faces a lawsuit accusing ISP of operating “a system of dragnet surveillance” by using the cameras to monitor all traffic that passes them.
* Tribune | ComEd’s computer billing fiasco shuts down community solar program for four months: For nearly four months, subscribers to community solar farms dotting the landscape across northern Illinois have been unable to get credit for the power generated to offset their regular ComEd bills. Meanwhile, the companies that operate the solar installations are not getting paid, essentially shutting down one of the state’s signature clean energy programs. “Our program serves as a model for how community solar could work in other states,” said Sarah Moskowitz, executive director of Citizens Utility Board. “It’s very disappointing to see one of our utilities single-handedly halt the program for several months.”
* Tribune | Illinois may soon return land the US stole from a Prairie Band Potawatomi chief 175 years ago: Rep. Will Guzzardi, who sponsored the legislation to transfer the state park, said it is a significant concession on the part of the Potawatomi. With various private and public concerns now owning more than half of the original reservation land, reclaiming it for the Potawatomi would set up a serpentine legal wrangle. […] Guzzardi hopes the Potawatomi don’t have to wait much longer to see that grow exponentially with the park transfer. “It keeps this beautiful public asset available to everyone,” Guzzardi said. “It resolves disputed title for landholders in the area and most importantly, it fixes a promise that we broke.”
*** Statewide ***
* Crain’s | Two years post-Dobbs, Illinois abortion providers feel the crunch: At a recent event before the City Club of Chicago, Chelsea Souder, co-owner of Hope Clinic for Women in downstate Illinois, laid out what her abortion practice is seeing since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade, the landmark legislation that protected the right to end a pregnancy. At the Granite City clinic — near the border of Missouri, where abortion is banned with limited exceptions — patient volumes have doubled within the last year, Souder said, with people visiting from about 20 states that have tightly restricted or outright banned abortions.
* Tribune | Dobbs, 2 years later: Out-of-state medical providers flock to Illinois for abortion training as opportunities dwindle: Since the end of Roe, Planned Parenthood of Illinois has seen a roughly 60% increase in trainees at its clinics, with many traveling here from other states. “There’s a big-time increase in demand for training,” said Dr. Virgil Reid, associate medical director with Planned Parenthood of Illinois. “We have recently reached a point where we had to put a pause on saying yes to new training requests from universities and other organizations around the country that frankly are desperate to get their doctors — their residents — training in this work.”
*** Chicago ***
* Sun-Times | Wrongful convictions unit failed to look into possible police misconduct in murder case, confidential report concludes: A confidential report by special prosecutors assigned to review a decades-old murder slams an initial assessment of the case by the Cook County state’s attorney’s wrongful convictions unit, saying it failed to look into “the integrity of the police investigation.” “This case presents a microcosm of the many ways in which a police investigation into a serious violent crime can fail,” the special prosecutors wrote.
* Chalkbeat | Chicago to change how it flags disruptive behaviors for its youngest students: Under student code of conduct changes the school board is slated to approve this week, schools would only flag behaviors that represent a serious safety issue, such as bringing a weapon to school. And letters alerting parents about these behaviors will no longer refer to “misconduct” and code of conduct “violations” — language district officials said stigmatized young children and failed to reflect their social-emotional development.
* Block Club | 2 CPS Students, Both 16, Fatally Shot Within 24 Hours In Separate Weekend Incidents: The Amundsen High School community is mourning the death of a 16-year-old student killed Friday evening in a shooting in Budlong Woods on the North Side that wounded two other teen boys. About 6:57 p.m. Friday, the three teens were getting into a car in the 5600 block of North Rockwell Street when they were hit by gunfire, police said. A witness said the three were shot at by a person in a black SUV, which fled the scene, police said.
* Sun-Times | Time for reflection: The Bean reopens after months of construction: The project included a rebuild of the plaza podium, adding new stairs, accessible ramps and a waterproofing system, according to the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. Construction was initially set to end in the spring.[…] The plaza is still undergoing some landscaping improvements, but that work will not impact access to “Cloud Gate,” city officials said.
*** Cook County and Suburbs ***
* Tribune | Thornton Township Board denies vendor payments sought by Supervisor Tiffany Henyard: Concerns over spending transparency by Supervisor Tiffany Henyard led the Thornton Township Board Thursday to deny payments to certain vendors who completed work for the township. Among the payments debated during the special board meeting, called after a last-minute cancellation of Tuesday’s scheduled meeting, were for lawn mowing services for seniors and media content creation for township events.
* ABC Chicago | Cook Co. Commissioner Dennis Deer dies, family announces: In a statement, the family said, “Dr. Deer’s passionate lifelong dedication made him a tireless servant to the community I areas of healthcare, education, economic development, employment and training, re-entry and affordable housing. “Dr. Deer’s greatest joy and pride were his family, He cherished his roles as husband to his high school sweetheart Barbara Deer and father to his twin sons Kaleb and Kanaan and daughter Trinity.”
* Daily Herald | With money to plan greenway, what’s next for defunct Route 53 extension — and should IDOT get paid?: IDOT began buying land for the expansion in the 1970s to solve traffic congestion. But sky-high costs and fears it would destroy natural areas eroded support, and the Illinois tollway, the project’s last sponsor, pulled the plug in 2019. Come 2022, a state advisory panel recommended transferring the property to IDNR to create a 12-mile green corridor between Long Grove and Grayslake. Looking ahead, the plan will engage local stakeholders, develop a consensus vision for the corridor and approach how to fund it, explained Democratic state Rep. Dan Didech of Buffalo Grove.
*** Downstate ***
* KFVS | Williamson Co. Circuit Clerk speaks out about resignation: Maze had announced on June 18 that he would be resigning from the elected position, citing an upcoming deployment overseas as the reason, which would last more than a year. However, on June 20, the Department of Justice released information about a fraud trial involving Maze. As a condition of the pretrial diversion, Maze was required to resign from his position as Williamson Co. Circuit Clerk and agreed not to seek re-election to any public office.
* WSIL | Authorities Investigate Threats Toward Southern Illinois Schools: Authorities said these reported threats were made via Facebook posts toward several area schools and originated outside of the country. Multiple law enforcement officials investigated and found the threat to be not credible, according to law enforcement and school officials.
* Concord Monitor | In Rockford Illinois – a blueprint for reducing homelessness, 1,050 miles from Concord: But in front of Concord’s city committee to end homelessness, Morrissey shared a different story last week. Rockford has achieved “functional zero” – where episodes of homelessness are rare and brief – for both veterans and those chronically homeless. The two keys to their success were putting together and maintaining clear data on who was experiencing homelessness in the community at a given time and an organized governance structure among city leaders, nonprofits and service providers to address it with people one-on-one.
The elected Crystal Lake city clerk, who has been charged with grooming and possessing images depicting child sexual abuse, made his initial court appearance Thursday, when a judge ordered he be released from county jail pretrial with conditions while awaiting trial.
The hearing also provided some of the first details of the allegations against Nicholas Kachiroubas, 45, who was arrested Tuesday after authorities from the McHenry County Sheriff’s Office Criminal Investigations Division served a search warrant, according to a news release.
Kachiroubas, who appeared in orange jail-issued clothing, is charged with possessing images of children being sexually abused, a Class 2 felony, and grooming, Judge Carl Metz said at the hearing. […]
Miller said Kachiroubas also possessed a nude photo of a child who was about 7 or 8 years old and that, when police asked Kachiroubas if he thought it was wrong for him to possess such a photo, he allegedly responded: “I guess I didn’t think I was doing anything (wrong).” […]
Kachiroubas is listed on DePaul’s website as an associate professor in the university’s School of Public Service. He also sits on the Illinois Community College Board, and has been the city clerk in Crystal Lake since 2009, having been elected in 2021 to his fourth term.
I’m told by the Illinois Community College Board and the governor’s office that the governor is removing Kachiroubas from the ICCB and we should see a formal announcement later today.
When it’s finally time to sentence the longest-serving Chicago City Council member in history for racketeering, bribery and attempted extortion, federal prosecutors want a judge to send “a simple, undiluted and unequivocal warning” to government officials across the state: […]
It’s been nearly a decade since an Illinois politician as significant as [ex-Ald Ed Burke] (14th) faced sentencing at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse. Plenty of lesser Chicago pols have been sent away, though, vexing judges inside the building. They’ve mulled the cost-benefit ratio for “rational” politicians who too often choose greed, graft and power over the public good.
Now, U.S. District Judge Virginia Kendall, one of the building’s most senior jurists, has a chance to send the loudest message since U.S. District Judge James Zagel gave 14 years to ex-Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Prosecutors want 10 years for Burke. Whatever Kendall does will add to a long-running courthouse debate about how to put a stop to corruption in Chicago — and whether that’s possible. […]
Burke’s sentencing hearing is set to begin at 10 a.m. Monday at the downtown courthouse. Hearings generally begin on time, so Burke must make his way by then to Kendall’s 25th-floor courtroom — which used to belong to Zagel.
A federal judge sentenced former Illinois Sen. Annazette Collins to a year in prison Friday for cheating on her taxes in a case with ties to the same investigation that snared indicted former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.
A jury in February convicted Collins of filing false individual tax returns for the years 2014 and 2015, failing to file one for the year 2016 and failing to file a corporate tax return for 2016.
“Her offenses were driven by greed,” U.S. District Judge Jorge Alonso said. “She doesn’t want to hear that, but it’s absolutely true.” […]
Meanwhile, the case brought by prosecutors revolved around her work with her lobbying firm, Kourtnie Nicole Corp., following her years in the legislature. That firm wound up collecting hefty sums from politically connected firms and utilities.
They included ComEd and AT&T Illinois, both of which were caught up in the Madigan investigation and faced criminal charges.
A project aimed at keeping invasive carp out of the Great Lakes could be in jeopardy if Illinois doesn’t meet a fast-approaching deadline to release federal funds.
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker has until the end of June to sign the agreement with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers or the project will incur additional costs and continue to face delays.
The Brandon Road Interbasin Project is a state-of-the art barricade at an important pinch point at the Brandon Road Lock and Dam along the Des Plaines River in Joliet, Illinois. From there, invasive carp could make their way from the Mississippi River to Lake Michigan.
The project costs more than $1.1 billion, which many say is a small price to pay to keep the Great Lakes healthy and protect the multi-billion dollar fishing and recreation industries.
* Treasurer Micheal Frerichs…
The State Treasurer’s Office made a record $130.1 million in investment earnings from the state investment portfolio in May, Illinois Treasurer Michael Frerichs announced today.
Treasurer Frerichs is the state’s Chief Investment and Banking Officer. He is responsible for investing state revenue in the state investment portfolio. So far in Fiscal Year 2024, Frerichs’ Office has earned more than $1.3 billion for the state portfolio.
“Every dollar we earn in interest is a dollar that lawmakers don’t have to raise in taxes,” Frerichs said. “The State Treasurer’s Office cannot solve all of our problems, but we can be part of the solution.”
Also in May, nearly $90.9 million in gross investment earnings was earned for cities, villages, school districts, counties and other units of government thattake part in the highly rated Illinois Funds local government investment pool the State Treasurer’s Office operates. So far in Fiscal Year 2024, the Office has earned more than $973.6 million for the Illinois Funds, which has received the highest rating of AAA from Fitch, a national credit ratings agency.
* Illinois Department of Employment Security…
The Illinois Department of Employment Security (IDES) announced today that the unemployment rate increased +0.1 percentage point to 4.9 percent, while nonfarm payrolls increased +12,700 in May, based on preliminary data provided by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), and released by IDES. The April revised unemployment rate was 4.8 percent, unchanged from the preliminary April unemployment rate. The April monthly change in payrolls was revised from the preliminary report, from +7,300 to +1,900 jobs. The May unemployment rate and payroll jobs estimate reflect activity for the week including the 12th.
In May, the industry sectors with the largest over-the-month job gains included: Professional and Business Services (+7,100), Government (+3,300), and Financial Activities (+2,400). The industry sectors with monthly payroll job declines included Manufacturing (-2,300), Leisure and Hospitality (-1,200), Construction (-100) and Mining (-100). […]
The state’s unemployment rate was +0.9 percentage point higher than the national unemployment rate reported for May. The national unemployment rate was 4.0 percent in May, up +0.1 percentage point from the previous month. The Illinois unemployment rate was up +0.7 percentage point from a year ago when it was 4.2 percent.
Compared to a year ago, total nonfarm payroll jobs increased by +43,900 jobs. The industry groups with the largest jobs increases included: Private Education and Health Services (+29,200), Government (+28,600), and Leisure and Hospitality (+13,900). The industry groups with the largest jobs decreases included: Professional and Business Services (-24,800), Trade, Transportation, and Utilities (-6,600), and Financial Activities (-4,500). In May, total nonfarm payrolls were up +0.7 percent over-the-year in Illinois and up +1.8 percent in the nation.
The number of unemployed workers was 317,400, up +1.3 percent from the prior month, and up +17.8 percent over the same month one year ago. The labor force was up +0.2 percent over-the-month and up +1.4 percent over-the-year. The unemployment rate identifies those individuals who are out of work and seeking employment. An individual who exhausts or is ineligible for benefits is still reflected in the unemployment rate if they actively seek work.
*** Statewide ***
* ABA Journal | 19 state AGs fire back after others demand ABA diversity standards change: Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul sent the letter to “reaffirm our commitment to ensuring that diversity, equity, and inclusion programs continue to effectively address discrimination throughout the private and philanthropic sector.” […] “We also write to respond to coordinated attempts to contort the law and invalidate programs aimed at eliminating and preventing racial inequities,” the June 20 letter states.
* Sun-Times | The heat inside your car can turn deadly in minutes this summer: A Sun-Times test this month — before the recent heat wave hit — found the inside temperature of a parked car in a sunny spot rocketed to dangerous levels in minutes. […] The black 2015 Toyota Corolla we tested June 13 on a residential street in Irving Park reached 103.1 degrees in 15 minutes and 114.1 degrees in 45 minutes, according to a sensor placed inside the car out of direct sunlight.
* Center Square | A book about bucket list items to see and do in Illinois: “100 Things to Do in Illinois Before You Die” is published by Reedy Press. Author Melanie Holmes said she wasn’t planning to write a guide book but became aware of Reedy Press’s series and decided there needed to be a book about her home state. […] Holmes said one of her favorite things to do is to visit the zoological park in Hanna City.
*** Chicago ***
* Crain’s | A year on, Chicago is still grappling with the void Jim Crown’s death created: Crown died in a racetrack accident on June 25, 2023, in Colorado on his 70th birthday, just weeks after the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago unveiled a violence-reduction program he championed, one that fell outside the group’s comfort-zone focus on transportation, education and state finance. His death cast a pall over Chicago’s civic community and renewed scrutiny of the city’s boardroom commitment to philanthropic causes against the backdrop of a corporate headquarters drain blamed in part on the city’s bleak homicide record.
* Sun-Times | In bid for young voters, Democrats offer social media influencers press access to August convention: It’s part of a critical voter outreach plan that’s been in place since President Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign and has extended into the halls of the White House — as Biden combats former president Donald Trump and his army of social media influencers. An estimated 32% of people between 18 and 29 got their news from TikTok last year, according to a Pew Research Center poll. And a poll conducted by the University of Chicago’s GenForward late last month found Biden has lost support from young Black and Latino voters compared to 2020.
* ABC Chicago | Indiana Fever vs. Chicago Sky rematch tickets poised to be most expensive in WNBA history: Ticket prices for Clark’s Indiana Fever and Reese’s Chicago Sky are the most expensive for a WNBA game ever, according to TickPick, with the average hovering at around $253 - 187% higher than the Sky’s average purchase price of $88. Currently, the cheapest seat just to see the game is around $250 with the most expensive ticket on sale going for more than $9,000.
* Block Club | 15 Things To Do In Chicago This Weekend: Pride Fest, Vegandale And A Bronzeville Bazaar: This weekend is packed with Chicago street and food festivals, including Pride Fest, Vegandale, Motoblot and the Magnificent Mile Art Festival. There’s also the Andersonville Vintage Market, a Lakeview native plant sale, the Bernard Street Yard Sale in Logan Square, a 5K along the 312 RiverRun trail and the return of the Bronzeville Vendor Fair and Wildflower Music Festival.
*** Cook County and Suburbs ***
* WBBM | Embattled Dolton mayor at center of chaotic Thornton Township board meeting: People complained about Henyard’s leadership, about a canceled previous meeting and the amount of time they’re allowed to speak. Those in attendance also argued with one another. They even argued with a man who stood at the podium and suggested they act like adults.
* Tribune | One migrant worker’s effort to claim workers’ comp, a right all workers have despite immigration status: Jose Antuna fell through a drain at a west suburban car wash where he worked and tore his meniscus in mid-November. […] In Illinois, it is illegal under the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 to knowingly hire workers who are in the country without legal permission. However, these workers are as entitled to workers’ compensation benefits when injured on the job as people who are citizens.
*** Downstate ***
* SJ-R | ‘Icon of Springfield’: New plaque recognizes Horseshoe sandwich: Visit Springfield, a tourism division of the Springfield Convention & Visitors Bureau, unveiled a plaque to commemorate the birth of the Horseshoe sandwich at the historic Leland Building at the corner of Sixth Street and Capitol Avenue in Springfield. The location is where the original Springfield Horseshoe Sandwich was created.
* Intelligencer | Steven Cook pleads guilty to falsifying bank records: The president of a southern Illinois bank admitted to a scheme to falsify bank records to facilitate real estate loans. Steven Cook pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Benton, Illinois to three felony counts of aiding and abetting the making of a false bank entry. Cook was the president of SouthernTrust Bank at the time. The bank has branches in Marion, Vienna and Goreville, Illinois. Cook was also a member of the bank’s board and a member of its loan committee.
* WCIA | Illinois Raptor Center in urgent need of donations: The Illinois Raptor Center specializes in aiding all kinds of birds. They said they are currently “floor-to-ceiling” in baby raptors, and are struggling to keep them fed and medicated. The organization also said their air conditioning isn’t working at their office and education center. The break-down puts pressure on their need for funding — however, money for food and meds must be prioritized over repairs, they said.
*** National ***
* AP | Car dealerships are being disrupted by a multi-day outage after cyberattacks on software supplier: For prospective car buyers, that may mean delays at dealerships or vehicle orders written up by hand, with no immediate end in sight. Here’s what you need to know. CDK Global is a major player in the auto sales industry. The company, based just outside of Chicago in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, provides software technology to dealers that helps with day-today operations — like facilitating vehicle sales, financing, insurance and repairs. CDK serves more than 15,000 retail locations across North America, according to the company. Whether all of these locations were impacted by this week’s cyberattacks was not immediately clear.
* Apparently, now Jeanne Ives isn’t pure enough for some folks. Illinois Review…
Ever since news broke that embattled Illinois Republican Party Chairman Don Tracy was resigning effective July 19th, Illinois GOP state central committee member Jeanne Ives has been working the phones trying to gauge support as she considers a potential run for the party’s top spot – despite spending the last two years angering the very base that made her, and was instrumental in Tracy’s decision to resign.
In December of 2022, Ives stunned a room full of over 200 grassroots activists during a SSC meeting when she defended then IL GOP Finance Chairman Vince Kolber, who had just insulted the grassroots for not donating money to the state party – yelling – in an almost out of body experience that, “Vince is not your problem! This man gave me $750,000 when I ran against Gov. Bruce Rauner!”
Just months before challenging Gov. Rauner in the GOP primary, Ives was seen smiling for a photo with her soon-to-be Republican political opponent. Rauner – bruised and damaged during a vicious primary against Ives, would lose his re-election to political newcomer JB Pritzker by 16 points – just two years before the pandemic and Gov. Pritzker’s shutdown orders and mask mandates.
Last September, Ives endorsed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for president during the 2024 presidential primary, despite the wildly popular former president Donald Trump leading in the polls among Republicans over his political opponents, including DeSantis by over 30 points. And when Ives learned that the president’s son – Donald Trump Jr. was coming to Illinois to promote Letters to Trump last October, her team made requests to interview Trump Jr. on her radio show, and to speak on stage during the event. When the requests were turned down, and this publication accurately reported about it, she became angry – and went on Facebook attacking the event featuring Trump Jr. and falsely alleged that the hosts couldn’t sell tickets.
In their first Second Amendment case since they expanded gun rights in 2022, the justices ruled 8-1 in favor of a 1994 ban on firearms for people under restraining orders to stay away from their spouses or partners. The justices reversed a ruling from the federal appeals court in New Orleans that had struck down the law.
Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the court, said the law uses “common sense” and applies only “after a judge determines that an individual poses a credible threat” of physical violence.
Justice Clarence Thomas, the author of the major 2022 Bruen ruling in a New York case, dissented.
The challenge to the law was brought by Zackey Rahimi, a drug dealer who was placed under a restraining order after a 2019 argument with his girlfriend. He argued that the government had violated his Second Amendment rights by blocking him from possessing guns.
Rahimi knocked the woman to the ground in a parking lot, dragged her back to his car and fired a shot at a bystander, according to court records. The girlfriend escaped, but Rahimi later called her and threatened to shoot her if she told anyone about the assault. The pair have a child together.
A Texas court found that Rahimi had “committed family violence” and that such violence was “likely to occur again in the future.” It issued a protective order that suspended Rahimi’s gun license, prohibited him from having guns and warned him that possessing a firearm while the order remained in effect might be a federal felony.
Rahimi later violated the protective order and was involved in five shootings between December 2020 and January 2021, according to a government brief. […]
Rahimi argued in federal court that he had the right to possess guns, but a judge ruled against him on that issue. Afterward, he pleaded guilty to the federal charge and received a sentence of six years in prison. He continued to challenge the law, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit reheard his case after the Supreme Court’s Bruen ruling.
Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that since the United States was founded “our nation’s firearm laws have included provisions preventing individuals who threaten physical harm to others from misusing firearms.”
The provision at issue in the case “fits comfortably within this tradition,” he added. […]
In his dissent, Thomas stuck to his view that the history of similar laws at the time of the nation’s founding is determinative. Other justices are more willing to consider laws that are not exactly the same but have a similar effect.
“Not a single historical regulation justifies the statute at issue,” Thomas wrote.
* G-PAC…
The Gun Violence Prevention PAC (G-PAC) of Illinois today applauded the U.S. Supreme Court decision to uphold federal law that bars domestic violence abusers from having guns when they have an order of protection entered against them.
John Schmidt, G-PAC Executive Board Member and former U.S. Associate Attorney General, issued the following statement in response to today’s decision in U.S. v Rahimi:
“The Court’s decision upholds the basic principle that we can deny guns to dangerous people. It rejects the false idea that common sense limits on gun ownership are inconsistent with the Second Amendment right to bear arms for self-defense. The fact that the decision was written by Chief Justice John Roberts with the support of all but one of the other Justices sends a positive sign the Court will continue to uphold sensible laws that protect us against gun violence.”
* The Network…
The Network: Advocating Against Domestic Violence has released a statement about the U.S. Supreme Court’s 8-1 decision in United States v. Rahimi which upholds a federal law that prohibits people subject to domestic violence orders of protection from possessing firearms. The Court reversed the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit decision that individuals subject to domestic violence protective orders have a constitutional right to possess firearms.
“The Supreme Court has asserted that an individual found by a court to pose a credible threat to the physical safety of another may be temporarily disarmed consistent with the Second Amendment. Survivors of domestic violence deserve to be protected from harm and this decision reinforces the obligation of governments to safeguard survivors. The Illinois General Assembly must reaffirm this right to safety from gun violence and pass Karina’s Bill this fall,” said Amanda Pyron, Executive Director of The Network: Advocating Against Domestic Violence.
The court held that when an individual has been found by a court to pose a credible threat to the physical safety of another, that individual may be temporarily disarmed consistent with the Second Amendment. Thousands of survivors seek orders of protection each year as an element of safety while they break free from domestic violence situations.
The importance of prohibiting firearms in domestic violence situations cannot be overstated.
- Risk of intimate partner homicide increases 500% when abusers have access to a gun.
- Leaving a domestic violence relationship is a period of high lethality risk, including when filing for an order of protection.
- In domestic violence homicides where the victim had an order of protection, 1 out of 5 victims were killed within two days of the order being issued.
By validating the federal law prohibiting abusers with orders of protection against them from gun possession, the Supreme Court has shown its agreement that the safety of survivors – particularly women – is critical. The Network is grateful to the Supreme Court for its action to protect victims of domestic violence in the U.S.
Attorney General Kwame Raoul today issued the following statement in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in U.S. v. Rahimi, which will preserve federal law that prohibits individuals under domestic violence restraining orders from possessing firearms.
“For decades, federal law has barred individuals who are subject to domestic violence restraining orders from possessing firearms, and I am very pleased to see the U.S. Supreme Court uphold these longstanding, commonsense tools that protect victims of domestic violence and prevent gun violence.
“As we highlighted in the brief we led in this case – which was joined by 25 attorneys general across the country – intimate partner violence and gun violence are closely connected. Firearms are the leading cause of intimate partner homicides – more so than all other weapons combined. Studies have shown that an abuser is five times more likely to murder an intimate partner if a firearm is in the home. Laws like the federal law upheld today and similar protections in Illinois that bar abusers from accessing firearms have successfully reduced intimate partner homicide.
“The harms of domestic violence reach beyond intimate partners and family members. Perpetrators of domestic violence are also a threat to public safety. From 2014 to 2019, 60% of mass shootings in the United States either involved domestic violence attacks or the perpetrators had a history of domestic violence.
“Domestic abusers are dangerous and should not have access to firearms. Full stop. Today’s decision is a commonsense win for public safety and gun violence prevention.”
* Senator Dick Durbin…
“Today, the Court reaffirmed that the Second Amendment is not limitless and rejected a meritless challenge to an essential gun safety law. In doing so, they are protecting the lives of women and families across the nation. Unfortunately, Justice Thomas, the lone dissenter in the case, continues to isolate himself from a commonsense view of the limits of the Second Amendment.
“But let’s be clear: the only reason this case was before the Court is that two years ago a conservative supermajority of judicial activists established a radical new standard that makes it much easier for the gun lobby to challenge longstanding gun safety laws. The Court should overturn its misguided Bruen decision as soon as possible.”
In March 2023, Durbin chaired a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing entitled “Protecting Public Safety After New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen.” The hearing focused on the impact of the radical new standard for the constitutionality of modern-day gun safety laws set by the Supreme Court’s decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen in 2022. With that decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the constitutionality of modern-day gun safety laws depends on whether the government can demonstrate that there were sufficiently similar historical gun laws in place at the time of the adoption of the Second Amendment in 1791 or the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868. This 2022 ruling opened the door to the Fifth Circuit’s overturning of its original ruling in United States v. Rahimi, thus allowing those with domestic violence protective orders to still possess firearms.
In August 2023, Durbin joined nearly 170 members of Congress in filing an amicus brief in opposition to the constitutional challenge. In the bicameral brief, Durbin and the members called on the Supreme Court to set a clear standard allowing Congress to pass laws that keep the American people safe.
*** Adding *** Rep. Maura Hirschauer…
State Rep. Maura Hirschauer, D-Batavia, issued the following statement Friday after the Supreme Court sided overwhelmingly with gun safety advocates and survivors of domestic violence by upholding federal protections preventing abusers from possessing firearms:
“The United States Supreme Court spoke clearly and forcefully in favor commonsense gun safety, with justices from every end of the ideological spectrum upholding efforts to get guns out of the hands of domestic abusers.
“While this ruling is a great relief for survivors of gender-based violence, the federal protections affirmed today merely preserve the status quo—and for tens of thousands of women and families, it is clear that this is not enough. We now know without question that we can do more, and we must. Here in Illinois, we should move forward by enacting Karina’s Bill, which will provide clear guidance for getting guns out of the hands of abusers, and ensure those weapons are removed sooner—all within a framework that justices have now overwhelmingly endorsed.
“The Supreme Court has shown us that we can enact Karina’s Bill with confidence, knowing that the gun lobby’s bad faith claims have been rejected by the nation’s highest court. I look forward to working with my colleagues to get this important legislation into law as soon as possible.”
*** Adding *** Illinois State Rifle Association…
US Supreme Court Upholds Importance of Due Process in US v. Rahimi
Today, the US Supreme Court held in US v Rahimi that the temporary restriction of a dangerous individual’s ability to possess a firearm is consistent with the history of the 2nd Amendment.
While there are those in Illinois who would seek to remove firearms and deny rights to individuals without the benefit of due process, The Illinois State Rifle Association points out that today’s opinion makes clear that proper due process is an important part of the process where 2nd Amendment rights are concerned.
Notably, Chief Justice Roberts finds that a temporary restriction under 922(g)(8) is proper because in part:
“A prosecution under Section 922(g)(8) may proceed only if three criteria are met. First, the defendant must have received actual notice and an opportunity to be heard before the order was entered.”
The Illinois State Rifle Association has opposed recent attempts by activists to pass laws which restrict 2nd Amendment Rights without due process, and we strongly encourage those groups to heed the words written in the majority opinion today which also contains the following passages:
“we note that Section 922(g)(8) applies only once a court has found that the defendant “represents a credible threat to the physical safety” of another.”
“the Second Amendment right may only be burdened once a defendant has been found to pose a credible threat to the physical safety of others.”
Again, today’s decision makes clear that a court must make a finding before restricting 2nd amendment rights. These rights cannot be curtailed on the basis of an unverified allegation, and the ISRA will continue to fight against attempts to remove firearm owner’s rights to due process in the Illinois legislature.
“Today’s opinion applies solely to those who have been shown to be a credible threat to others through due process in the legal system. The ISRA continues to fight for the rights of peaceful citizens to protect themselves through firearm ownership and exercise of their 2nd amendment rights” - Richard Pearson, Executive Director, Illinois State Rifle Association.
* Related…
* NPR | In today’s gun rights cases, historians are in hot demand. Here’s why: Bruen has also created sudden, intense interest in research from people such as Brennan Gardner Rivas, an independent scholar who wrote her dissertation on the history of gun regulation in Texas. “The states and attorneys general who are trying to defend their gun laws from challenges now have to seek out historians to identify analogous historical laws,” Rivas says. “They’ve all found me on their own through Googling me and looking up my publications and things like that.”
The Itasca Village Board turned down a proposed drug rehab center after two years of debate among residents.
The Haymarket Center wanted to turn a former Holiday Inn, located at 860 West Irving Park Road, into a 240-bed drug treatment center.
Since 2019, there has been opposition by some Itasca residents since the proposal, who argue the village is too small for the facility. They have voiced concerns related to zoning changes, tax revenues and whether emergency services would be able to handle possible increased demand. […]
While the proposed facility cleared zoning and planning, the village’s board had the final say with a 6-0 vote Tuesday night not to go ahead with construction.
The Haymarket drug treatment center’s more-than-two-year attempt to open a rehab in Itasca took another turn Thursday when officials said U.S. Attorney John Lausch has launched an investigation into whether the village’s rejection of the center was in keeping with the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Mayor Jeff Pruyn released a letter Lausch sent last week, in which he announced the probe and noted that the ADA protects people with disabilities — including substance use disorder — from discrimination.
The Haymarket drug treatment center filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against the village of Itasca, claiming its rejection of a rehab facility proposed for a former hotel amounted to discrimination against people with substance-use disorder. […]
“The intentional and orchestrated discriminatory conduct across Itasca’s key governmental entities is designed to interfere with the rights of Haymarket Center, the people with disabilities it serves, and their families,” attorney Mary Rosenberg of Access Living, an advocacy center for the disabled that is representing Haymarket in the lawsuit, said in a statement announcing the lawsuit.
* Today…
The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Chicago has sought to file a complaint in intervention in a pending lawsuit against Itasca, Ill., alleging the village engaged in unlawful disability discrimination in reviewing and ultimately denying a zoning request filed by a non-profit health care provider to use its property as a treatment center for people with substance-use disorders.
The Department of Justice has since completed an extensive investigation and substantiated Haymarket’s claim that the Village violated Title II of 2 the ADA in reviewing and denying its zoning request. […]
The Village engaged in disparate treatment by employing a host of unprecedented and highly anomalous tactics to frustrate Haymarket’s treatment center proposal. As one primary tactic, Village officials—especially Mayor Jeffrey Pruyn—legitimized, endorsed, and fanned the flames of residents’ fears by issuing scores of public statements disparaging Haymarket and its supporters while urging residents to voice their fears and concerns at zoning hearings. Just as the officials intended, the discriminatory opposition movement swelled, seeped into the hearings, and persisted until it ultimately tainted the decision-making process.
Village officials also concocted a pretextual narrative that the treatment center would impose severe economic harms on the region and its taxing bodies. To accomplish this, before the zoning hearings began, the Village: (1) misclassified the treatment center as a planned development instead of a “health center” special use; (2) waged a public campaign against Haymarket that focused the public discourse on its pretextual economic concerns while amplifying 3 residents’ fears; and (3) drew the Itasca Fire Protection District (“Fire District”) and Itasca School District 10 (“School District”) into the zoning process as “interested parties” to oppose Haymarket.
The misclassification imposed onerous zoning requirements on Haymarket, most notably by requiring it to prove, with assistance from experts and attorneys, that the center would impose no economic harms on the region. The public campaign disseminated pretextual economic talking points to Haymarket’s opponents and further fomented opposition. And the “interested party” designations allowed the Fire and School Districts to leverage nearly trial-like due process rights to help the Village bury Haymarket’s proposal under baseless economic concerns. […]
The tactics prejudiced Haymarket by galvanizing the discriminatory opposition movement around made-up economic impact claims and converting what should have been a routine special-use zoning proceeding into an unprecedented and openly hostile zoning process involving 35 hearings lasting over two years, with heavy participation from attorneys and experts, and imposing staggering costs for Haymarket.
After the hearings concluded, the Village denied zoning approval based on pretextual economic impact concerns that (1) the Village would lose desperately needed tax revenue if a nonprofit rather than a hotel operated at the site; (2) Haymarket’s patients would require costly emergency medical services from the Fire District; and (3) Haymarket patients or their children would overwhelm the local K-8 School District. During the hearings, Haymarket had offered overwhelming proof that these purported concerns were unlawfully considered and baseless, and it made extraordinary concessions to resolve them anyway. But these efforts fell on deaf ears because they spoke only to concerns that were pretext for discrimination.
Lastly, the Village failed to fulfill its accommodation obligations under the ADA prior to denying Haymarket’s zoning request. First, the Village failed to accommodate Haymarket’s reasonable request to use its special-use process. And second, the Village conducted a fake accommodations analysis after deliberately breaking down and failing to conduct any meaningful interactive process that might have revealed solutions to its purported concerns.
…Adding… Haymarket Center President & CEO Dr. Dan Lustig…
We are heartened by the Department of Justice’s finding that Haymarket Center faced a ‘discriminatory’ and ‘onerous’ zoning application process in our effort to open a comprehensive substance use disorder treatment center in the Village of Itasca. By filing to intervene in this case, the DOJ joins Haymarket Center in our efforts to reinforce equality and fairness in healthcare, address discrimination and inequities against those with substance abuse disorder and protect vulnerable populations by ensuring access to life-saving treatment. As always, we welcome the opportunity to find a resolution with Itasca leaders and hope the DOJ filing moves us closer to opening Haymarket DuPage.
Friday, Jun 21, 2024 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
Uber is leading the charge to close critical transportation gaps, ensuring reliable access to its services in places that need it most, such as underserved areas like Englewood. This is a part of Uber’s broader commitment to augment and expand the reach of Chicago’s transportation ecosystem, focusing on overcoming the first-mile/ last-mile hurdles that have long plagued residents in farther afield neighborhoods. Uber aims to extend the public transit network’s reach, making urban transportation more accessible and efficient for everyone. Discover the full story on how Uber is transforming city transportation for the better.
An effort is also underway to waive or minimize filing fees for transgender people as they request a legal name change — and allow the petitioner to request that a court seal the name change if public disclosure may harm their health or safety. The bill is aimed at protecting other vulnerable populations, including survivors of violence and refugees. Legislation stalled in the Illinois Senate this spring.
“Obviously, we have to think about the whole state. And here in Chicago, you can live relatively anonymously. But, you’re living in a small town and you have to publish in your local newspaper that you’re transitioning, that’s going to put you at significant risk,” said the bill’s sponsor, State Rep. Kelly Cassidy, D-Chicago. “So, similarly, we provide the safety waivers for folks who have other risks, whether it’s somebody fleeing a domestic violence situation, somebody coming out of a trafficking situation, things like that. We’ve created these bypasses for folks, and this would have added to it.”
Cassidy is also pushing for a measure that would give a $500 tax credit to people and health care providers who are fleeing states that limit access to abortion or gender affirming care.
Equality Illinois is leading a push for the state to require sex education in public schools. The state provides districts with a “medically accurate, evidence-informed, response and trauma-informed guide” for sex education — but it is optional for districts to provide. Parents can also opt their students out of it.
With the legislative session over for spring in Illinois, cannabis/hemp industry stakeholders across the state are regrouping and making plans for a veto session in the fall. Hemp advocates and supporters in Illinois must unite over the summer to ensure that their industry is protected, and their business models can continue to flourish. […]
I recently chatted with Rep. Ford about this spring session and his plan for 2024’s veto session.
Here’s what he had to tell me:
Today, after much work and consideration, hemp products are still unregulated in Illinois. Last year, I introduced Illinois House Bill 4161, which would create a regulatory framework for hemp products and establish important requirements like licensing, testing, and labeling. I also introduced HB4193 that would create age minimums for hemp product purchases, limited to adults who are 21 years of age or older. This year, I introduced HB5306, the Industrial Hemp Act, designed to accomplish those same goals.
I agree with Gov. JB Pritzker that a hemp regulatory proposal must be top priority during veto session this fall. I joined him in his disappointment that we couldn’t get a bill through in spring. Going into veto session, I hope to work with all stakeholders to educate lawmakers on solutions to our communities’ issues while still leaving opportunities for this growing industry to flourish in Illinois. We will then finalize a bill that will accomplish all stakeholder goals. Anything else could put hundreds – if not thousands – of Illinois companies out of business and Illinoisans out of work, while starting a new war on drugs in Illinois. Our communities have been targeted and destroyed by this failed war, and it is past time to repair the harm, not create prohibition 2.0.
A crying 6-year-old was brought to an emergency department after being found sluggish and cold to the touch. The parents had been at work when the babysitter gave several cookies from the kitchen to the child as a snack. Each cookie contained several adult doses of THC, the part of marijuana that gets people high. The child was admitted to the hospital overnight and recovered.
This was just one of 244 cases of cannabis edible exposures among children 5 and younger reported in 2023 to the Illinois Poison Center. […]
Illinois lawmakers couldn’t decide between regulating or banning the products this spring, so they did nothing. Unlike licensed cannabis, which must undergo testing and labeling and is only available to those 21 and over, hemp products remain unregulated, without even a legal age restriction, though some companies impose their own age limits and testing.
Nevertheless, exposures appear to occur with both licensed and unlicensed products, said Dr. Michael Wahl, medical director of the poison center.
Among the bills that did not pass is a piece of legislation that sought to restore protections for wetlands stripped last year in a United States Supreme Court decision. In May 2023, federal protections for wetlands were gutted, weakening Clean Water Act protections for millions of acres of wetlands across the U.S.
An Illinois bill, SB 771, or the Wetlands Protection Act, that would have reinstated those protections in the state passed in committee, but failed to make it to the chamber floors of the General Assembly. The bill will be considered again during the veto session this fall. […]
Sponsors of the bill said a law is needed for Illinois to fill the gap left by the Supreme Court decision. The reinstatement of regulations would ultimately help reduce flooding in vulnerable communities and improve water quality, proponents said.
One major opponent of the legislation was the Illinois Farm Bureau, which also signed onto the federal lawsuit that eventually reversed wetland protections. Chris Davis, the farm bureau’s director of state legislation, said its opposition stemmed from not enough protections for landowners. […]
Sen. Laura Ellman (D-Naperville), sponsor of the senate Wetlands Protection Bill, said that she’s still committed to working with the farm bureau this summer.
Illinois State Rep. Harry Benton (D-Plainfield) formally introduced HB 5860 on June 11.
The bill would amend Illinois’ Flag Display Act and prohibit officials from knowingly displaying or causing to display “the United States national flag with the union down on government property.” […]
A separate, but closely related bill (HB 5861) would amend Illinois’ Flag Display Act to fine government officials up to $25,000 for flying an American flag upside down on public property. The current penalty for a violation is anywhere from $1-15.
Neither bill addresses whether a government official or someone else could display an American flag upside down on private property.
Many people in Illinois were watching for this decision as the General Assembly considers Karina's bill, which is along similar lines. SCOTUS decision appears to give a green light that the law would be constitutional if it passes the General Assembly #twillhttps://t.co/DdWHOOJedF
Friday, Jun 21, 2024 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
Lawmakers in Springfield recently negotiated a back-room deal that could radically change the way small businesses and consumers use their credit and debit cards to give corporate megastores a multi-million dollar giveaway.
This new law could:
- Force separate cash payments on sales tax and tips
- Reduce consumer privacy by exposing more information on your purchases
- Create costly operational nightmares and paperwork burdens for small businesses
This first-of-its-kind, untested mandate would create chaos, removing credit and debit cards as the safe, secure and hassle-free way to pay in Illinois — all so giant, out-of-state corporations can look a little better to their shareholders.
* OK, right up front I need to disclose that I was given the option of receiving a free cicada bobblehead as part of the marketing for this post, which I accepted. But I really would’ve posted it anyway because it’s a pretty cool thing and I’ve purchased other products from this company in the past…
This morning, the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum unveiled the first Cicada Bobblehead. Due to an unusual overlap of the lifecycles of two types (or broods) of cicadas, trillions of the insects are expected to emerge in the United States by the end of June, especially in the Midwest. The 13- and 17-year cicadas only emerge in the midwestern and eastern U.S. in the same year every 221 years, with 2024 being the first such year since 1803. The first-ever Cicada Bobblehead is being produced by the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum.
Positioned on a base bearing its name across the front with a grass-like texture on top, the cicada bobblehead features its prominent red eyes set wide apart, short antennae, and membranous wings. The bobbleheads, which will be individually numbered, are only available through the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum’s Online Store. Expected to ship in November, the bobbleheads cost $30 each, plus a flat-rate shipping charge of $8 per order. […]
“We’re excited to create this bobblehead celebrating the triumphant return of the cicada,” National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum co-founder and CEO Phil Sklar said. “The sounds of summer have taken on a new meaning in 2024 with the arrival of the popular insects. This bobblehead is a must-have for cicada lovers everywhere!”
Other than the free sample, I won’t make anything else off of this. But maybe we can convince the “Hall of Fame and Museum” to produce an Illinois politics bobblehead line.
The periodical cicadas, which emerge from underground in the spring every 17 years, are expected to die off by the end of June, according to Morton Arboretum scientists. When they die off, millions of the dead insects will cover the ground in suburban Chicago and much of northern Illinois.
* The Question: What has the cicada situation been like by you?
* ICYMI: Businesses closed into next week after fire on East Adams Street in Springfield. SJ-R…
- The 400 block of East Adams will remain closed indefinitely until remains of the building are demolished, final demo is set for Tuesday.
- The cause of the fire is still undetermined.
- All businesses – save for Buzz Bomb Brewing Co which has a separate side entrance – will be closed for the following week at least for the building’s demolition.
* Sun-Times | Illinois a blue haven for gender affirming care, but LGBTQ+ advocates say housing, safety still a concern: An effort is also underway to waive or minimize filing fees for transgender people as they request a legal name change — and allow the petitioner to request that a court seal the name change if public disclosure may harm their health or safety. The bill is aimed at protecting other vulnerable populations, including survivors of violence and refugees. Legislation stalled in the Illinois Senate this spring. “Obviously, we have to think about the whole state. And here in Chicago, you can live relatively anonymously. But, you’re living in a small town and you have to publish in your local newspaper that you’re transitioning, that’s going to put you at significant risk,” said the bill’s sponsor, State Rep. Kelly Cassidy, D-Chicago.
* The Atlantic | The Truth About America’s Most Common Surgery: Despite the C-section being the country’s most common surgery, many expectant parents are not encouraged to seek out information about the specifics. This leaves mothers poorly equipped for the procedure’s aftermath, especially when the surgery is unplanned. At the beginning of the book, Somerstein recounts her own emergency C-section, during which the anesthesia failed and the obstetric staff disregarded her anguish. “I felt it all: the separation of my rectus muscles; the scissors used to move my bladder; the scalpel, with which he ‘incised’ my uterus,” she writes. “Yet the operation continued. I was expected to bear the pain.” Invisible Labor follows her search for context about this traumatic experience, and her desire to understand why women’s pain is so often treated as psychological rather than physiological.
* WaPo | Reggie Jackson shares searing stories of racism at Negro Leagues tribute: As a young member of the Athletics’ organization in 1967, just before the major league club moved from Kansas City to Oakland, Jackson played for Birmingham at Rickwood Field and other ballparks in the South. On Thursday, he said returning to Birmingham was “not easy.” “The racism, when I played here, the difficulty of going through different places where we traveled — fortunately, I had a manager and I had players on the team who helped me get through it,” he said.
*** Statewide ***
* Daily Herald | State Republican Party chair quits, Del Mar hopes to fill void: Palatine Republican and former lieutenant governor candidate Aaron Del Mar announced Thursday he will seek the chairman’s job. “Moving forward, if my peers believe in me and give me the opportunity to lead this party, the Democrats better be ready. I’m no milquetoast,” said Del Mar, a State Central Committee member.
* WGEM | SkillsUSA Illinois leader excited about funding increase for career and technical education: Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs in Illinois are getting a boost new state budget. The fiscal year 2025 budget will invest $58 million in CTE programs, a $10.3 million increase. […] SkillsUSA Illinois Executive Director Eric Hill said the money will allow it to expand in underserved rural areas and connect more students with real-world learning experiences.
* AGRINEWS | Illinois Soybean Association celebrating 60 seasons of success: The Illinois Soybean Association will observe its 60th anniversary with special events and commemorations throughout the year. Over those six decades, ISA has worked, in tandem with farmers and industry, to help Illinois’ soybean farmers grow better soybeans and find new markets for their products.
* Sun-Times | Pilsen ‘serial polluter’ Sims Metal should not get city permit, groups say: Ahead of a community meeting Friday night, multiple organizations are warning Chicago’s public health department that Sims Metal Management should not receive a new permit because it hasn’t yet built and tested pollution controls required after a state lawsuit. In addition to the pollution controls, some community members are asking for a health impact study that would take into account other sources in the area that contribute to poor air quality.
* Sun-Times | White Sox lose for 15th time after leading in seventh inning:
“We let one get away from us,” manager Pedro Grifol said. So it goes for the Sox, who fell to a major-league-worst 20-56 despite six innings of one-run ball from Flexen and RBI from Luis Robert Jr. (double), Andrew Vaughn (single) and Andrew Benintendi (sacrifice fly) against Spencer Arrighetti in the fifth inning.
* Sun-Times | Angel Reese makes WNBA history as first rookie with seven consecutive double doubles: On Thursday, as the Sky (5-9) snapped their four-game losing streak with an 83-72 victory over the Wings, Reese made history with her seventh consecutive double-double. It’s the longest double-double streak by a rookie in WNBA history and the third-longest streak by any player. With it comes a message: Not only is Reese’s game translating just fine, but she’s proving to be the biggest steal of the draft, with a very strong case for Rookie of the Year developing.
*** Cook County and Suburbs ***
* Daily Herald | ‘This is not a moment of pride for anybody’: McHenry County Board scales back Pride Month resolution: The scaled-back version includes language such as “Pride Month offers a unique and significant opportunity to affirm and uphold the rights of all to freedom of choice in sexual orientation” and “Pride Month further upholds the ideal that LGBTQ+ residents of McHenry County, as all residents, have the right to live their lives with freedom from fear of harassment; exclusion; educational, housing or employment bias.” The original proclamation included language referencing LGBTQ people serving in government and the military, as well as those who are “forced to hide their identities and live in secrecy and fear due to the criminalization of their relationships,” among other things.
* Daily Southtown | Will County Board members question vote on Pride month resolution: The Will County Board voted Thursday to approve a proclamation recognizing June as LGBTQIA+ Pride Month, but not before some board members questioned why the proclamation was on the agenda. “I would like to know where’s the representation for the traditional family,” said Julie Berkowicz, a Republican from Naperville, who was one of two Republicans questioning why the board was voting on the Pride proclamation.
* Lake County News-Sun | Robert Crimo III expected to change not guilty plea in Highland Park July 4th mass shooting: Lake County State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart confirmed Thursday night that Crimo, who had pleaded not guilty to 117 felony counts, is expected to change his plea at a Wednesday hearing before Judge Victoria Rossetti. Rinehart declined to discuss specifics of the plea change, other than making a brief statement. “We have been continuing to work with victims and survivors as the situation develops,” he said.
* The Root | All The Alleged Schemes, Scandals and Shenanigans That Keep This Chicago-Area ‘Super Mayor’ In The News: On top of a recent lawsuit from a previous employee claiming wrongful termination for refusing to aid in her alleged “political schemes,” Henyard’s reputation has been smacked left and right by claims of corruption. She’s denied most if not all of the claims stacked against her, claiming she’s got receipts to prove “fact over fiction.” If you want to keep track of the legal battle, here’s 15 allegations Henyard is going up against.
* Sun-Times | Michelle Mbekeani leaving Cook County state’s attorney’s office 6 months after taking new role: The website, Periodsentence.com, also drew the ire of a judge at the courthouse, who believed her involvement with the organization conflicted with her role in the prosecutor’s office. Judge Michael McHale ordered Mbekeani banned from his courtroom in January after holding a conflicts hearing in the case of Dante Brown, who is fighting to overturn his double murder conviction. She told the judge the website was a “class project” and “not a real business,” according to the judge’s order. When McHale learned that Mbekeani had registered the business with the Illinois secretary of state and asked her to explain, he said he found her answers “duplicitous, incomplete, evasive and untruthful.”
*** Downstate ***
* Door County Pulse | Craig Blietz Painting Hangs in the Illinois Governor’s Mansion: A call from an architect friend in Chicago made Door County artist Craig Blietz aware that a painting of his was featured on the opening page of a book by M.K. Pritzker, wife of Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker. “My friend received the book as a present from his wife and had no idea anything of mine was in there,” Blietz said.
