* The ongoing climate/energy bill negotiations mean I can’t really plan anything like a real vacation, so long weekends are gonna be the rule for a while…
Since economic shutdowns began and COVID-19 death counts started to rise in March 2020, national unemployment rates have hovered at historically high numbers, stressing state unemployment systems left dealing with an unprecedented number of claims.
In Illinois, that’s led to a deficit in the Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund – or the pool of money used to sustain the social safety net – that could rise to $5 billion.
Stakeholders from both political parties, as well as business and labor groups, are now warning of “crippling” tax increases on businesses and cuts to unemployment benefits that could result if the ongoing deficit goes unaddressed for too long. […]
Lawmakers and stakeholders reached by Capitol News Illinois said they were hopeful for another round of federal aid, this time targeted to shore up trust funds nationwide. Failing that, members of both parties believe the state should use a large portion of its remaining federal American Rescue Plan Act funds – a sum of more than $5 billion of the $8.1 billion allocated to the state – to address the deficit.
As I’ve said before, I really think that’s where much of the set-aside money is going if Congress doesn’t act.
The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) is fully adopting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated guidance for COVID-19 Prevention in Kindergarten (K)-12 Schools released today.
“Our goal is to protect the health of students, teachers, and staff so that in-person learning can resume as safely as possible,” said IDPH Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike. “The CDC is right: vaccination is the best preventive strategy. As school board members, parents, teachers and superintendents plan for a return to in-person learning in the fall, we strongly encourage those who are not vaccinated to continue to mask. IDPH is proud to fully adopt school guidance issued by CDC, which is based on the latest scientific information about COVID-19.”
The updated school guidance now aligns with guidance for fully vaccinated people, which allows activities to resume for fully vaccinated people without wearing a mask except where required by federal, state, and local rules and regulations.
Major elements of the updated guidance include:
• Masks should be worn indoors by all individuals (age 2 and older) who are not fully vaccinated.
• CDC recommends schools maintain at least 3 feet of physical distance between students within classrooms, combined with indoor mask wearing by people who are not fully vaccinated, to reduce transmission risk. When it is not possible to maintain a physical distance of at least 3 feet, such as when schools cannot fully re-open while maintaining these distances, it is especially important to layer multiple other prevention strategies, such as indoor masking.
• Screening testing, ventilation, handwashing and respiratory etiquette, staying home when sick and getting tested, contact tracing in combination with quarantine and isolation, and cleaning and disinfection are also important layers of prevention to keep schools safe.
• Many schools serve children under the age of 12 who are not eligible for vaccination at this time. Therefore, this guidance emphasizes implementing layered prevention strategies (masking, distancing, testing) to protect people who are not fully vaccinated.
Schools and communities should monitor community transmission of COVID-19, vaccination coverage, screening testing, and outbreaks to guide decisions about on the level of layered prevention strategies being implemented.
State Superintendent of Education Dr. Carmen I. Ayala issued the following declaration mandating in-person learning with limited exceptions:
Beginning with the 2021-22 school year, all schools must resume fully in-person learning for all student attendance days, provided that, pursuant to 105 ILCS 5/10-30 and 105 ILCS 5/34-18.66, remote instruction be made available for students who have not received a COVID-19 vaccine or who are not eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine, only while they are under quarantine consistent with guidance or requirements from a local public health department or the Illinois Department of Public Health.
“All our students deserve to return safely in-person to schools this fall,” said Dr. Ayala. “With vaccination rates continually rising and unprecedented federal funding to support safe in-person learning, and mitigations such as contact tracing and increased ventilation in place in schools, we are fully confident in the safety of in-person learning this fall. We look forward to a great school year and to the energy of Illinois’ young minds once again filling our school buildings.”
The Illinois Education Association released the following statement attributable to IEA President Kathi Griffin:
“We are very excited that the Illinois Department of Public Health has decided to adopt the Centers for Disease Control’s guidance for schools. Both agencies are correct that vaccines are the best way to keep students and staff safe and for those who can’t get vaccinated, wearing a mask is the next best option. This news has been highly anticipated. Our members are looking forward to the start of this school year and now we have an idea of what the year will look like, and it is based on science, which is a great comfort.”
“There’s a long-standing myth in Illinois that downstate taxes are going to Chicago and supporting Chicago and that is just not true,” [political scientist John Foster], a former member of the SIU political science faculty, explained.
In fact, he said, the research shows that Southern Illinois gets more in state funding for every dollar spent on taxes than any other part of the state.
“Here in the southern 19 counties — basically I-64 south with the exception of the metro east area of St. Louis — we are getting back between $2.75 and $3 for every one tax dollar we pay depending on the year,” Foster said. “On the other end of that are the suburban counties; they are not getting nearly as much back as they are sending.” […]
“If you could somehow get around the Constitutional issues and split, you would create a very poor state,” he said. “Illinois, as a whole, is very wealthy. In total, our economy is in the top 20 in the world, but if you separated the 96 counties outside of Cook County from it and those around it, the 96 would be, by far, the poorest state in the country. It would create an economic disaster.”
Returning to the broader question we began with – the assertion that perception is more important than the facts – is a fundamental axiom of politics that does not bode especially well for mass democracy. Facts should count for something – indeed, for a lot – and are essential to any form of rational decision-making. Rational action at both the individual voter level and the aggregate public opinion level is crucially important in a representative democracy. The operation of a successful mass democracy depends in the long run on the people being well informed and acting according to reality rather than inaccurate perceptions and myth.
“Perception is reality” is destroying this country.
* I told subscribers about this earlier today. Alexi Giannoulias will report having $3 million in his campaign account at the end of the second quarter. Fundraising email…
Dear Friends,
During the past six months, we’ve been working hard so we have the resources and support that our campaign needs to win the Illinois Secretary of State race in 2022.
We recently exceeded our quarterly fundraising goal, having received an overwhelming number of contributions to bring our campaign fund total to more than $3 million cash on hand by the June 30 deadline.
I can’t thank you enough for your help!
Your response shows that we have amassed a broad-based coalition that continues to grow momentum and gain support each day from all parts of the State.
In the end, Illinoisans want solutions-driven leadership that brings people together, restores trust in government and delivers results for hard-working families that I promise to deliver.
Sen. Tammy Duckworth’s re-election campaign reports $5 million cash on hand after raising $2.37 million in the second quarter of 2021. “Almost all, 97 percent, of the more than 43,000 contributions received over the quarter were under $100,” the campaign said in a statement. The average individual contribution was under $40, according to Illinois Democrat’s camp.
* The ILGOP criticizes Democrats’ attempts to “tighten controls on utilities” in a fundraising email. Utilities don’t produce power…
Friends,
Springfield Democrats are currently attempting to enact a number of SUBSTANDARD energy policies. Led by Governor Pritzker, IL Democrats want to tighten controls on utilities and close several major coal-fired power plants in the state.
This is unacceptable, and Illinois Republicans are fighting back.
Will you join us?
Protect Illinois Jobs
Democrats want to turn Illinois from an exporter of energy to an exporter of jobs. They would rather import dirtier power from less efficient plants in other states than fund the energy plants in their own districts.
Just two of the power plants suggested for total shutdown by Pritzker would cost Illinoisans over 2,000 jobs. As you know, Democrats control every level of Illinois state government, and they have all but shut out the GOP from having any part in this new energy legislation.
Our current power grid is among the most RELIABLE in the country and keeps us PROTECTED from brownouts and blackouts. To shut these down is to shut down the entire state of Illinois.
Pitch in now to stand up to Governor Pritzker and his awful energy proposals:
* US Rep. Danny Davis’ primary challenger Kina Collins…
Hey Rich, I wanted to reach out to give you an urgent update from the finance team.
If you didn’t see Kina’s message yesterday, here’s what’s going on: a new establishment super PAC has been formed just to protect Danny Davis from our campaign and the movement we’re building together.
But like Kina told me, “My opponent can depend on corporate money, we’re busy building people power.” That’s why I’m reaching out to our grassroots supporters and asking: can you chip in whatever you can to help our movement beat this PAC?
Illinois Democrat Sean Casten is doubling down on his defense of critical race theory and arguing that it is “unpatriotic” to oppose an ideology that teaches young children that “whiteness” is the devil.
NRCC Comment: “Every vulnerable House Democrat should be as candid as Sean Casten when it comes to their views on critical race theory.” – NRCC Spokesman Mike Berg
Hilarious. Click here to hear what he actually said.
Today, we’re calling on Governor J.B. Pritzker to ensure the SAFER Communities Act is funded by the federal ARP assistance.
The SAFER bill would reduce mass incarceration in Illinois, as well as create a job training program for formerly incarcerated people. This would not only keep people out of prison, but help them get jobs so they can take care of themselves and their families. This is a win-win for the community!
Take 30 seconds to send prewritten emails urging Governor Pritzker to ensure that the SAFER Communities Act is funded by the federal ARP assistance.
Our collective efforts have powered this important proposal forward in Springfield, but there is still work to be done.
Help push the SAFER Communities job program over the finish line by taking part in today’s digital action!
Today, Governor JB Pritzker signed HB 376, the Teaching Equitable Asian American History Act, into law, making Illinois the first state in the nation to require a unit of Asian American history be taught in public schools. The monumental measure will ensure every high school graduate in Illinois will learn about Asian American history as well as the rich contributions and traditions of the Asian American and Pacific Islander community.
The legislation builds on the progress the state has made in ensuring the content taught in Illinois classrooms reflects the diversity of the people who call Illinois home. With the recent rise in acts of violence and bigotry against the Asian American community, teaching students about rich culture and important contributions of the Asian American community throughout history will help combat false stereotypes. […]
The legislation adds a new section on Asian American history study to the Illinois School Code. Beginning with the 2022-2023 school year, every public elementary school and high school will be required to include a unit of instruction studying the events of Asian American History, including the history of Asian Americans in Illinois and the Midwest. […]
The bill specifies that the curriculum should include:
• The contributions of Asian Americans toward advancing civil rights from the 19th century onward
• The contributions made by individual Asian Americans in government, arts, humanities, and sciences
• The contributions of Asian American communities to the economic, cultural, social, and political development of the United States.
While the legislation specifies topics that should be addressed in the curriculum, the state will not require or designate a specific curriculum for school districts. The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) is authorized to make instructional materials available to all school boards; however, each school board will determine the minimum amount of instructional time that qualifies as a unit of instruction as stated in the bill.
* Comments from the press release…
“This TEAACH legislation will not only better educate all of our young minds about the contributions of Asian Americans and their communities and culture, but it will give our Asian American students a chance to learn about the experiences and stories they have a personal connection with,” said House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch (D-Westchester). “Illinois is now a leader for the entire nation, and it’s our children, our future, who will be better because of it.”
“Asian American history is American history. Yet we are often invisible. The TEAACH Act will ensure that the next generation of Asian American students won’t need to attend law school to learn about their heritage,” said State Representative Jennifer Gong-Gershowitz (D-Glenview). “Empathy comes from understanding. We cannot do better unless we know better. A lack of knowledge is the root cause of discrimination and the best weapon against ignorance is education.”
“This historic measure makes Illinois the first state in the nation to set a standard for culturally competent Asian American history curriculum,” said State Senator Ram Villivalam (D-Chicago). “This milestone offers students of all backgrounds cross-cultural education, and ensures that the stories and experiences of our communities are accurately reflected in the classroom. As the son of Indian immigrants and representative of one of the most diverse districts in the state, I am proud to have sponsored this legislation.”
Vaccinated teachers and students don’t need to wear masks inside school buildings, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday in relaxing its COVID-19 guidelines.
The changes come amid a national vaccination campaign in which children as young as 12 are eligible to get shots, as well as a general decline in COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths.
“We’re at a new point in the pandemic that we’re all really excited about,” and so it’s time to update the guidance, said Erin Sauber-Schatz, who leads the CDC task force that prepares recommendations designed to keep Americans safe from COVID-19.
The nation’s top public health agency is not advising schools to require shots for teachers and vaccine-eligible kids. And it’s not offering guidance on how teachers can know which students are vaccinated or how parents will know which teachers are immunized.
The agency will also call on school districts to use local health data to guide decisions about when to tighten or relax prevention measures like mask wearing and physical distancing. Officials said they were confident this is the correct approach, even with the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant, and the fact that children under 12 are not yet eligible for vaccination.
The guidance, which The Times has seen in draft form, is a sharp departure from the C.D.C.’s past recommendations for schools, bluntly acknowledging that many students have suffered during long months of virtual learning and that a uniform approach is not useful when virus caseloads and vaccination rates vary so greatly from city to city and state to state. […]
The new guidance will continue to recommend that students be spaced at least three feet apart, but with a new caveat: If maintaining such spacing would prevent schools from fully reopening, they could rely on a combination of other strategies like indoor masking, testing and enhanced ventilation. The guidance recommends masks for all unvaccinated students, teachers or staff members. […]
It also strongly urges schools to promote vaccination, which it called “one of the most critical strategies to help schools safely resume full operations.” Studies suggest that vaccines remain effective against the Delta variant. […]
The guidance relies heavily on the concept of “layered” prevention, or using multiple strategies at once. In addition to masking and social distancing, those strategies may include regular screening testing, improving ventilation, promoting hand washing, and contact tracing combined with isolation or quarantine.
The recommendations call on local officials to closely monitor the pandemic in their areas, and suggest that if districts want to remove prevention strategies in schools based on local conditions, they should remove one at a time, monitoring for any increases in Covid-19.
The guidance, which is not binding, reflects many of the same concepts that the CDC released in April and May for the broader population.
But it may fuel a new round of political debate about masking and vaccinations — heralded by some, derided by others — as divisions carry over to practices in schools.
And practically speaking, it may be difficult to implement: It does not spell out how schools would collect accurate information about who is vaccinated — and thus able to go without a mask — and who is not.
“The school has to decide if and how they’re able to document vaccination status,” Sauber-Schatz said. If that is not possible, she said, “the safest thing to do to protect those people who are not fully vaccinated” is to go with a universal policy requiring masks.
I’ll post the guidance when it’s published by the CDC.
The CDC also recommends that all bus drivers and their passengers — vaccinated or not — wear a mask while traveling to school.
The biggest sticking point for schools though will likely be whether to require proof of vaccination. Most schools already require proof of childhood immunizations with few exceptions.
The CDC, which does not set vaccination requirements for schools or child care centers, makes clear in its recommendations that it will be up to schools and local officials to decide what to do. The agency specifically notes that schools may opt for a universal masking policy, particularly if they have unvaccinated populations and don’t want to require verification that a person has been vaccinated.
“We do allow for flexibility in our guidance,” said Capt. Erin Sauber-Schatz, who helped to write the guidelines as a member of CDC’s COVID response team.
*** UPDATE *** The new CDC guidance for K-12 is here. The new guidance for daycare is here.
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has requested President Joe Biden send federal troops to her city amid a rising crime wave, an offer she previously rejected under former President Donald Trump.
A day after Mayor Lori Lightfoot talked with President Joe Biden at O’Hare Airport about the extra resources he promised to combat crime in Chicago, the mayor said Thursday more federal help will come “relatively soon.”
Lightfoot also dismissed as false a report from a conservative news outlet that she asked Biden to send troops to Chicago, a story that seemed the peg for a Fox News reporter to ask White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki about it at the Thursday briefing. […]
“And no, we don’t need federal troops; we need federal resources of a different kind. And I’ve been very vocal about that; really vocal about both issues since 2019, and I talked at length last summer about the Trump administration’s disastrous policy of sending troops into cities like Portland and Seattle, which was an unmitigated disaster. Troops don’t know how to do local law enforcement. They’re not interchangeable,” Lightfoot said.
SCOOP: Democratic Rep. Dave Vella and Republican Rep. Tom Bennett, assistant minority leader, had planned a bipartisan legislative update over lunch tomorrow, but the invitation rankled Republicans who didn’t see the benefit of such public camaraderie. There was even talk about some GOP members calling a caucus meeting to voice their concerns. Their view: “Why would our leader co-host a Democratic meet-and-greet?”
The event didn’t just cross party lines, it crossed district lines, too. Vella is in the 68th District and Bennett in the 106th. Vella thought it would be a good way for lawmakers to get to know his district, he told Playbook. “My goal is to bring as many people as I can to look at the manufacturing, trade schools, and restaurants that are here,” he said. It’s about “reaching across the aisle.”
But before anyone could RSVP, Bennett had to bow out, said Vella. “He wasn’t able to make it.”
Um, no.
Anyone who knows anything about Leader Bennett knows that he holds these luncheons all the time, with members of both parties. Vella, a Tier One target, made the mistake of promoting the lunch as some sort of big event and Bennett decided he’d rather not participate. Also, while there may have been some talk among the more extreme elements of the HGOP caucus, the caucus chair told me nobody ever asked him about holding a meeting to discuss this topic.
House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch is giving a new meaning to bipartisan campaign reform. He’s holding a fundraiser tonight with Republican state Rep. Joe Sosnowski.
It’s a rooftop event overlooking the Cubs game against the Cardinals. Welch and Sosnowski have done this before. They split the tickets they sell and do their own sales and promotion.
Back when Welch was just another Democratic rep, it seemed like a nice way to show that lawmakers can work across the aisle. Now that Welch is House speaker, the gesture takes on a whole new meaning.
It plays into Welch’s pitch for bipartisanship — something he’s talked about since becoming speaker in January — and his efforts to show that it’s here to stay. It could benefit Sosnowki. Even Republicans want time with the speaker, after all.
Friday, Jul 9, 2021 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
Lawmakers are on the verge of passing legislation that would raise electric rates and turn Illinois into an exporter of jobs and importer of energy from neighboring states with higher carbon intensity. While masquerading as a clean energy bill, the proposal would shut down highly efficient, state-of-the-art power plants in Illinois in favor of energy produced in states that are far behind on meeting carbon reduction goals. Legislators must reject this plan and keep energy affordable, reliable and made in Illinois.
Coming online in 2012 during the Obama-Biden Administration and purpose-built with $1 billion of emissions controls, Prairie State Energy Campus stands apart from older, traditional coal plants. Employing more than 650 full-time workers and another 1,000 union contractors, Prairie State has also partnered with state and federal officials to study ways to further cut emissions. Illinois Electric Cooperatives and municipalities that own Prairie State are committed to keeping energy affordable and reliable while we invest in a cleaner energy future, but we cannot let policy get ahead of technology. Forcing a premature closure of Prairie State will have affordability and reliability impacts for Illinois electric cooperative and municipal consumers. Prairie State is the bridge to Illinois’ energy future.
llinois’ credit rating got another boost on Thursday, but some disagree on what’s behind the growing faith in the state’s ability to pay its debts. […]
Senate Minority Leader Dan McConchie, R-Hawthorn Woods, said the recent actions are driven by the federal bailout.
“We still have the worst unfunded pension liability in the entire nation, we’re still the worst credited state in the entire nation, and at some point, somebody is going to have to be the adult in the room and do their job,” he said.
Being an adult would entail working on a budget, which the Senate Republicans didn’t do this year, even though that very prudent state budget helped the state earn two ratings upgrades in a week. Instead, the Republicans mocked the budget and one of McConchie’s members even used it as target practice in a campaign video.
Look, I actually like the guy and he definitely has a role to play, but backing away a tiny bit from the “Illinois sucks” frame every now and then wouldn’t kill anybody.
* Meanwhile…
Um. Paid back? $138 billion? Nope. Not by the state anyway. And it's not like we were the only state economy flooded with federal money. Sheesh. https://t.co/uBooM3MrUn
The Illinois Department of Employment Security is finally implementing a so-called work-share program — first authorized under a 2015 law — that could have saved anywhere from 43,600 to 123,900 jobs statewide during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to research from the University of Illinois and Illinois Economic Policy Institute.
Work-share laws, also known as short-time compensation, allow companies to avoid mass layoffs by reducing workers’ hours so they’re still employed, while also allowing them to receive partial unemployment benefits. The concept is popular in European countries and more than two dozen other states have work-share programs.
While Illinois has had such a law on the books for nearly seven years, work-share was never actually implemented during former Gov. Bruce Rauner’s term or the first half of Gov. JB Pritzker’s administration. But the state’s employment agency is belatedly making good on the program — just as the state’s economy has reopened from all COVID restrictions. To help with the endeavor, the U.S. Department of Labor last week announced Illinois will receive a $4.2 million grant from the federal government.
But work-share will come too late for the thousands of Illinois workers laid off permanently during the pandemic, losing wages, healthcare benefits tied to their employment and sometimes getting divorced from the workforce completely.
“It’s really frustrating, it’s disappointing,” State Sen. Steve Stadelman (D-Rockford) said. “State government failed its workers, failed its employees by not implementing this seven years ago.”
A few days after the Fourth of July in 2018, Zay Manning was shot outside his neighborhood corner store in Bronzeville — the one he grew up going to for a bottle of lemonade and a bag of hot fries.
He was 19 and loved helping his younger brother produce music — picking out beats, tweaking the sound one bar at a time.
The one bullet that hit him nearly killed him.
During his hospital stay, police officers and doctors told him about the Illinois’ Crime Victim Compensation Program, which uses state and federal dollars to reimburse victims of violent crime and their families for injury-related expenses. Manning applied, hoping to recoup some of the costs of his medical bills and replace clothing destroyed and bloodied in the shooting. But he found the program difficult and confusing as he also was navigating back-to-back hospital visits.
“It was a lot of documentation I didn’t really understand,” Manning says. “I got discouraged.”
More than a year after submitting his claim, Manning faces a similar situation as most of the program’s applicants.
He hasn’t gotten a single penny of compensation.
The nearly 50-year-old government program that’s supposed to help ease the blow of being a crime victim largely isn’t doing that, an investigation by The Trace has found.
Marjorie Taylor Greene is mad at China for not containing Covid-19.
“I don’t want anybody in this country to depend on our enemy, China, who sent a Chinese virus that was made in a lab, that is a bio weapon, not only to our country, but all over the world,” Greene, a freshman member of Congress from Georgia, said. “And people died.”
However, speaking at a political fundraising event on Thursday night [for US Rep. Mary Miller], Greene encouraged hundreds of older voters to resist the life-saving vaccines that have proven to be society’s best weapon at fighting Coronavirus infection, hospitalization, and death.
It would not be her last contradiction of the evening.
On Tuesday, speaking about the country’s ongoing efforts to recover from the pandemic, President Biden said, “Now we need to go to community by community, neighborhood by neighborhood, and oft times door to door – literally knocking on doors – to get help to the remaining people protected from the virus.”
Before Biden made those remarks, local public health departments and community groups had already begun deploying similar public awareness campaigns to combat misinformation about the vaccines.
Still, Greene seized on Biden’s comment to scare people in the audience that federal agents, not local public health officials or volunteers, might arrive at their door if they didn’t take the vaccine. She said her ‘We Will Not Comply Act,’ which she filed in April, would offer wary citizens protection against federal overreach.
“It gives you permission to tell Biden’s little posse that’s gonna show up at your door, you know, that intimidate you — they probably they probably work for Antifa by night, and then they come and intimidate you to take the vaccine by day — Well, you get to tell them to get the hell off of your lawn,” she said to a room of about 500 people.
Of course, you don’t need permission from Congress to tell someone to get off of your private property. But Greene said her legislation would also allow people who refuse the vaccine to sue their employers for discrimination if the company makes vaccination mandatory.
* Mihalopoulos was also there…
More talk about Chicago than Downstate I’m this opening video.
Rep Miller says Chicago is a “war zone” and that she, her family and others in her district do not let people attack their businesses: “We shoot back”
The Bailey aide is asked if he wanted to avoid being associated with #MarjorieTaylorGreene by coming here. The aide replies no, he just had somewhere else to be.
Here’s my story from last year about Bailey, who sued the challenge the stay at home orders https://t.co/m31×777w0A
Friday, Jul 9, 2021 - Posted by Advertising Department
[The following is a paid advertisement.]
Climate change is no longer an impending crisis. We’re in a state of emergency right now. Last month, more than 480 people died in the Pacific Northwest when temperatures skyrocketed to 117 degrees. Last week, the Gulf of Mexico was on fire.
But instead of taking action in Illinois, fossil fuel companies and out-of-state interest groups are working overtime to mislead consumers about the health, cost, and climate impacts of toxic coal plants. Recently, Congressman Rodney Davis earned a “Pants on Fire” rating for claiming that the Prairie State coal plant was somehow not a major polluter.
Here’s the truth: Prairie State is one of the largest polluters in the nation, and that one plant is responsible for nearly 30% of all CO2 emissions in the Illinois power sector.
The impact of this toxic coal plant isn’t theoretical: Prairie State causes roughly one premature death every week and costs nearly $2 billion a year in damage to our health and environment.
Legislators have an opportunity to pass an equitable energy bill that not only closes dangerous coal plants like Prairie State, but provides resources for impacted communities while maintaining reliable power for everyone in Illinois.
