July 28, 2014

QUOTE OF THE DAY

every_man

Crain’s: Poor families use ‘supervouchers’ to rent in city’s priciest buildings

The high-rise at 500 N. Lake Shore Drive is the second-most expensive in the city, with rents for a one-bedroom apartment approaching $3,000 a month, well beyond the reach of most Chicago residents.

But that’s not too much for the Chicago Housing Authority, which has used federal tax dollars to pick up most of the tab for four lucky residents in the year-old building, with its sweeping views of Lake Michigan, a concierge and a dog-grooming center.

The tenants moved in over the past two years as part of a push by the CHA to expand its housing voucher program so that more low-income residents can leave the city’s roughest neighborhoods and start a new life in places with low poverty and crime and close to good schools and jobs.

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WSJ: Let Patients Decide How Much Risk They’ll Take

Earlier this month, at a private conference for the CEOs of his portfolio companies, venture capitalist Vinod Khosla interviewed Google GOOGL -0.82% co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, asking them if the company might jump into health care. “It’s just a painful business to be in,” Mr. Brin replied, later noting that “the regulatory burden in the U.S. is so high that I think it would dissuade a lot of entrepreneurs.”

Mr. Brin is right. As a neurosurgeon-scientist and entrepreneur who co-founded a bioelectronic medicine company that deploys implantable technology to supplant drugs, I wish he were wrong. But rampant misalignment of incentives is hampering technology in the U.S. health industry.

Start with the Food and Drug Administration, which places the highest premium on “protecting the public health,” according to the agency’s website. The agency believes this goal is best accomplished through detailed oversight, ponderous review and ultimately control.

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Huffington Post: Fast Food Workers Vow Civil Disobedience

Comparing their campaign to the civil rights movement, fast food workers from across the country voted Saturday to escalate their efforts for $15-an-hour pay and union membership by using nonviolent civil disobedience.

More than 1,300 workers gathered in a convention in center in suburban Chicago to discuss the future of a campaign that has spread to dozens of cities in less than two years. Wearing T-shirts that said “Fight for $15” and “We Are Worth More,” the workers cheered loudly and said they would win if they stuck together.

“People are just fed up,” said Cindy Enriquez, 20, of Phoenix.

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Chicago Sun Times: Free Pre-K on the way?

The Pre-K way: Sneed hears Mayor Rahm Emanuel is this/close to rolling out a plan to fund free preschool enrollment for 4-year-olds from low income families.

“Watch for the mayor to build on his expansion of full-day kindergarten to all Chicago children,” said a mayoral source.

“Roughly 1,500 4-year-old kids from low income families who qualify for the federal school lunch program have no access to half-day pre-K,” said a mayoral source.

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Huffington Post: New Illinois Taxi Industry PAC Flexes Muscle in Uber Battle

The new Illinois taxi industry PAC has opened its wallet.

The Chicago-based Illinois Transportation Trade Association, a trade group representing the taxicab industry, formed its political action committee at the end of May with a planned annual budget of $1 million to help defend itself politically against the onslaught by rideshare companies, such as Uber.

In May, the taxi PAC put $200,000 in the bank.

Now they’re ready to spend.

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CBS: Gov. Quinn To Live Off Equivalent Of Minimum Wage

Gov. Pat Quinn agreed on Sunday to briefly live on the equivalent of a minimum-wage salary as he rallies support for a Nov. 4 Illinois ballot measure on the issue.

The Democrat made the pledge at a campaign event focused on the nonbinding ballot question, which asks voters if the minimum wage should be raised for people over age 18 from $8.25 to $10 by 2015.

“There’s a principle as old as the Bible,” Quinn told supporters at the Federal Plaza in Chicago. “If you work 40 hours a week, if you’re doing your job, you shouldn’t have to live in poverty.”

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SJR: Back pay, OT pushes state government’s ‘$100,000 club’ to 7,800

Nearly 1,600 more state workers collected $100,000 or more from the state in 2013 than topped that figure just a year earlier.

However, the increase could be a short-lived phenomena, according to state agencies where most of the biggest increases in the $100,000 club occurred.

Many of them said that making good on back-wage increases that had been withheld from unionized employees helped drive up the figures.

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Dispatch: Guard your right to know; tell lawmakers to let FOIA bill die

Gov. Pat Quinn took a giant step late last month to protect citizen access to information about their government.

But if his veto of a bill making it more difficult and expensive for citizens to uncover government corruption is to stand, legislators must be recruited to the cause as voters encounter them on the hustings in the weeks ahead.
First constituents will have to educate lawmakers about the obvious and serious dangers lurking in HB3796, which seeks to amend the Illinois Freedom of Information Act. They will have their work cut out for them. The bill passed both houses with almost no opposition, which suggests an override of Gov. Quinn’s veto would be easy to accomplish.

Among those voting yes were area lawmakers: Sen. Mike Jacobs, D-East Moline, and Reps. Don Moffitt, R-Gilson, Mike Smiddy, D-Hillsdale, and Pat Verschoore, D-Milan.

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CARTOON OF THE DAY

obamacare