Just when you think Illinois’ state leaders can’t make anything any worse, well, they make it worse.

The taxation and the lack of job opportunities and the drop in services that impact the quality of life have all conspired to again cost the state population.

For months, the top financial watchdog in state government has declined to turn over financial records to election authorities. He also has disclosed he is under federal investigation regarding his campaign fund. Frank Mautino, a former lawmaker appointed Illinois auditor general last year, continues to stonewall.

Only in corruption-numb Illinois would Mautino remain on the job under those circumstances.

The appropriate gifts for the Christmas stockings of many top state officials in Illinois this year would be a lump of coal each. Illinois coal, of course, while there still is some.

Once a leader in coal production, my home state has dropped to 3,728 miners employed last year, from 5,663 in 1995.

Cook County’s looming minimum wage hike and paid sick time law have sparked the perpetual debates about whether such mandates help workers or hamstring employers and threaten jobs.

Now at least one community is doing more than debating — it has opted out. And other suburbs could follow suit.

Forget the holiday blues. If you live in Illinois, chances are you are suffering from an acute case of the political blues, a bug that has long afflicted our state.

Although it was divisive, the presidential election is not the root cause of Illinois’ political blues; rather, it’s how our state does its business. Year after painful year, the people of Illinois pay for their politicians’ unique talent for gaming, deadlocking and bankrupting the system. There are few places where these dark arts are more evident than with gerrymandering – the practice of manipulating legislative boundaries to protect incumbent politicians and reduce the number of competitive legislative races.

One of the last chances for former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich to win early release from federal prison rests on a pending decision by the man whose Senate seat Blagojevich was convicted of trying to sell — President Barack Obama.

Blagojevich, 60, is in the fourth year of a 14-year prison term. He recently submitted a request to have his sentence on wide-ranging corruption convictions commuted, the U.S. Department of Justice has confirmed.

In Lake County’s Community High School District 128, teachers on average earn $102,000 and administrators $146,000 — but that doesn’t include annual bonuses.

The affluent district paid more than $500,000 in bonus checks this month, mostly to teachers and administrators rewarded for high student achievement, but to all other employees as well, with limited exceptions.

As Chicago grapples with a surge in killings and a mistrust of law enforcement stemming from police shootings, the number of arrests in the city has fallen by 28 percent versus last year, a Chicago Sun-Times analysis finds.

The number of arrests in Chicago this year is on target to be the city’s lowest since at least 2001, according to the Sun-Times analysis of city crime data.

Property owners can take comfort, but shouldn’t lapse into negligence, now that the Illinois Supreme Court has clarified a 1979 state law protecting them from some slip-and-fall lawsuits.

The high court reaffirmed earlier this month that the Snow and Ice Removal Act shields property owners from liability if someone gets hurt because they didn’t do a good enough job of shoveling, but only when the snow or ice was the result of natural conditions.

An alderman indicted on corruption charges while he sat in a City Council meeting is merely the latest in a rogues’ gallery of elected officials to face such allegations in Chicago, a city that over the years became saddled with a national reputation for corruption.

Willie Cochran — who pleaded not guilty Friday to bribery, extortion and wire fraud charges — received word of his indictment last week while he sat in the City Hall chamber, fellow aldermen stopping by for hushed conversations.

Federal officials say public housing authorities and other groups in Illinois will receive nearly $1.4 million to boost employment and economic independence.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced the funding last week. Illinois’ share is part of nearly $33 million nationwide. The money will also go to Native American tribes and non-profit organizations.

East St. Louis Township exists solely to help some of the neediest people in the state. Now that its former supervisor, half the trustees and a paid consultant to the township face or have pleaded guilty to criminal charges, what will happen?

New appointed Township Supervisor Tommy Dancy said he is committed to the mission of helping people.

The popular Coliseum show-ring at the Illinois State Fairgrounds is unsafe for use, an investigation by The (Springfield) State Journal-Register revealed this week.

Steel columns supporting portions of the more than 100-year-old show-ring have deteriorated to the point where they could fail, according to a report obtained by the newspaper through a Freedom of Information Act request. An inspection of the 60,000-square-foot amphitheater found leaks in the roof, water damage, mold and other hazards.