Get the latest news from around Illinois.
Chicago Tribune: 'Me, me, me! Did I mention me?' The greed of Illinois' pay-us-first legislators
The pile of past-due bills at the Illinois comptroller’s office stands at more than $12.8 billion. That’s money owed to struggling families, small business owners, nursing homes, community colleges — most entities that rely on the state for payment. The stack of bills has been building for a decade but now reaching heights of wretched proportion.
You’ve read stories of suffering, of a decimated safety net, of the state’s most vulnerable citizens getting shoved to the back of the payment line. You’ve read about medical services getting cut because the state isn’t paying health insurers on time. You’ve read about low-income, at-risk students losing college loans. You’ve read about social service providers slashing programs.
Chicago Sun-Times: Marijuana organizations given green light on political donations
A federal judge ruled Friday that medical marijuana centers and dispensaries in Illinois can contribute to political committees and campaigns.
The decision came three and a half years after a state law banned those contributions.
Crain's Chicago Business: Illinois' stack of unpaid medical bills now reaches $3.5 billion
The state budget stalemate, which has stretched on for nearly two years, is putting lives on the lines, according to emotional testimony out of the Illinois House Thursday.
That’s because the state’s now $12.6 billion backlog also includes months and months of unpaid medical bills on behalf of state workers and retirees. At last count, the state owed $3.5 billion in medical bills for its employees, according to a spokesman for the State of Illinois Comptroller. In early March, a dental lobbying group said dentists who treat state employees were owed a collective $174 million.
Chicago Tribune: Rauner touts support for pension plan that includes CPS aid, vetoes a city proposal
Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner summoned reporters to his office Friday to announce more than two dozen House Republicans are willing to vote for pension legislation that would include money for Chicago Public Schools but faces an uncertain future in Springfield.
And the governor’s announcement projecting progress came hours before he vetoed a different plan from Mayor Rahm Emanuel to save money by changing city workers’ pension plans.
Chicago Sun-Times: Rauner urges Dems ‘to get on board’ GOP’s CPS funding plan
Gov. Bruce Rauner on Friday urged Democrats in Springfield to support a Republican plan he says would provide much-needed funding for the nation’s third-largest school system, avert a crisis and save taxpayers money.
“Let’s get this done because this will then lay the foundation so we can get a broader bargain done that’s good for taxpayers, where we get a balanced budget with other reforms to grow jobs and protect our taxpayers,” Rauner told reporters at the Thompson Center.
Chicago Tribune: State asks judge to dismiss CPS lawsuit alleging 'separate and unequal' education funding
Attorneys for the State of Illinois asked a judge Friday to dismiss an education funding lawsuit brought by Chicago Public Schools as part of the district’s efforts to plug a gaping budget hole.
The state argued that CPS’ complaints about pension funding and Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner’s veto of a bill to send CPS $215 million are issues to be settled by the legislature, not the courts.
Chicago Tribune: Ex-CPS consultant sentenced to 7 years in prison in bribery scandal
The education consultant cast by prosecutors as the “mastermind” of a bribery scandal that upended Chicago Public Schools and disgraced Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s hand-picked schools chief was sentenced Friday to seven years in prison by a federal judge.
In sentencing Gary Solomon, U.S. District Judge Edmond Chang said that “public corruption is a blight on our city and our state. It breaks the public’s trust in government, and there are grave consequences when the public’s trust is broken.”
Chicago Tribune: Black officials to Rauner: We don't want Paul Vallas at Chicago State
A froup of black city leaders has denounced Gov. Bruce Rauner’s push for a new leader at Chicago State University ahead of an emergency board of trustees meeting scheduled for Monday.
The governor’s office said earlier in the week that Rauner wants Paul Vallas, the former CEO of Chicago Public Schools, to assume some sort of crisis management role at the Far South Side university. The role is meant to be temporary until a new, full-time president can be found. The job has not been clearly defined and does not yet have an official title.
Quincy Herald-Whig: State Chamber CEO: Illinois needs fiscal sanity
Illinois needs to “return to fiscal sanity” and pass a balanced budget, the president and CEO of the Illinois State Chamber of Commerce told a Quincy audience Friday.
Todd Maisch was the guest speaker at the annual business leaders breakfast for state Rep. Randy Frese, R-Paloma. Maisch said the state budget impasse that has dragged on for two years has made bad government finances even worse.
State Journal-Register: Home care agency says it needs $2.1M from state to make payroll
A Springfield-based provider of home care services says it needs a $2.1 million payment from the state in order to meet its April 3 payroll.
In a letter to Comptroller Susana Mendoza, Community Care Systems Inc. also said it is owed more than $17 million and asked that the office “release funds to a level that will catch us up to the same level as all other vendors.”
Chicago Tribune: Rauner says employment agency security breach affects 1.4 million residents
The governor’s office says about 1.4 million Illinoisans are affected after one of the state’s employment security agency vendors was hacked.
Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner’s office said Friday afternoon that the Illinois Department of Employment Security notified the Illinois General Assembly about the hack. State officials say the hacker may have accessed the names, social security numbers and birthdates of job seekers in the vendor’s database. Authorities say the data break may have impacted ten states.
Chicago Tribune: Illinois Lottery's private manager faces 2nd lawsuit alleging fraud
A second lawsuit has been filed accusing the Illinois Lottery’s private manager of defrauding players after a Tribune investigation found the lottery did not award many of the biggest prizes in its largest instant ticket games.
The lawsuit was filed last week in Cook County Circuit Court by two people who describe themselves as longtime scratch-off players, and — like the first one filed last month in downstate St. Clair County — it seeks class-action status to cover all players who bought tickets for the games.
Chicago Sun-Times: 18 Chicago city workers topped $100K in OT in 2016
Eighteen city employees made more than $100,000 in overtime in 2016 — most of them more than doubling their salaries, records obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times show.
Another 476 city workers were paid between $50,000 and $99,999 in overtime, while 2,325 collected between $25,000 and $49,999.
Chicago Sun-Times: Chicagoans take triple hit on old Wrigley factory
The abandoned factory that the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co. left behind in Bridgeport has been like a wad of gum stuck to the shoes of Chicagoans.
First, Wrigley shut down the factory, sending 600 jobs to the far suburbs, in 2006 — four years after Mayor Richard M. Daley gave the company $16 million in tax breaks to keep its headquarters in Chicago.
Chicago Tribune: Funds released to repair 'structurally deficient' Lake Shore Drive bridges
The Illinois Department of Transportation said on Friday it will release $4.2 million to repair two Lake Shore Drive bridges that have drawn concern from residents, officials said.
Repairs to the bridges over Lawrence and Wilson avenues will cost an estimated $8.4 million, split between federal and state funds. The 1930s vintage bridges are in visible disrepair, with chunks of concrete broken off and pieces more than six inches wide littering the sidewalk. Uptown neighborhood residents have sounded alarms about the two bridges for a decade, but little has been done.
Chicago Sun-Times: 2 Chicago aldermen tangle over honorary street signs
If the two bickering aldermen were women, you might call it a cat fight. Since they’re men, let’s call it a street fight — literally.
Ald. Anthony Beale (9th), chairman of the City Council’s Transportation Committee, is blocking Ald. Jason Ervin (28th) from ramming through 18 honorary street designations for living Chicagoans before a rules change that will limit designations to two every year per alderman — and require the honored individual to be dead.
Chicago Tribune: New report shows Chicago police street stops down, minorities still stopped more
Despite a dramatic drop in the number of street stops by Chicago police in the first half of 2016, officers continued to disproportionately stop African-Americans, according to a new report.
The report found that nearly 71 percent of stops were of African-Americans, though they make up only about a third of Chicago’s residents.
Chicago Tribune: Former Evanston city worker alleges millions in undeposited cash, checks
A former Evanston city employee has reported to local and state officials — and asked for whistleblower protection — that stacks of undeposited cash and checks totaling an estimated $3 million to $5 million were left unsecured and scattered about a city office.
City Manager Wally Bobkiewicz said on Friday that the complaint letter, dated March 7, is authentic but declined to comment further.
State Journal-Register: Downtown Springfield organization weighs in with TIF priorities
A joint initiative of the Springfield Project and Greater Springfield Chamber of Commerce to renovate a downtown church into apartments and office space won praise from city officials and $985,000 in downtown tax increment financing money.
Mike Pittman, who chairs the city’s Economic Development Commission, called the $8.5 million endeavor to convert the former First United Methodist Church at 501 E. Capitol Ave. “one of the best projects to ever come to us.”
Belleville News-Democrat: Local corruption probe results in felony charges for six people
A former top-ranking East St. Louis official was among six people indicted Friday as part of Operation Watchtower, an investigation by prosecutors and police into government corruption.
Robert L. Betts, of Swansea, a former East St. Louis city manager who once headed the city’s Department of Regulatory Affairs, was charged with harassing a witness, St. Clair County State’s Attorney Brendan Kelly said. According to a criminal complaint, Betts allegedly threatened Australian-born businessman Richard Treloar with a handgun while at a bar in the city in September.
Belleville News-Democrat: Belleville law for stores selling second-hand stuff is just junk
Municipal leaders don’t like too many pawn shops or payday loan stores because of what it says about their community: Poor economy, bottom-feeding businesses. They often turn to limits as a way to discourage them.
Apparently Belleville is also worried about what too many thrift stores says about the community. Aldermen on Monday voted 12-3 to limit the number to 10, and only two of those can be downtown.
Belleville News-Democrat: Split board OKs $4.58 million for soccer field turf to lone bidder
A $4.58 million single-bid contract for soccer field synthetic turf drew criticism from four aldermen, a local resident and a St. Louis company at the O’Fallon City Council meeting Monday, March 20.
Synthetic turf is being installed at seven soccer fields at the O’Fallon Family Sports Park as part of the Destination O’Fallon economic development project. The 10-year-old grass fields are being upgraded to all-weather ones to make the multi-sports complex state-of-the-art and attract regional and national tournaments.