Gov. J.B. Pritzker is setting aside a controversial proposal to reduce the state’s payment to its severely underfunded pension plans for the coming budget year after tax revenue collected last month far exceeded expectations.

Due to a variety of factors, including changes that resulted from the recent federal tax overhaul, the state’s individual and corporate income tax revenue in April was more than $1 billion higher than what came in during the same month a year ago, according to a letter Illinois Department of Revenue Director David Harris and Pritzker budget director Alexis Sturm sent to legislative leaders.

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill once characterized the Soviet Union as a “riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.”

That’s beautiful phraseology that reflected the outside world’s inability to understand the Byzantine maneuvers of the leaders of that closed, authoritarian regime.

Illinois Senate President John Cullerton is backing a plan to raise the state’s cigarette tax by $1 per pack — three times higher than the 32-cent increase Gov. J.B. Pritzker proposed in his budget plan.

The state’s cigarette tax is currently $1.98 per pack and was last increased in 2012 when a $1 per pack hike went through. Supporters say raising the tax by another dollar would generate an additional $159 million in revenue for the state while also reducing smoking rates and saving money on health care costs.

State Rep. Jerry Costello II, D-Smithton, is leaving the state House of Representatives for an Illinois Department of Natural Resources position, the governor’s office announced.

Costello, son of former congressman Jerry Costello, has been appointed to director of Law Enforcement at the IDNR.

A former state employee was fined by the Illinois Executive Ethics Commission for not disclosing consulting work he did for a company to which he had also award a state contracts.

Mark Doyle, a former Illinois Department of Human Services employee tasked with the closure of the Warren G. Murray Center in Centralia, was fined $154,056 for violating the state’s revolving door law.

Students were back in class at two more Chicago charter schools Tuesday morning, following the end of a coordinated strike by unionized educators that stopped classes last week.

A tentative agreement with the Chicago Teachers Union was reached late Monday, according to a news release, allowing hundreds of students at two schools operated by the nonprofit Instituto del Progreso Latino to return to the classroom.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel once bragged he’d made “lemonade out of a big lemon,” and would save taxpayers $1 billion over 71 years, when he settled reimbursement claims from the company leasing Chicago’s parking meters.

But the results of the latest annual audit of the deal Chicagoans love to hate shows the company that took over the meters is still raking in tremendous revenues.

Chicago’s government watchdog says Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s library system hasn’t yet implemented plans to fix flaws in the way staff is allocated throughout the city’s 80 library locations.

Following up on a 2018 report, Inspector General Joe Ferguson’s office on Tuesday said the library system hasn’t yet analyzed the systemwide workload or reconsidered how the library locations are classified to make sure they’re properly staffed. The library system also has not looked into how much time employees spend on various tasks.

The executive director of the McHenry County Conservation District could earn more than $200,000 in annual compensation, plus benefits, next fiscal year due to a number of lucrative provisions in a contract that first was established in 2010.

Elizabeth Kessler’s current contract began with a salary of $143,574, with built-in increases of 2% after the first year and 4% in subsequent years. Although the 2010 contract was only for four years, it allowed the terms to extend every two years.

A newly elected Woodstock City Council gave initial approval Tuesday to more than $1.5 million in tax increment finance district incentives for five development projects.

Lisa Lohmeyer, Wendy Piersall and Darrin Flynn were sworn in Tuesday. Incumbents Mark Saladin, Dan Hart and Maureen Larson chose not to seek reelection in the April 2 election.