A new study published by the Illinois Civil Justice League shows that campaign contributions from trial lawyers to Illinois politicians and judges topped $35.25 million during the past 15 years.

Though an office in Shanghai continues to operate, the New Delhi office never opened, and interim Provost Edward Feser said the campus is re-evaluating its international strategy.

Current county board members will have to document their work hours — and reach a county-specific minimum — to qualify for a public pension. “Document their work hours”? Oh, the humanity.

“It’s not just an African-American studies fight. The humanities and social sciences all feel like we’re under attack in this environment where universities tend to have a business mentality in the ways they look at higher education now,” says an associate prof at Chicago State. Comment: That’s as it should be. Scrutiny of liberal arts programs to weed out the BS and indoctrination is decades overdue.

The US Department of Labor recently passed new rules allowing states to establish new retirement savings plans for people working in private-sector jobs without retirement plans. These new rules reportedly also allow cities to do similar things. So far, eight states have established plans like these. They are California, Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, New Jersey, Oregon, and Washington.

A detailed look from a leading pension analyst.

Springfield’s fiscal mess continues to rack up victims: small business development centers on college campuses around the state, which are shutting their doors or retrenching because of funding shortfalls. About a quarter have closed, the latest at Governors State University in south suburban University Park, which is going the way of other abandoned locations at Joliet Junior College, Illinois State University in Normal and Waubonsee Community College in Aurora.

“The bankruptcy of public pension funds is an issue worldwide.” Comment: But in Illinois, the epicenter of the crisis, the majority political establishment remains in denial. “Nothing a little tax increase wouldn’t solve” remains its mantra.

The stated aim of the amendment — it’ll be on your Nov. 8 ballot — is to prevent state and local governments from using transportation revenue for non-transportation purposes. Sounds fine, to a point. But the diabolical effect is that contractors, and the unions whose members they employ, would have constitutionally guaranteed dibs on future billions of state and local revenue dollars.

Illinois taxpayers cannot afford “ghost pensioners,” which are Illinois state workers who have spent enough time working for the state to become vested in lucrative state pensions, a Chicago attorney said in a recently published article.

If you’re a suburban homeowner, chances are you pay a higher property tax rate than someone living in Hawaii or New York