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That investigation is focusing, at least in part, on whether Madigan put the arm on the utility giant – which the Legislature helps regulate – to hire certain lobbyists who then did little or no work.
Ald. Matt O’Shea, 19th called for representatives of hedge fund Alden Global Capital, Tribune Publishing’s largest shareholder, to appear at a City Council committee hearing to talk about whether the company plans to invest in local journalism.
The measure specifically prohibits people from directing insults, taunts or “offensively coarse language” toward anyone else in a public place.
Even spared the burden of a ban on self-service, Illinois drivers are still straining under $1.9 billion in vehicle-related tax and fee hikes signed into law by Gov. J.B. Pritzker in 2019.
“In the meantime, those state lawmakers in Springfield who aren’t going to be facing indictment anytime soon should make it a priority to tighten up the rules regarding ethics in lobbying and in the legislature and put an end to the revolving door that immediately turns lawmakers into paid lobbyists.”
Illinois has tallied 891 public corruption convictions since 2000, more than any other state. And the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois had 1,730 federal corruption convictions: more than any other district court in the country.
The Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board, which is fully funded by fines from traffic offenses, has a $5 million hole in its budget. State law changed the way the money is allocated last year; another 2019 law allows judges to waive traffic fines in court.
Thank you to ZeroHedge for republishing our article.
“You’re buying at a neighborhood store and paying over there. But you’re not paying to buy it online, even though you’re consuming it here,” City Comptroller Reshma Soni said. “The whole point of this is, if the waste is in Chicago, we need to reduce that waste.”
The proposed ordinance would allow parking enforcement aides to take a picture of the encroachment and mail the violation—with fines ranging from $60-to-$150— to the address of the license plate holder.
Last fall, audits revealed the city was behind nearly $4 million in mandated contributions to the pension funds that support first responders.Since then, the comptroller has seized all incoming revenues to the city and redistributed them to the pension funds to cover the back payments. The revenue intercept caused interruptions to city services.
House Bill 4870 is similar to a mandate in California. It requires any new residential construction to have a dedicated circuit that runs to the garage or all parking spaces to make it “electric vehicle ready.”
Delivered—FEB. 19, 2020.
“Buying up law enforcement,” the Washington Times says.
If you’ve listened to Gov. J.B. Pritzker in the past few weeks, you’ve heard him play games with words. We called him out on it recently and now he’s doing it again. If the progressive tax fixes the budget deficit and delivers a tax cut, then there will be no money for property tax relief.
“I think most of us aren’t opposed to investing more money in these children,” Rep. Tom Weber, R-Lake Villa, said. “I have a problem not seeing what the money is going toward.”
“Rank-and-file members should be involved in how we allocate the new revenues that are a result of economic performance and growth and not the result of new tax increases,” Deputy Minority Leader Tom Demmer, R-Dixon, said, adding new revenues can be combined with “commonsense ways to reduce spending in government that seem at least to have bipartisan support right now.”
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