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Thank you to ZeroHedge for republishing our article.
Greg Hinz has long been among the most prominent of Illinois’ reporters and commentators on Illinois government given his position as such at Crain’s Chicago Business.
Here are his two recent articles directed to us at Wirepoints. We reproduce them in full with no further comment, for now, except to highlight the portions pertaining to Wirepoints, and to ask our regular readers to consider in light of what we’ve actually written.
A $100 million capital plan — bankrolled by an existing line of credit — will pay for new vehicles, sidewalks and the treasured aldermanic menu program. Normally, the city issues general obligation bonds backed by property taxes to cover a more sweeping capital program. But these are not normal times.
Some district administrators have said they are preparing for cuts. But leaders of the state’s largest school district, Chicago Public Schools, have said they plan to spend $125 million more on its campuses next year and the federal stimulus money will help support that investment.
“A reduction in the annual cost of living increase for public employee pensions — now an automatic 3% hike, compounded annually — should, finally, be seriously entertained…Could pain be avoided by adjusting the way our state is financing its debts, including pension debt? We don’t know for certain, but it’s time for government’s brightest financial minds to look under every rock, consider every option.”
Michigan’s Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer told NPR last month that she’d been in regular contact with the governors of Illinois, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Ohio: “We know that COVID-19 doesn’t respect party lines and it doesn’t respect state lines, and that’s why we’ve got to share our best information and move strategically together whenever possible.” Now, many of those national and regional plans seem to have evaporated.
Pritzker and Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul’s office argued that Sangamon County is “the most convenient venue” for the case because public health officials who would be called to testify and all of the documents in the case are officially located in Springfield. Bailey’s attorney suggested the governor sought a change of venue only because he is displeased with the Clay County judge’s rulings thus far in the case.
Said State Sen. Patrick Joyce (D-Essex), “We want to go along with the governor’s program. I was just concerned about where the line was drawn. It’s even better if all of the [Northeast] region meets the governor’s criteria, and we all open up at the end of the month.”
Emails and documents obtained via Freedom of Information Act requests show coroners and medical examiners across the state have raised questions about the processes of classifying COVID-19’s role in an individual’s death, citing, in some cases, the difficulty of determining whether the novel coronavirus played a “probable” role in someone’s death or a “suspected” role.
Property owners can pay their property taxes in four installments instead of two, without penalty.
“When you look across your congregations, do you see the elderly, or people with underlying medical conditions like asthma, diabetes, heart disease or upper respiratory ailments — the kinds of underlying conditions that make each individual, old or young, significantly more vulnerable to COVID-19?
For those interested in the courts’ opinions.
The April 11 implosion caused citywide outrage, especially as Chicago’s Latino community battles high rates of coronavirus. As of Friday morning, the 60623 ZIP code, which includes Little Village, has had 2,325 confirmed cases of COVID-19. At the time, Lightfoot slammed the site’s owner, Hilco Redevelopment Partners, and vowed to stop work at the site indefinitely.
The 19-0 vote drew applause from an overflow crowd in the open air at the 9th Street Beach on Lake Shelbyville. The County Board also voted 12-7 to place a resolution on the November ballot that asks residents whether Chicago should be a separate state from the rest of Illinois.
The governor’s five-phase reopening plan calls for more nonessential businesses to reopen and for employees to return to work in the third phase of the plan. However, schools and day cares won’t open until the fourth phase. That poses problems for parents and providers.
McHenry County’s 25 mayors want to be separated from Chicago in the regional plan, as do those in DuPage County. “It’s reaching a boiling point with our mayors. They are frustrated and exasperated,” Naperville Mayor Steve Chirico told WLS-TV on behalf of DuPage County mayors.
“A few extremists are in denial, claiming the disease is a hoax and such. Of more interest, and consequence, is the growing number of people who are willing to put their worries about jobs and the economy above their concerns about public health. This group is willing to gamble lives on the bet that they’ve got their priorities straight.
“The upshot is a barely civil war of ideas. It features disputes over constitutional
“The county board should approve the Pappas-Preckwinkle proposal to waive late fees. It would give property owners throughout Cook County time to catch up. To take a breath…But nibbling around the edges won’t solve the property tax problems of Illinois.”
“We write to you with deep concern over the recent threats issued by Governor J.B. Pritzker to possibly withhold federal aid provided through the State of Illinois from any local government that reopens its economy in accordance with federal health guidelines but ahead of Governor Pritzker’s own arbitrary timetable.”
“It is outrageous that the Governor is threatening retaliation against these leaders and the men and women of their offices”
“I know they’re all going to go up there, and the shops up there are going to do way better than we’re going to do here. I’m glad they have business. I’m glad they’re open, but it’s just not right. It’s just not right,” said one Illinois business owner.
The city’s business enforcement arm has fielded more than 3,400 complaints about alleged violations of the stay-at-home-order.
Q&A with Dr. Clyde W. Yancy, chief of cardiology at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine – one of the first researchers to identify that COVID-19 deaths haven’t been experienced evenly across all segments of the population.
Mark Konkol: “Here’s how it was explained to me: One person who gets tested three times is counted once by the city’s data and three times by state’s testing count. The number of confirmed cases is supposed to be “de-duplicated” so the total number of positive cases isn’t inflated.”
“As a Will County Board Member and Chair of the Homer township Republican Party, I can’t help the small business’s that are facing permanent closure. I cannot help people that lost their medical insurance or jobs. I cannot explain why they can not safely open their business. This shutdown is a direct violation of both the U.S. and Illinois Constitutions that we Americans will fight to the death to protect. Now when a person or business calls me, I will have a way they can join in fixing this dire situation.”
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