-- Connecting the dots between our economy, government and business --
That words so simple, so innocuous and so true could raise as many core issues as they do says so much that’s extraordinary about the circumstances we are in. Those issues go far beyond Lightfoot and Chicago.
Not only did the state fail to effectively protect retirement home residents from COVID-19, but in its rush to manage the situation it failed to protect them from neglect and abuse as well.
“Siobhan Haugh, a parent and school board member at St. Paul of the Cross School in Park Ridge, says she ‘is not worried’ about sending her three boys back to school. ‘There are risks with everything, and this is worth trying,’ she says. ‘Lockdown was one thing, but once things started to open up, I had to get more comfortable with them doing things. We have to figure out how to live until there’s a vaccine.'”
Jim Dey: “(T)he ads in support of the progressive tax plan couldn’t be more misleading in their references to states with progressive-income-tax systems like Iowa and Wisconsin. The clear message of the ad is that in those states — unlike in Illinois — lower- and middle-income taxpayers pay income taxes at lower rates, apparently all the way up to $250,000. But the ads don’t explicitly say so, and Pritzker’s ad team is depending on people not to look too closely to those states’ rates.”
“Whether or not we do some additional things like having the bridges up really depends upon what we’re seeing and what we’re hearing from an intelligence perspective,” the mayor said.
The Illinois Rental Property Owners Association supported the moratorium on evictions at first, saying it made sense for public health. But now, months later, they claim there is no longer a rent-paying crisis.
As of Thursday night, there were 1,526 people hospitalized with COVID-19 across Illinois, according to the state health department. That is 86 fewer people than were hospitalized with the virus a week earlier. But in Chicago, a daily average of 18 people were newly hospitalized with coronavirus symptoms, two more people a day admitted to hospitals than a week earlier.
“Surely in 6 months, couldn’t we have installed plexiglass barriers and outside air ventilation systems in the IDES offices by now,” they asked in their letter. “Limit the number of people in the offices, socially distance, mask, all that, hell, we don’t care, put a tent up outside and buy laptops for the staff — but get these offices back open. People are hurting.”
Although IDES said it will investigate the fraud, that can take months as bank records are subpoenaed and as they work through a backlog of fraud cases.
The National Guard is not the “panacea” some seem to think it is, Lightfoot said. “We’re gonna have this debate, and it’s an important one to have, but I think we have to have it in the context of, ‘What is it that we need to keep our residents safe?'”
“My sister is a postal worker. I know that she and her colleagues work hard every day to deliver the mail,” Lightfoot said.
“Four of the most-respected minds met in a rare face-to-face debate Wednesday, hosted by the Lake Zurich Area Chamber of Commerce….Ted Dabrowski, president of the financial watchdog Wirepoints said the issue boils down to whether or not Illinoisans trust lawmakers enough to remove the flat-tax progression and spend more of their money.”
State Rep. Charlie Meier, R-Okawville, represents parts of Clinton, Madison and St. Clair counties, all of which are included in the latest list: “We had the state police at a wedding trying to shut it down [last] Saturday night in my district…She said, ‘just write me the ticket, I am not stopping this reception….it’s bad that it’s come to this.”
“It’s one more thing that manufacturers have to deal with [in Illinois],” Illinois Manufacturers’ Association President and CEO Mark Denzler said, noting that energy costs are second to employee costs, which are higher than neighboring states. “We are the largest consumers of energy in Illinois.”
Independent review is needed “in response to IDPH’s recent discovery that the Bureau of Long-Term Care was not properly processing and investigating complaints of abuse and neglect at long-term care facilities from approximately March 15 to June 30, 2020.” That time period included 272 allegations of abuse and neglect
Pritzker moved to extend the ban again amid warnings that tens of thousands of Illinois residents could be evicted before they could get a grant from the state, which have not yet been awarded.
“When Johnson was released from Cook County Jail — it took days to get him fitted with an electronic monitoring device — he tweeted to his followers: ‘I have two neck tattoos and I have now been to jail. Will y’all please go listen to my music now?’ He then posted a new song titled, ‘Blacked out, Pissed Off.'”
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services notified the city that it will rebid $176 million in grants that previously went straight to City Hall. “These are pretty serious issues,” said Lauri Morrison-Frichtl, the executive director of the Illinois Head Start Association. “The city based its new structure on Head Start funding and now they are going to lose some of those dollars and some of those children. It now throws a wrench in their planning.”
Mark Konkol: “CTU leaders want us to believe they’re fighting for kids when, behind closed doors, they want extra money for less teaching.”
Eric Zorn: “The tension between the general sentiment that Black lives matter and the existence of a specific organization with that name is problematic…If ‘Black Lives Matter’ becomes a platform for incendiary views, the signs of support, obvious and lightly concealed, will start to come down. The important mission will be harmed.”
“If Springfield is freed from the constitutional constraints of a flat tax rate, soon enough middle-class earners also will get hit with a rate increase. That’s because lawmakers find it easier to hike taxes than cut spending, reduce regulatory burdens or take other actions to encourage employers to stay in Illinois, invest and grow the economy.”
“My background is IT, and my husband works with big data. This idea that we can’t figure it out, it’s just not true,” the Northern Illinois University employee said.
“Our police are working 12-hour days, their days off are being canceled, we need to give them some kind of relief and so we are just asking for the National Guard to come in and aid and assist, not patrol our communities,” Ald. Anthony Beale said.
The 13-page set of principles the governor will make public today makes no mention of attempting to claw back any of the more than $150 million in earnings that ComEd acknowledged its bribery-tainted lobbying efforts in Springfield yielded since 2011.
The counties are: Bureau, Cass, Clay, Clinton, Franklin, Greene, Grundy, Hancock, Henderson, Jefferson, Logan, Madison, Monroe, Moultrie, Randolph, St. Clair, Union, Whiteside, Will, and Williamson.
“Even when we differ, we can still work together, to come to some conclusion that moves us forward as a state and as a country,” said Ivory, the president of the Illinois State Black Chamber of Commerce.
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