“Census data released in December showed that since 2013, more than 223,000 residents had moved out of Illinois. The number leaving has not made up for the number arriving. Those are people who won’t be paying taxes here in income, property, sales, alcohol, cigarette, cannabis, parking or gasoline. They won’t be renting apartments, shopping here, buying homes, dining out or sending their kids to school. Just about every sector of the Illinois economy is affected when we lose population.”

Illinois lawmakers have drafted legislation to combat the high price of prescription drugs, and now U.S. House Democrats are doing the same on the federal level. Additionally, Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin has joined Democrats in a letter to the president urging him to expand and improve the Medicaid and Medicare.

It could have been worse: some predictions called for Illinois to lose two seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. Illinois has been losing seats since it peaked at 27 seats before 1943.

Friday was the deadline for the General Assembly to pass bills out of each chamber, for consideration in the other chamber. The General Assembly’s session is scheduled to end May 31.

It is important to note that these budget appropriations figures are spending authority, or amounts that each agency is authorized to spend during the fiscal year. Actual expenditure amounts are often much lower than the authorized appropriations.

But, the measure found mounting opposition from the public with nearly 2,500 citizens filing what’s called a witness slip in opposition to the legislation. “People are very concerned about having this information based in a data registry,” said state Rep. Norine Hammond.

Illinois was one of seven states that will lose one seat for the Congress that will be seated in 2023.

One landlord said the eviction ban has given rise to another problem: squatters who might have been given the keys by a departing tenant. They aren’t on any lease, but police generally won’t help get them out, categorizing any complaint as a landlord-tenant matter they won’t touch during the pandemic.

The Illinois House approved the measure on a 76-31 vote after stripping out a small fee that would have raised $200 million a year to help finance the replacement of lead pipes known as service lines, which were installed throughout the state during the last century to convey water into single-family homes and two-flats.