According to sources with knowledge of the announcement, the governor will announced a phased-plan to drop the indoor mask mandate in most settings, but that plan will not include a repeal of the mask mandate in public schools. See our own column on this linked here.

The Shakman plaintiffs said they have communicated to the governor that they would be willing to consider backing his request for vacating the decrees over state government, on the condition Pritzker or a representative of his administration agree to swear to the court that they know of no such politically motivated hiring. To this point, however, Pritzker and his administration have refused to agree to that term.

Senate Bill 4028 calls for instruction on mental health and illness in elementary and secondary schools and would require information how and where to find mental health resources in the state.

Illinois Education Association Vice President Al Llorens writes, in part, “We do not want another disruption to our students’ learning while we are still working to bridge the learning gap created by the pandemic. That’s why we believe our school districts should not make any rash decisions changing COVID safety requirements until after this process plays out in our court system. Our educators should be focused on their students – not worrying about health and safety.

The “Moving Cities Forward” platform prioritizes restoration of the Local Government Distributive Fund, which originally in 1969 dedicated 10% of the state’s total income tax revenue to municipalities, but is now closer to 6%.

“It’s important to keep in mind that the corporate income tax isn’t the only high tax that businesses are paying in Illinois,” analyst Katherine Loughead said. “They also pay the state’s high property taxes, high sales taxes. Those things pile up to make Illinois one of the least friendly states for businesses in terms of high tax burdens across the board.”

Nationwide, 85% of job losses have been recouped, but only Carbondale-Marion recovered past that mark. Every other metropolitan area in the state – and Illinois as a whole – remained far off a full employment recovery.

Illinois ranked 42nd in the nation for access to full-time, in-person learning from September 2020 to April 2021, according to a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report. 2021 saw 17% fewer students meeting English language arts standards, and an 18% drop in students meeting math standards for their grade since 2019.

The Illinois State Board of Education at the start of the school year announced statewide enrollment in public schools was down 3.5%. Time4Learning, a national developer for homeschool curriculum, said over 3,400 students in the Chicago area signed up at the beginning of the 2021-2022 school year.

Invest in Kids scholarship opportunities are set to expire Dec. 31, 2023. If the program is allowed to die, thousands of Illinois students and their families would be left scrambling for other scholarship money to stay in their schools. Or they might have to leave their private schools, or never get the option.

Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont announced Feb. 28 will be the final day of a statewide mask mandate in schools. It will be decided on the district level afterwards. California is ending their indoor mask mandate for vaccinated residents, which is nearly 70% of the state. Iowa, Delaware, and New Jersey are all dropping mask mandates as well, citing a drop in COVID-19 metrics.

“COGFA has estimated that a sales tax on services would generate between $1 billion and $3 billion in additional revenue for Illinois, depending on the number of services taxed. More importantly, revenues from a sales tax on services would likely grow over time, as it tracks the direction of the economy. Taxing more services would give Illinois something that Pritzker’s budget lacks: a sustainable new revenue source that would help put the state on a path to fiscal stability.”

When asked to comment on the governor’s veto and the creation of revised legislation to include a provision that only compensates vaccinated employees, Illinois Education Association (IEA) President Kathi Griffin commented, “The resolution we reached with the governor’s office on the language for House Bill 1167 ensures education employees do not have to exhaust their sick time when they are forced to take time off for COVID related reasons. It also means if schools close or switch to remote learning, hourly employees’ paychecks will be protected.”

As the omicron variant of Covid-19 fades, at least five states with Democratic governors this week moved to roll back mask mandates. It’s a sign that even states that took a more cautious approach to battling the virus are looking to relax pandemic-era public health restrictions as Americans learn to live long-term with Covid.

“The judge didn’t certify the class, so technically only the plaintiffs would be covered. But if you read the order, the judge enjoined the defendants (including both the state defendants and individual school boards) from requiring the school districts to mandate use of masks by students or staff,” said Nancy Fredman Krent, who teaches education law as an adjunct professor at Chicago-Kent College of Law. “So you can read the order as covering only the plaintiffs or read it as covering the defendants in their actions generally.”

Illinois is one of only 13 states to tax groceries. Some lawmakers are saying the tax shouldn’t be suspended, but rather repealed. “A 1% abatement in just the cost of food is little appeasement to a working mom trying to feed her family when inflation is at 8%,” said state Sen. Jill Tracy.

America’s blue states are increasingly chasing normalcy, especially when it comes to face mask rules meant to slow the spread of COVID-19 [but not Illinois].

The CDC spread what amounts to misinformation in its promotion of cloth masks, which countless medical experts have said are useless against Omicron, the dominant COVID-19 variant in the United States.