The Financially Distressed City Law allows for the creation of a financial advisory authority for a distressed home rule municipality, with the power to reject loans, budgets and contracts, and otherwise oversee the city’s finances. In other words, the buck stops with them. Records indicate that only one other municipality, East St. Louis, has sought state oversight under this act since it passed in 1990.
A largely unasked question is becoming glaring: Is Illinois doing all it should to use artificial intelligence to make government cost less and work better? So far, the evidence says no.