By Nika Schoonover On his latest marketing tour to sell his State budget plan, governor JB Pritzker visited a community college in Normal Tuesday, March 14 to highlight his proposed investments in higher education. “With an additional $100 million directed to the (Monetary Award Program) grant program, a student can
By Peter Hancock Moody’s Investors Service announced Tuesday, March 14 that it has upgraded Illinois’ bond rating to A3, up from Baa1, marking the eighth credit upgrade the State has received in less than two years. Moody’s is now the second major rating agency to put Illinois in the ‘A’
By Hannah Meisel In the wake of a pair of recent decisions from the Illinois Supreme Court strengthening the State’s law governing how companies must treat employees’ and customers’ biometric data, longtime critics of the law see an opening to weaken it. But backers of Illinois’ Biometric Information Privacy Act
By Nika Schoonover Governor JB Pritzker Friday, Feb. 10 signed 15 bills into law, tackling policy areas from tourism to prison reform and making it easier for those previously convicted of felonies to legally change their names. The laws passed the General Assembly in their recently concluded lame duck legislative
By Jerry Nowicki Governor JB Pritzker’s second-term legislative agenda will begin in earnest next week when he proposes his fifth annual State budget to lawmakers in the General Assembly. Although a governor’s proposal usually provides framework for the State’s annual spending plan, it rarely makes it through the General Assembly
By Jerry Nowicki Sustained higher-than-predicted State tax revenues have in recent months given lawmakers a level of budgeting flexibility that is, at least in modern times, without precedent in a State with a reputation for perilous finances. For the current fiscal year and the one prior to it, that’s led
By Peter Hancock The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) announced Tuesday, Jan. 31 that Elgin-based School District U-46 superintendent Tony Sanders will become the next State superintendent of education. Sanders, 53, will succeed Carmen Ayala, who announced in November 2022 that she would retire effective January 31. ISBE reported
By Peter Hancock Attorney General Kwame Raoul on Monday filed a petition asking an appellate court to vacate a temporary restraining order that was issued late Friday Jan. 20 to block enforcement of the State’s recently-passed assault weapons ban. Raoul’s office filed the petition in the 5th District Appellate Court
By Hannah Meisel A trio of gun owners and a firearms retailer in southeastern Illinois have filed the first two lawsuits in what’s expected to be a flurry of litigation against the State’s new law banning the sale and manufacture of assault weapons in Illinois. Democratic Party leaders who pushed
Drum Major MLK Awards were distributed Monday evening at East Aurora High School onMartin Luther King, Jr. Day.
By Peter Hancock On the first full day of his second term, governor JB Pritzker Tuesday, Jan. 10 signed a bill banning the sale, distribution, and manufacture, of high-power assault weapons, .50 caliber rifles and ammunition, and large-capacity magazines, while still allowing those who already own such weapons to keep
By Peter Hancock Illinois House Republican Leader Jim Durkin will left the Illinois Statehouse Tuesday, Jan. 10 for the last time as a State legislator. After a bruising 2022 election cycle in which House Republicans lost five seats, Durkin did not seek another term as leader of the caucus. But
Governor JB Pritzker and wife, MK, take their first dance of his second term Monday, Jan. 9 night during an inaugural ball at the Exposition Building on the Illinois State Fairgrounds.
Elimination of cash bail one of many changes taking effect Jan. 1 By Peter Hancock By now, almost everyone in Illinois has heard that Jan. 1 will mark the beginning of a significant change in the state’s criminal justice system – the elimination of cash bail. It’s an issue that
By Peter Hancock Victims and survivors of multiple mass shootings urged State lawmakers Monday, Dec. 12 to pass a ban on assault weapons, arguing that communities throughout Illinois have felt the pain of deadly mass shootings. “I was shot multiple times on the Fourth of July in Highland Park,” Lauren
By Jerry Nowicki State lawmakers Tuesday, Nov. 29 announced a bipartisan plan to use State revenues to pay down the remaining $1.4 billion in debt taken on by the State’s Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Part of the agreement is expected to move through the General Assembly
By Tammie Sloup,FarmWeek Rural communities are older, sicker, and poorer. “It’s a terrible marketing line,. but a great elevator speech when trying to communicate the uniqueness of rural communities,” said Alan Morgan, chief executive officer of the National Rural Health Association. Morgan, who has more than 31 years of experience
By Jerry Nowicki Early voting hours and locations greatly were expanded across the State this week as the campaign season entered its final two-week stretch. Polling places opened across the city of Chicago as well. Information on early voting for each election authority can be found on the Illinois State
By Peter Hancock Illinois voters will be asked in November to decide whether the right of workers to form unions and engage in collective bargaining should be enshrined in the State constitution. The first clause of the amendment contains two sentences. The first would establish a “fundamental right to organize
By Jerry Nowicki Governor JB Pritzker announced a plan Tuesday, Sept. 27 to reduce a $1.8 billion Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund deficit by $450 million through an infusion of unemployment-related revenues. The trust fund is the pool of money paid into by employers to provide a social safety net for
