Health & Fitness
Stantis cartoon tells pension story: Herding cats; Young GOP chief: Let me fix the party! Also: Reboot on HuffPo: Your Reboot Illinois Daily Tip-Off
Cartoonist Scott Stantis tells the entire pension reform story in a single cartoon. Plus, will the Illinois GOP be relevant again?
HERDING CATS There's a big difference between herding sheep and herding cats. Hearing the words "pension reform" brings out the feline side of Illinois lawmakers. At least that's the scene Scott Stantis draws at the Illinois Pension Corral. In this case, we think the picture tells the story pretty well.
REBOOT ON HUFFINGTON POST Reboot Illinois has been accepted as a regular blogger for Huffington Post, and today we've got an update on pension reform. It's big news for supporters of House Speaker Michael Madigan's pension reform bill. Reports from the number-crunching actuarial nerds show Madigan's bill will save Illinois taxpayers $187 billion over the next 30 years. That's way above the $150 billion Madigan originally had estimated. Unions that support a rival bill that may save $46 billion are not impressed. Read it here!
GOP AT A CROSSROADS This weekend the Illinois Republican Party convenes in Springfield to select a new chairman. Reboot Illinois Chief Operating Officer Madeleine Doubek started covering Illinois state politics 25 years ago when the party was a force. "The wins for Illinois Republicans since then have been few. Will the election of a new party chairman change all of that? Or will the Grand Old Party in Illinois be singing the same old song?" Read her entire blog post here.
Find out what's happening in Palatinewith free, real-time updates from Patch.
WORLD'S WORST JOB That's what Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka calls the chairmanship of the Illinois Republican Party. And Chicago Young Republicans President Angel Garcia wants it. New voters, technology and money are his key ingredients for an Illinois Republican revival in 2014. "2014 can be an historic year for the GOP if the new Illinois Chairman focuses on politics, not policy," he writes in an op-ed today.
ENDING THE ILLINOIS INCUMBENT PROTECTION PROGRAM Ever wonder why Statehouse incumbents win 97 percent of the time? It's easy when your district has been carefully drawn to keep you in and the opposing party out. That's a formula for complacency and corruption. We don't like this system and we've joined the CHANGE Illinois! coalition to get party bosses out of the process. If you're in central Illinois, join us tonight at Bradley University to learn more about this initiative. You can sign up here. If you can't be there, go here to learn more about this important effort.
Find out what's happening in Palatinewith free, real-time updates from Patch.
PERVERSE, LEGAL, HIGHLY EFFECTIVE Those are Better Government Association President Andy Shaw's words to describe the political map-making process in Illinois. The BGA is an ally in the effort to take map-drawing privileges away from party bosses and make a fair system. It won't be easy. "Elected reps making it easier for opponents to beat them by unrigging the process? Next," Shaw writes in his weekly column.
DAILY TIP-OFF While pension reform dominates the news out of Springfield, let's not forget that lawmakers also are busily crafting the state budget. The annual tradition of House Democrats passing a budget and Republicans complaining of being locked out of the process has begun. The House budget passed Tuesday reverses some of the cuts made by Gov. Pat Quinn -- most notably putting back $400 million in cuts to education funding.
House Republicans are not pleased. They say the cuts are necessary if the state plans to pay down billions in back bills and survive when (if?) the temporary income tax expires in 2015.
As mentioned above, there was big news on pensions Tuesday. Supporters of House Speaker Michael Madigan's bill now say it will save $37 billion more than originally forecast. That's not far from the total of the estimated $46 billion in possible savings from Senate President John Cullerton's competing bill, which has the blessing of Illinois labor unions. It's a pretty stark contrast between $187 billion and $46 billion over 30 years.
We have links to these and other Illinois news stories in the Daily Tip-Off section of our website.
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