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After a summer filled with debate amongst the Cook County Commissioners in regards to the sales tax rollback, Board President Todd Stroger's veto, and the commissioners inability to garner enough votes to override said veto, the state legislature has gotten involved. Yesterday, both the House (by a 66-49 vote) and the Senate (by a 49-1 vote) passed a bill that sets the new requirement for a veto override at three-fifths of the commissioners (11) rather than the current requirement of fourth-fifths (14). Now all that's left is for Gov. Quinn to sign it. The bill was specifically aimed at Stroger and the tax rollback. The bill's sponsor, Sen. Dan Kotowski (D-Park Ridge), said, "This is a great win for taxpayers in Cook County." Stroger spokeswoman Chris Geovanis said, "We're disappointed that the legislature chose not to use logic and decided to change the rules in the middle of the game." Stroger has previously said he would fight any such legislation in court if it was passed.
State lawmakers have a few other things on their plate today as well, one being campaign finance reform. The Tribune breaks it down like so:
At the heart of the legislation are the first-ever limits on campaign contributions: Candidates could get up to $5,000 each for the primary and general elections from individuals, $10,000 from corporations and unions and $50,000 from political action committees.But the proposal also would allow all four legislative leaders to spend unlimited sums of money from their campaign accounts to individual legislators or candidates in general election races. Since [State House Speaker Mike] Madigan also is state Democratic chairman, he also could devote unlimited party campaign resources to hard-fought contests.
In primary races, however, the legislative and political party leaders combined would be restricted to giving $200,000 to a statewide candidate, $125,000 to a state Senate candidate, and $75,000 to a state House candidate.
House Republican leader Tom Cross wasn't impressed with the legislation, saying those lack of limits on leaders in general elections was, "status quo remains the same."
And still to be dealt with? The bill cutting back free rides for seniors on the CTA.
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Nice to see that Madigan still keeps much of his power under so-called campaign finance. Fucking tool. He cares nothing for this state or its people. He would have made a great Mafia guy.
I'm a native of this state, and I love this state, as I love the Midwest. But nothing will ever change in Illinois unless the citizens somehow manage to instill the fear of God into our leaders.
In short, nothing will ever change.
The disturbing thing is that, if Stroger does fight this in court, he will be using more of our tax dollars to fund his fight.
As he should! Public ignorance comes at a price and I say let the people foot the bill.
you're suppose to applaud Madigan and the legislature for coming to the “rescue” by legislating for Cook County Board, and ignore that they didn't deal with the growing pile of sh*t that concerns our state. Do you think Madigan and Co would ever try this with Daley?
They spent more time usurping Cook County than they did on dealing with the state's dire dire financial situation. And forget about Campaign finance reform
Why would Madigan and Co try to do this Daley? They are all part of the same general gang of fake-Irish criminals from the South Side.
"They spent more time usurping Cook County than they did on dealing with the state's dire dire financial situation. And forget about Campaign finance reform"
Yes, it seems they did.
The only way is strict public financing of campaigns. No exceptions, no mercy. The 1st Amd wasn't intended to give corporations, unions and other groups control of lawmakers and other leaders. And if it was, then the 1st Amd is not as great as we pretend it is.
Interesting some one of full Irish decent( black Irish) once corrected me when I called Daley, Madigan and Burke Irish.
And this isn't the first time the true intention of the constitution was subverted by Corp. Amerikkka, look at that they did to the Fourteenth Amendment!
I'm part Irish.
After a few years in Chicago, I started to play down that part of my ethnicity in favor of the other mutt parts of me (though, of course, I remain 100% American). Chicago makes me embarrassed to be associated with that group.
Call me racist. I don't care. It is what it is.
Well Tilda Its kinda like Prop Joe said in the Wire
"Who you tellin'? I got motherfuck*n' nephews and in-laws f*cking all my sh*t up all the time and it ain't like I can pop a cap in their a*s and not hear about it Thanksgivin' time. For real, I'm livin' life with some burdensome ni**ers."
It takes a 2/3 vote in Congress to override a veto by a U.S. president, and that has seemed to work pretty well these last couple of centuries. I don't see why it should take more than that to override a veto of the Cook County president. I don't see why Cook County should place more power in one man than the country does at large.