One of former State Rep. Doug Hoeft’s pet causes was PADS.

Helping the least of God’s people, as Jesus admonished us all to do.

The Elgin legislator got significant money put in the budget for a facility.

He died before it could be built.

Earlier this month, I noticed an article about the budget item, but with the name of a new state senator, Michael Nolan, attached to it.

Somehow, I doubt that Hoeft cares, but I imagine the lack of inclusion of his name in the article caused some pain for his family.

Doug, by the way, told one of my supporters who lived in his district that I was “the most influential and the least influential” state representative in Springfield.

I wonder if he was thinking of the attack piece that I presented to our House GOP caucus the day we discussed Governor Jim Edgar’s proposed income tax hike (a variation of the tax swap that he savaged Dawn Clark Netsch for proposing in 1990) for the first half of his characterization.

I can imagine his thinking of my being the last Republican to pass a bill in 1995, after we had taken control of the Illinois House for only the second term of my service in Springfield.

That was the spring Maureen Murphy and I tried our hardest to pass a bill that would require testing of mothers for HIV. With such a test, the infection rate for babies with an HIV-mother could be cut dramatically.

We lost because we took the Republicans on the committee for granted.

We assumed that they would follow the facts.

Too many did not.