McHenry County Blog

Mike Tryon told me that teens are the ones most likely to be “crammed” on their cell phones.

A press release from State Rep. Mike Tryon:

Governor Signs New Law that Prohibits Third Party Fees on Phone Bills

SPRINGFIELD….. A phone bill scamming practice known as “cramming” will no longer be allowed under legislation signed into law in Illinois this week.

State Rep. Mike Tryon (R-Crystal Lake), a co-sponsor of House Bill 5211, said the new law makes it illegal for third party vendors to bill consumers for goods or services on their phone bills.

“This is a follow up to a bill I previously passed which added clarity for services that appear by third parties on phone bills,” Tryon said. “This bill takes phone bill clarity to a next, logical level.”

According to Tryon, the charges are often unwanted or the result of consumers who not did not have a full understanding for services they signed up for.

“Too often vendors fail to tell consumers about all of the fine print associated with their services, and a ‘free trial offer’ turns into a vague monthly fee on phone bills,” Tryon said.

“This new law should address a great deal of this practice.”

The bill had the full support of the Illinois Attorney General’s office, which filed 30 lawsuits in recent years against third party companies accused of cramming. The new law takes effect January 1, 2013.

Ten years ago respected Republican State Senator Carl Hawkinson from the Peoria area narrowly lost a bid for the Illinois Supreme Court to a trial lawyer named Thomas Kilbride.

It gave complete control of the highest level of the state’s judicial branch to the Democrats.

The victory was orchestrated by House Speaker Mike Madigan, who was also Chairman of the Illinois Democratic Party.

Now Kilbride has to run against his record.

3rd Judicial District

No opposition candidate will be on the ballot in the 3rd Judicial District.

But, there’s a hitch.

He has to get a 60% favorable vote to be retained in office.

Only rarely does a judge, a pretty low-profile office, get kicked out of office.

Back in the early 1980′s Republicans in Boone County got mad at Judge (David, I think) Babb. Nice enough guy.

Babb had been elected to the circuit court as a Republican, but decided to run for the appellate court as a Democrat.

Needless to say, Boone County Republicans were less than pleased.

In this Republican appellate district, he was not elected.

When he came up for retention, I noticed “Dump Babb” yard signs on the road I took while teaching a course in state and local government at Rockford College.

One could not drive through Boone County without seeing the signs.

He failed to received the required 60% vote for retention and was dumped.

Now Republican political strategist Jon Zahm is running an anti-Kilbride web site. It’s called “Do Not Retain Judge Kilbride.” Or “Vote NO Kilbride” for short.

Ed Murnane’s Civil Justice League‘s JustPAC links to liberal rulings of the West Central Illinois judge.

Most irritating was the one ruling monetary ceilings on medical malpractice awards are completely unacceptable.

The Illinois Supreme Court has given the Illinois trial lawyers everything they want, just as national Dems did when the health care reform bill was barely passed with Melissa Bean’s vote.

Liberals are decrying the role of money may take in Kilbride’s election.

I didn’t hear them complaining ten years ago when Madigan and the trial lawyers put so much in the race to defeat Hawkinson.

The following language was signed into law (Senate Bill 3010) by Governor Pat Quinn on Thursday. July 29th:

“Notwithstanding any provision of this Section to the contrary, any township may, by ordinance or resolution, build, purchase, or lease a township hall, a multi-purpose senior center, or a combined township hall and multi-purpose senior center within the township without referendum approval, if the building, purchasing, or leasing of the township hall, multi-purpose senior center, or combined township hall and multi-purpose senior center is paid or provided for with funds that are not the proceeds of bonds authorized under this Article.”(emphasis added)

And internalize this, which is also in the bill:

“Notwithstanding any provision of this Section to the contrary, any township may, by ordinance or resolution, purchase, erect, equip, remodel, or renovate a community building without referendum approval, if the purchasing, erecting, equipping, remodeling, or renovating of the community building is paid or provided for with funds that are not the proceeds of bonds authorized under this Article.”(emphasis added)

Not the words “without referendum approval.”

Grafton Township Trustee Betty Zirk extols the virtues of a new Grafton Township Hall to the 2009 Annual Town Meeting. On a tie vote, electors defeated the effort to ratify the unlawful actions to build the new building.

All that is required to build a new township hall is combining it with a senior center and having enough money to build it without selling bonds.

At least that’s how this non-lawyer reads the language.

Maybe my headline is too aggressive, considering the incredible legal fees that the township officials have run up in their separation of powers suit, now before Judge Michael Caldwell.

Grafton Township voters have a referendum on the fall ballot to build a new township hall. No one thinks it will pass.

When I attended the Algonquin Township meeting, the board’s attorney, Lew Matuszewich referred to the bill as “the Grafton Township bill.”

So, my guess is that my interpretation is not too far off the mark.

In the State Senate, Pam Althoff voted, “Yes,” while Dan Duffy opposed the bill.

In the Illinois House, State Reps. Mark Beaubien and Mike Tryon voted, “Yes,” while Jack Franks voted, “No.”

I just got charged $5 apiece for two DVD’s of the Crystal Lake City Council meeting last spring when the board voted to hike the city sales tax by 75%.

Compare that to Huntley School District 158′s providing the first DVD requested free and each subsequent one 50 cents.

Kudos for the willingness of District 158 to allow taxpayers and media inexpensive access to what goes on at its meetings.

And, I guess I should mention that after years of sending me Certified Letters (now costing $5.54 each) to tell me a Freedom of Information request is ready or denied, I got a phone call last time saying that the Metra Ridgefield train station documents I requested were ready for inspection.

A phone call really will suffice.

The pre-Crystal Lake posts of my father’s biography can be found by looking down on McHenry County Blog.

100 W. Crystal Lake Avenue today. The house is the same, but the intersection is much more functional.

Dad rented a home at 100 W. Crystal Lake Avenue. We started school there (the junior class built its Homecoming float there) as Mother and Dad looked for something that would allow more access to the lake for the 50-horsepower Wolverine outboard boat we bought that summer. The boys of the previous tenants had used the attic as a BB gallery. The BB’s were everywhere.

Soon my parents found a home to rent at 800 West Broadway in Lakewood, but, more importantly in the Country Club Addition Property Owners Association. That gave us the right to keep our boat in the lake.

Dad became the association’s secretary, maintaining up-to-date Address-O-Graph plates for what was probably decades.

Since there was no Rotary Club in town, Dad joined the Crystal Lake Kiwanis, where he became the long-time secretary, doing the tedious record-keeping job of the first service club in Crystal Lake.

After the November election, Dad received a “thank you” letter from the ward committeeman in Chicago where he lived.

My father, a ghost voter in 1958. Who would have believed it?

Having been active in politics in Easton, Maryland, Dad was determined not to become so in Crystal Lake.

Crystal Lake, the reason the Skinners moved to town. In the center, where you see the pontoon boat, Mr. Litzenburger anchored his splendid Chris Craft board.

It took two years for him to break his pledge.

The Crystal Lake High School District was holding a bond referendum during the spring of my senior year. He started writing letters to the weekly Crystal Lake Herald. The next week the school board’s president would reply. My father would offer a rebuttal the next week. (None of the current Northwest Herald nonsense of only allowing one letter a month.) This went on until I knew the teachers were looking at me and pointing out I was the son of the guy trying to defeat the bond issue.

The bond referendum lost. Since it was my last semester and Oberlin College had already accepted me, my grades didn’t matter as much, but I don’t think any of the teachers retaliated. I still remember standing in the study hall while a couple of teachers looked my way from the westerly hall near Ken Tarpley’s speech class room. I wondered if they were saying, “There’s his son.”

Later Dad ended up on some committee to solve whatever space problem was perceived and, when he discovered that the football field had to be moved, he asked if a sidewalk could be built. I suspect that was his major victory on the committee.

Now, too often, I tell my son as we drive on Wallace, “That’s my Dad’s sidewalk.”

”I know, Dad. You’ve already told me,”

my son replies, sometimes in an irritated tone of voice.

When Richard Nixon ran for office in 1960, Dad became head of his local citizens committee. That put him in touch with the Republican precinct committeemen.

At some point in the 1960′s, Dad took over the publication of the Government Improvement League Newsletter, GIL Newsletter, for short. He wrote about assessments and taxes.

Dad’s office at the Barley and Malt Institute was in the Builder’s Building on Wacker Drive when he started work.

After the lease ran out, he convinced his board to move the office to Des Plaines. (“If we ever meet in Chicago, it will be near O’Hare, not Downtown Chicago.” They agreed. It was on the corner of Route 14 near the train station across from the movie theater in an old Masonic Hall.)

When that lease came up, he asked if he could move the office to Crystal Lake, arguing that if the board ever met in Chicago, it would be at a hotel near the airport, not in the Des Plaines office.

He ended up on Brink Street, later on the second floor on the west side of Williams Street, then the tip of “V” in the Crystal Lake Plaza and, finally, at Mike Janek’s old auto dealership on the corner of Woodstock and Brink.

More tomorrow.

= = = = =
Links to all of the articles can be found below:

Biography of Calvin L Skinner – Part 1 – Second Son, School Years

Biography of Calvin L. Skinner – Part 2 – College, Marriage, First Jobs

Biography of Cal Skinner, Sr. – Part 3 – First House, Elected President of the Easton, Maryland, Town Council

Biography of Cal Skinner, Sr. – Part 4 – Storm Sewer Grates, Miles River Yacht Club, Slot Machines, Chesapeake Bay Bridge

Biography of Cal Skinner, Sr. – Part 5 – Switching Parties, Moving to Salt Lake City, Middletown and Crystal Lake

Biography of Cal L Skinner – Part 6 – The Early Crystal Lake Days, Dipping Feet Slowly into Political Arena

Biography of Cal Skinner, Sr. – Part 7 – Running for County Auditor, Precinct Committeeman, Calling the Meeting that Led to McHenry County College

Biography of Cal Skinner – Part 8 – The Star Reporter, Daughter Ellen Bored in High School, Prohibited from Attending MCC Classes

Biography of Cal L Skinner – Part 9 – Responsible Republicans’ Slate, County Board Reapportionment

Biography of Cal Skinner, Sr. – Part 10 – Unsuccessful County Clerk Try, County Airport Fight, Wife’s Death