McHenry County Blog

I missed the press release below about Dave McSweeney’s having been appointed to succeed appointed State Rep. Kent Gaffney, who replaced State Rep. Mark Beaubien.

Apparently, Gaffney decided to give McSweeney something of a head start. Seniority doesn’t mean as much in Springfield as it does in Washington, but it will probably get him the lowest license plate number of those elected in November, 2012, a better parking space and, if Tom Scott has broken with the assigned seating practice of his predecessor, Lee Daniels, the seat of his choice after all senior to him have made their selections.

The press release quotes McSweeney saying this:

“Fiscal responsibility with each tax dollar is my priority from day one.”

This is his “day one.”

Sangamon County Circuit Court Judge Pete Cavanaugh swaers in David McSweeney as his daughter Melissa watches.

David McSweeney Appointed to State House

Barrington Hills, IL – Representative elect David McSweeney (R-Barrington Hills) was appointed to the Illinois House of Representatives today to serve the remainder of the term of retiring State Rep. Kent Gaffney (R-Wauconda). McSweeney is set to be officially sworn in on January 6th and will represent the current 52nd district during the 97th General Assembly lame-duck session scheduled from January 6th – 8th.

“I am honored to receive this appointment and now it’s time to get to work and tackle the state’s major fiscal challenges,” said McSweeney.

“The 52nd district has a tradition of honest and responsive leadership in government.

“I will continue that strong tradition and I thank and commend Rep. Gaffney for his service and commitment.

“Kent has served our state well and I’m confident that he will continue to be a leading voice in helping to solve the major issues that we face.

“I also want to acknowledge the longtime service of Mark Beaubien to our community.”

McSweeney has a successful business background in which he has worked as an investment banker, financial consultant and currently as an investment specialist.

McSweeney will lean on that experience and ‘know-how’ and has pledged to take a common sense business approach when drafting and supporting legislation.

“We have a responsibility to act now on key legislation that will significantly impact our state’s fiscal future,” added McSweeney.

“Fiscal responsibility with each tax dollar is my priority from day one.”

The 98th General Assembly will convene on January 9th. McSweeney will then represent the newly mapped 52nd District, which will include parts of Algonquin, Barrington, Carpentersville, Cary, Fox River Grove, Island Lake, Lake in the Hills and Wauconda.

A Friend of McHenry County Blog sent the following paragraph from Forbes:

“The fourth most dangerous city as ranked by our list is Springfield, Ill., a metro area of 200,000 four hours south of Chicago where the FBI reports 855 violent crimes and 70 rapes each year per 100,000 citizens.

“Despite its dangerous ranking, the state of Illinois has made great strides to respond to violent crimes against women; Illinois currently has more than 33 24-hour rape crisis centers and in 1992 was one of the first states to include rights for victims of violent crime in its state constitution.”

I doubt the danger to woman has anything to do with the politically charged atmosphere of the State Capital, but there is not doubt that there is a sexual aspect to this and undoubtedly other political arenas.

A view of the Illinois Capitol rail on the third floor where the legislative chambers are located.

In the musical “Boss,” based on Mike Royko’s book of the same name, there’s a song about “the girls who keep their jobs with their tails.”

I was told that Illinois Bell used to hire good looking young woman from rural parts of Illinois to fulfill that role.

Such assignations, of course, would not end up in an FBI data base, if the practice continued.

Neither would the “Springfield wives” of state legislators.

There was widespread talk that one of the ERA supporters changed an attorney-legislator’s vote the night before one of the votes.

And at a post-session party thrown by Governor Jim Thompson at the Executive Mansion, I was approached by a good looking young woman. When I demurred, she asked my if I let my wife (Robin Geist then) run my life. I told her that in matters like this, I did.

I stayed in the cheapest hotel–the Hotel Governor–along with other legislators who were not rolling in dough. It and its former parking lot is now the location of the Illinois Wine Tasting event at the Old Capitol Art Fair each May.

The walls were not that thick and some political types used it for affairs.

Then, there was the lobbyist who tried to pick up one of my constituents who was in the Capitol city for the week lobbying on a matter dear to her heart.

When he handed her his hotel key, she dropped it over the rail. They were on the third floor.

This is as good a place as any to put the initiation rite in the Illinois House of Representatives.

Veterans wait until there is a good looking woman sitting in the gallery.

They write a note to the legislator saying the woman would like to get acquainted and inviting him to join her in the gallery.

When the man (maybe it’s used on women, too, now) approaches the woman, someone gains the floor for purposes of an introduction and introduces the State Rep., who gets razzed when he returns red-faced to the chamber.

It hasn’t been a good week for Democratic Party State Representative Jack Franks.

“Chainsaw Jack” got lots of blowback from his venture into playing gofer for the electric utilities of Illinois.

Look at these trees next to the sidewalk and electric power lines at Crystal Lake's Main Beach. Under "Chainsaw Jack" Franks' bill, Com Ed would be permitted to chop them down.

He quickly figured out he did not have the juice to get his bill to allow Com Ed and Ameren to cut down ever tree within twenty feet of a power line and turned the hearing into a “subject matter” hearing only.

What happened?

Locally, opponents mobilized.

Although Franks introduced the bill on November 21, 2011, amendatory language didn’t show up until February 21, 2012, a week before Franks received a $1,000 contribution from Ameren (Com Ed’s monopoly counterpart in Central and Southern Illinois).

A hearing was set a week later.

McHenry County Conservation District leaders reacted negatively to the language, sending the letter you see below to Franks:

The day of the Public Utilities Committee meeting, on which Franks’ serves, the Environmental Defenders of McHenry County sent out an email to its members urging them to contact Franks in opposition to tree demolition bill.

Jack Franks

Today Franks told Republican colleague Mike Tryon that his House Bill 3884 needed an amendment and that he probably wouldn’t call the bill.

And today was a worse day for Franks than the day of the Committee hearing.

Franks carried his fight with the McHenry County Board to the House floor.

His bill to force election of the County Board Chairmen in McHenry and Lake Counties in an at-large election was voted upon.

“He didn’t even give the voters a chance,” Tryon told me of the bill.

Franks astonished Tryon by explaining on the House floor that the idea came from DuPage County Board Chairman Dan Cronin.

“This could have been an ‘Elect Jack Franks for Life’ bill.

Tryon, a former McHenry County Board Chairman said,  “That’s not what McHenry County needs.  We need a facilitator, someone to make sure the County Board policies are being followed.

“We pay an administrator,” he stressed.

“We don’t need a ‘Boss Hog’-type.”

There was a vote on that House Bill 3953 today and it went down in flames.

16 votes “Yes” and 100 voting “No.”

Tryon argued against the bill, as did newly-appointed State Rep. Rita Mayfield, who served on the Lake County Board prior to being appointed to fill a vacancy last summer.  Mayfield explained that the Lake County Board was unanimous in its opposition to Franks’ bill.

The way things work in Springfield, her membership in the Black Caucus brought all of them to vote “No.”

As the roll call was being taken, retiring State Rep. Dave Winter stood up to observe that it appeared that Jack Franks was going to join “The Century Club.”

That’s a designation used to mock those who manage to get a bill out onto the floor, but who see it go down in flames with 100 or more of the 116 members voting against it.  When liberal Robert Mann chaired the Criminal Justice Committee, his criminal bills regularly got slaughtered by his generally “law and order” colleagues.

The 16-100 roll call on House bill 3953 calling for the at-large election of county board chairmen in McHenry and Lake Counties follows:

State Rep. Kent Gaffney one one of 19 people who voted for Jack Franks' House Bill 3953 to force at-large election of the county board chairmen in McHenry and Lake Counties.

Now Franks isn’t the only McHenry County State Representative to have achieved that “honor.”

Yours truly, Cal Skinner, Jr., got the Century Club “award” on June 7, 1994, when I filed an amendment to Senate Bill 1595 that would require the DCFS to

• “maintain a central registry of all cases in which the Director of Children and Family Services, following an investigation and hearing as provided in this Act or the Department’s rules, determines that a person who is certified as a school teacher or administrator in Illinois is a perpetrator of sexual or physical abuse of a child,
• “the Department shall send the name of such person, by mail, to the chief administrator and president of the school board of each school district in this state and to the chief education officer of each state, the District of Columbia, and each territory of the United States.

“The Department shall make available to members of the public, upon request and without charge, copies of any information contained in the register maintained under this Section.”

I think the amendment was inspired by a former principal of Lundahl Junior High School in Crystal Lake named Virgil Lauglin, who led one of my honorary pages into a life of homosexuality, even molesting him in his Lundahl office, but it may have been a teacher there whom DCFS found had abused a student either sexually or physically or both.

When the “problem” with the principal was discovered, he was allowed to quietly resign and move to Iowa.

Exporting such “problems” or covering them up since then would have been a lot more difficult had my amendment be adopted in 1994.

Needless to say, the teachers unions killed the proposed amendment to Senate Bill 1695.

Click to enlarge the image above, examine the names, and you will find some current political figures who wouldn’t want this roll call used against them.

Only two besides myself were brave enough to vote for it:

• Bernie Pedersen and
• Al Salvi

Two, Terry Parke and future Congressman Jerry Weller, voted “Present.”

One of the best pieces of legislation I ever lost.

The Illinois General Assembly is in session this week. Its switch board is open, however. The number is 217-782-2000,

With June first being the witching hour, that is, after May 31st Republican votes are needed, the Illinois General Assembly is in session this weekend.

If you have an issue upon which you would like to comment call the state switchboard at 217-782-2000 and ask for the legislator to whom you wish to speak.

McHenry County Blog reported on Republican McHenry County Sheriff Keith Nygren’s involvement with Democrat State Representative Jack Franks’ fund raiser.

Apparently the relationship is reciprocal.

Over the transom, so to speak, comes the silent auction sign-up sheet below:

The Jack Franks' "Page for a Day" bid sheet at a Keith Nygren fund raiser.

It is the donation of a “Page for a Day” with Franks in Springfield.

It’s not that it has to cost the legislator making the donation anything. He just provides the opportunity for the purchaser to run errands for state reps for a day.

But, given the inclusion of Nygren’s name on a list of supporters that Franks mailed far and wide, it does make one wonder.

Perhaps as interesting is the name of Nygren’s candidate for State’s Attorney against incumbent Republican Lou Bianchi, Dan Regna, as the only bidder when this photo was taken.

If I were Tribune columnist John Kass, I might be tempted to suggest there is a Bi-partisan Combine in McHenry County.

= = = =

I first ran into the term “over the transom” in connection with a currency exchange scandal uncovered by Chicago Daily News reporter Jack Mabley.  He said that legislators in Springfield left the the transoms of the window above the door in their hotel room open if they were amenable to accepting bribes.  This was before the days of air conditioning and an open hotel room and transom windows could provide cross-ventilation.

Some might say this is a red tailed hawk.

But today, it is a tax hawk.

I only wish it could be flying around the Illinois House and Senate chambers ready to swoop down and peck the fingers of any legislator tempted to push his or her green button for a 50% income tax hike.

Former 1970 Constitutional Convention Delegate, State Representative and State Senator Virginia Macdonald died this week.

I learned that when I read the Chicago Tribune’s obituary.

During the 1970’s, Ginny sat in front of me all but my first term. She was part of the voluntary “no smoking” section on the House floor in front of the press box.

She was a kind, gentle soul.

I asked my friend former State Rep. Penny Pullen if she had any thoughts she wanted to share. She wrote the following:

In official General Assembly-ese, Virginia Macdonald was addressed from the chair of the House or Senate as “The Lady from Cook, Mrs. Macdonald.” In her case, the words were true.

She was a gentle lady and kind. And though she was a firm partisan and the epitome of the “moderate” Republican, Virginia Macdonald befriended people she thought worthy regardless of differences in views. (This is how it should be but often is not!)

She was one of the two legislators I often affectionately called “Mom,” the other being the late Dolly Hallstrom of Evanston.

My friendship with Ginny began when my boss lost his battle to leukemia while in his early 40s. I had been his administrative assistant, working with him not just in the district office but also in Springfield, which occasioned my acquaintance with many legislators.

I’d been working in the Illinois House for seven years and had expected this behind-the-scenes job to be my career, but suddenly it was gone, and I was left to wonder what the future might have in store for me.

I received a call from one of the legislators who had taken over sponsorship of my boss’s dozen bills, requesting me to come back to Springfield to testify for the legislation and help the various sponsors gain insight into what my boss had intended with his proposals.

I was willing to do that but wasn’t sure whether I’d be comfortable kicking around Springfield with too little to do. Ginny was kind enough to put me to work; she had not yet been assigned a secretary, and her mail was piling up so badly, she feared she could never catch up. I played secretary for Ginny, and she drove me back and forth each week to session.

It was during this session, thanks to her kindness in recognizing my need to be useful, that I found the legislature was still the place where I could work effectively, and Ginny became one of four legislators who hired me part-time while I decided what to do, a season that soon led to my 16-year career as a Member of the Illinois House.

Her kindness and friendship, along with her strong sense of justice, came to the fore again many years later, when State Rep. Bernie Pedersen was being challenged by the feminist movement in the Republican primary.

Though Bernie was much more conservative than Ginny, and his opponent was more in line with Ginny philosophically, she was furious and determined that no harm should come to this good and gentle man while she could have any say about it!

She personally wrote and endorsed a large post card to every woman voter in Bernie’s district who might take a Republican ballot, urging the voters to ignore the smears being leveled at Bernie and instead to vote for his re-election.

That card – signed by a lady who was well respected by every Republican in the area – played a major role in Bernie’s prevailing in a primary where several of his conservative colleagues (including me!) went down.

I have not had the pleasure of seeing Ginny during the last several years, and I am saddened now to read of her passing. For her kindness and her friendship and for her iron will of justice, I will never forget Virginia Macdonald. She was a credit to her district, to her party and to the people of Illinois.

To both of us – and to Bernie, too, I’m sure – our philosophical differences made no difference.

She was a gem.

= = = = =
Rep. Virginia Macdonald can be seen in the third row from the back sitting two seats to the right of House Speaker W. Robert Blair, who is standing in giving a speech. The photo was taken in either 1974 or 1975 in Macdonald’s and my first term. Click to enlarge either image.

Former 1970 Constitutional Convention Delegate, State Representative and State Senator Virginia Macdonald died this week.

I learned that when I read the Chicago Tribune’s obituary.

During the 1970’s, Ginny sat in front of me all but my first term. She was part of the voluntary “no smoking” section on the House floor in front of the press box.

She was a kind, gentle soul.

I asked my friend former State Rep. Penny Pullen if she had any thoughts she wanted to share. She wrote the following:

In official General Assembly-ese, Virginia Macdonald was addressed from the chair of the House or Senate as “The Lady from Cook, Mrs. Macdonald.” In her case, the words were true.

She was a gentle lady and kind. And though she was a firm partisan and the epitome of the “moderate” Republican, Virginia Macdonald befriended people she thought worthy regardless of differences in views. (This is how it should be but often is not!)

She was one of the two legislators I often affectionately called “Mom,” the other being the late Dolly Hallstrom of Evanston.

My friendship with Ginny began when my boss lost his battle to leukemia while in his early 40s. I had been his administrative assistant, working with him not just in the district office but also in Springfield, which occasioned my acquaintance with many legislators.

I’d been working in the Illinois House for seven years and had expected this behind-the-scenes job to be my career, but suddenly it was gone, and I was left to wonder what the future might have in store for me.

I received a call from one of the legislators who had taken over sponsorship of my boss’s dozen bills, requesting me to come back to Springfield to testify for the legislation and help the various sponsors gain insight into what my boss had intended with his proposals.

I was willing to do that but wasn’t sure whether I’d be comfortable kicking around Springfield with too little to do. Ginny was kind enough to put me to work; she had not yet been assigned a secretary, and her mail was piling up so badly, she feared she could never catch up. I played secretary for Ginny, and she drove me back and forth each week to session.

It was during this session, thanks to her kindness in recognizing my need to be useful, that I found the legislature was still the place where I could work effectively, and Ginny became one of four legislators who hired me part-time while I decided what to do, a season that soon led to my 16-year career as a Member of the Illinois House.

Her kindness and friendship, along with her strong sense of justice, came to the fore again many years later, when State Rep. Bernie Pedersen was being challenged by the feminist movement in the Republican primary.

Though Bernie was much more conservative than Ginny, and his opponent was more in line with Ginny philosophically, she was furious and determined that no harm should come to this good and gentle man while she could have any say about it!

She personally wrote and endorsed a large post card to every woman voter in Bernie’s district who might take a Republican ballot, urging the voters to ignore the smears being leveled at Bernie and instead to vote for his re-election.

That card – signed by a lady who was well respected by every Republican in the area – played a major role in Bernie’s prevailing in a primary where several of his conservative colleagues (including me!) went down.

I have not had the pleasure of seeing Ginny during the last several years, and I am saddened now to read of her passing. For her kindness and her friendship and for her iron will of justice, I will never forget Virginia Macdonald. She was a credit to her district, to her party and to the people of Illinois.

To both of us – and to Bernie, too, I’m sure – our philosophical differences made no difference.

She was a gem.

= = = = =
Rep. Virginia Macdonald can be seen in the third row from the back sitting two seats to the right of House Speaker W. Robert Blair, who is standing in giving a speech. The photo was taken in either 1974 or 1975 in Macdonald’s and my first term. Click to enlarge either image.

Larry DiPrima started it.

Maybe it was Myron Kulas.

The Royal Order of Mushrooms.

They sat in the back of the Illinois House chamber.

And they played the role of a typical mushroom.

They were kept in the dark and fed, well, you know McHenry County Blog is at worst a PG-rated blog, so you will have to fill in the blank.

And, why do the mushrooms like Governor Rod Blagojevich?

You’ll have to read that at McHenry County Blog.

Larry DiPrima started it.

Maybe it was Myron Kulas.

The Royal Order of Mushrooms.

They sat in the back of the Illinois House chamber.

And they played the role of a typical mushroom.

They were kept in the dark and fed, well, you know McHenry County Blog is at worst a PG-rated blog, so you will have to fill in the blank.

And, why do the mushrooms like Governor Rod Blagojevich?

You’ll have to read that at McHenry County Blog.