McHenry County Blog

Mike Tryon

It was “just” a surplus property issue.

Should it take approval of the Illinois General Assembly to dispose of surplus property worth more than $1 million?

But House Bill 4744 was aimed by Crystal Lake State Representative Mike Tryon directly at the Democratic (and some regional Republican) Party politicians promoting turning maximum security Thomson Correctional Center into terrorist central.

How creative!

President Barack Obama, Governor Pat Quinn and U.S. Senator Dick Durbin think it is such a wonderful idea.

But, led by not-yet-nominated-for-U.S.-Senate Congressman Mark Kirk, Republicans, including Congressman Don Manzullo, in whose district the prison is located, attacked the idea, not once, but repeatedly. All over TV.

Liberals pooh-poohed the unreasonable fear of opponents. When Manzullo pointed out that the terrorists would likely be tried in Rockford, the Obama Administration rushed in with the alternative that the courtroom would be behind the prison’s walls.

Then the would-be Christmas airplane bomber turned out to be from Yemen, the same country as most of the Guantanamo terrorists President Obama wants to transfer to Northwestern Illinois.

Byron nuclear power plants as seen from Interstate 39, upwind from McHenry County.

That got me thinking about

those Byron nuclear power plants we see on our annual pilgrimage to the Springfield Old Capitol Art Fair.

A terrorist act there releasing radiation would float right over McHenry County.

Enter Tryon with his bill.

It got out of committee, indicating House Speaker Mike Madigan’s approval.

And, it passed overwhelmingly. 81 of 116 voting “Yes.”

House Speaker Mike Madigan

So many ideas to share, so little time.

When I heard that House Speaker Mike Madigan was proposing doing away with the office of lieutenant governor, my first thought was the he was setting up his daughter Lisa, now Attorney General to be first in line to become governor, if anything happened to a governor.

I wanted to check the Illinois Constitution before writing a story and didn’t get around to doing that until just now.

In the meantime, others have made the point.

Here’s what the State Constitution says about succession:

SECTION 6. GUBERNATORIAL SUCCESSION

(a) In the event of a vacancy, the order of succession to the office of Governor or to the position of Acting Governor shall be the Lieutenant Governor, the elected
Attorney General, the elected Secretary of State, and then as provided by law.

State Rep. Jack Franks

And, you will note how quickly State Rep. Jack Franks (D-Marengo) took the same position.

Franks, justifiably, is tired of being just a state representative and he wants House Speaker Madigan to draw him a congressional district he can win.

And, in his heart of hearts, he’d love to by attorney general.

There is that little matter, however, of Lisa Madigan’s finding being attorney general not a bad gig to have while raising small kids.

$1,304,382.79 is invested Certificates of Deposit in local banks.

$28,579.93 is presumably in a checking account.

He spent $505,000 over the last six months of 2009. But $400,000 of that doesn’t really count, because it was going into a CD at the First National Bank of Marengo.

So, in reality about $105,000 was spent during the time of the quest.

Much of that time he was trying to position himself to run for governor.

Lots on paying staff and buying meals.

And, $9,000 to McKoen & Associates of Joliet on July 30th.

Guess the results weren’t as favorable as hoped.

One item popped out. $2,889 to Celtic Tours.

I guess it was campaign related. Franks went to Ireland with House Speaker Mike Madigan, Senate President John Cullerton and State Rep. Dan Burke (all D-Chicago). This is probably where the idea of Franks running for Congress after reapportionment came up.

Wednesday night Lake County Democratic Party Chairman and State Senator Terry Link went courting McHenry County Democratic Party Chairman and McHenry County Board member Kathy Bergan Schmidt Wednesday night at the McHenry County Farm Bureau building.

Before the above photo, there was a slight bow as Link went up to where Schmidt was putting out goodies for the assembled committeemen and guests. It would have been a classic.

During the meeting Schmidt explained how Link had been helpful to McHenry County Democrats back to when John Bartman chaired the central committeeman.

“I’d like to welcome Cal Skinner.  I never thought I’d live long enough to do that,” he said before saying,

Link explained that he had been Lake County’s Democratic Central Committee Chairman for eighteen years.

“We took a very bright red county and made it light blue.  It took a lot of work.  I could not have done it by myself.”

Referring to his candidacy for the Democratic Party nomination for lieutenant governor, he said,

“I’m not ready to retire.”

He said he would use the position to advance issues across the state the way he had passed the Smoke Free Illinois bill.  He wants the office to advance economic as it does in Indiana.

Link said his re-write of the Workers Compensation law–the first time in 30 years–had pleased both labor and industry so much that both gave him awards for his role of facilitator.

He was extremely proud of getting the Early Voting law passed.  He pointed out that he “carried all election law” bills and had faced House Speaker Mike Madigan down over Early Voting.

“I stood heel to heel with (Madigan).  I told him I wouldn’t sign off on (his bills if he wouldn’t pass Early Voting).”

Making his pitch to his fellow suburban residents, Link observed,

“We have nobody on this ticket who had announced–and I’m saying ‘announced’–who lives outside of Cook County, except me.”

Guess Link was referring to the possibility of McHenry County’s State Rep. Jack Franks running for governor or some other statewide office.

“I have the experience.  I come from business.  I know what it’s like to run a business.”

He also pointed out he knew what it was like to live in a rapidly growing county.

“I was born and raised in Lake County.  We have our problems.  We need to have that perspective (at the table).

“I’m asking for your support.”

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The photos are of State Senator Terry Link.  In the top photo he is talking to McHenry County Democratic Party Chair Kathy Bergan Schmidt. In the bottom picture, he is talking to Spring Grove’s Jeff Thirtyacre.

Springfield political columnist Bernie (OK, Bernard) Schoenburg of Springfield’s State Journal-Register flushed out details of why State Rep. Jack Franks (D-Marengo) hasn’t announced his future political plans.

Part, he points out, is probably because of his son Henry’s bar mitzvah last weekend.

And here are details about Franks’ trip to Ireland that I have seen no where else:

“Franks was to take off this weekend on a trip to Ireland with other lawmakers, including House Speaker MICHAEL MADIGAN and Senate President JOHN CULLERTON.

“The organizer of the trip is state Rep. DAN BURKE, D-Chicago, Franks said. Travelers are spending their own money, Franks said, though some meetings will take place with Irish officials.”

Sparking Schoenburg’s interest in Franks was a press release he sent out to national and state media. The Springfield reporter shared some of it:

“As a guest, Rep. Franks can provide firsthand insight into the quirky, dysfunctional chemistry between the legislature and Blagojevich.

“Rep. Franks … chaired several hearings that revealed the abuses of power and wrongdoing Blagojevich has been indicted on.”

The promotion apparently worked. The columnist wrote,

Franks was “interviewed by some national radio shows and by newspapers including USA Today.”

McHenry County Blog has suggested a campaign theme that might win Franks the Democratic Party nomination.

I wonder if Madigan, who, remember, has strings all over Illinois, and Cullerton will encourage or discourage Franks.

I wonder if Madigan, who, remember, has strings all over Illinois both as House Speaker and Chairman of the Democratic Party, and Cullerton will encourage or discourage Franks’s gubernatorial ambitions.

That’s what State Rep. Lou Lang (D-Skokie) said he was going to tell McHenry County Democrats at their central committee meeting Wednesday night.

Lang is a 22-year member of the Illinois House and Mike Madigan’s floor leader.

“I’m involved in a lot of noise on the floor,” he said.

“We just got through five years of a governor who didn’t understand his job. I’m not just talking the criminal charges.”

Lang talked about the impeachment trial, observing that there had been a lot of talk about it in the back rooms for a long time.

“One who did not talk about it quietly in the back rooms was your own State Rep. Jack Franks.

“I’d prefer to have taken him out (in an election). Impeaching a governor isn’t too good for your party.

“Democrats were moving forces in cleaning up our own act, in cleaning up Springfield,” said one of the members of the House Impeachment Committee.

“While it looked like fun, it was not fun.

“This is the most important time I’ve spent in the legislature.

“Governor (Pat) Quinn takes over…at the worst possible time.

“(We are in) unprecedented fiscal crisis in the state. All fifty states (are in the same condition).”

Referring to Quinn, Lang said, “He’s been practicing for this job for a very long time. He wakes up as Lieutenant Governor and went to sleep as Governor.”

Lang praised the courage of Quinn for proposing an income tax increase.

“It took a significant amount of political courage.”

“We must do something to maintain the level of services,” was the way Lang characterized Quinn’s motivation.

Lang told how the Federal government made it impossible to use most of the stimulus money to fill the $6-11 billion budget hole. Congress wrote into the law that Medicaid payment cycles had to be lowered from Illinois’ 90-days to 30-days.

“All that was left was the human service programs.”

He pointed out that when human service agencies faced a 50% cut in subsidies that “doesn’t equal 50% of the cost because of fixed costs.”

“I voted for the income tax.”

Lang was one of 42 Democrats who voted for it.

“Jack Franks, my very good friend, didn’t vote for it. He had legitimate, thoughtful reasons.”

“Dozens who voted, ‘No,’ did so just to protect their next election.

“Jack Franks is my good friend, but at least he had a reason.

“There are so many who did not.

“We did have thirteen more people (Democrats) ready to vote for an income tax increase,” Lang added.

Doing the addition, that meant the Democrats had 55 of the needed 60 votes to pass an income tax. Lang said that those 13 saw no reason to expose themselves to political challenge, if the bill were not going to pass.

Tomorrow: “Twelve Brave Souls.”

The next day: “More About the Income Tax Fight.”

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In the photograph of the three men during the question and answer session, you see, from left to right, Mark Freund, John Darger and Jonathan Farnick

You may have noted that the Chicago Tribune is putting a story with the logo

on its front page.

Everyday, I guess, but I only looked at Friday’s and Monday’s papers for this article.

Friday the upper right hand story was entitled

It was by Springfield Bureau Chief Ray Long, with the assistance of Ashley Rueff and Robert Becker.

It probably tilts toward the reformers’ point of view a bit, but it tells what’s happening in the State Capitol.

Monday’s article, by Rick Pearson, is not so objective.

Pearson starts with the premise that reform could be linked to an income tax hike.

As if taxpayers would willingly accept a 50% income tax hike for any change in the way of doing business that led the Democrats to hike spending by a billion dollars a year since they took control of all three branches of state government, thus, getting the state into the mess it now has.

Did you know

“rank-and-file legislators may decide the more reforms they enact, the more it could give them cover for raising the state’s income tax…”

Didn’t think so.

Having established the theme of his article, Pearson goes around and asks whether such a quid pro quo is likely.

Needless to say, he found someone to agree with the strategy he advances. And he got quoted first.

But others, like Senate President John Cullerton and House Republican Leader Tom Cross disagreed.

House Speaker Mike Madigan is the only significant voice to support Pearson’s thesis.

And the “let me continue doing what I’ve always done, but limit what others (excluding newspapers) can spend” approach to finance reform is not meaningful reform.

Pearson doesn’t even point out that most of the so-called reform folks are liberal enough to be in favor a massive income tax hike anyway.

Keep an eye the Tribune’s coverage of this strategy for passing a huge tax hike this week.

Elgin has the second largest Illinois school district. In the 1970’s I used to represent it.

Today it has the distinction of having all five of its high schools in failure mode.

And because of an overlapping tax district problem that allowed a clerical mistake, it will lose about $10 million in State Aid to Education next year.

Will Democratic Party State Reps. Keith Farnham and Fred Crespo and Senator Mike Noland let this opportunity slip through their fingers or seize the day, so to speak?

The bill that would do the trip is Senate Bill 2283 and former Huntley School Board member Larry Snow has made a persuasive case for how Democrats should help U-46 get the millions in state aid it would otherwise be receiving, if the technical fix in SB 2283 is passed.

Of course the bill would help Huntley School District 158, too, to the tune of $2 million a year.

State Senator Pam Althoff is the sponsor of the bill, which has yet to receive a “No” vote.

The article under which Snow commented announced that House sponsor Republican State Rep. Mike Tryon had agreed not to seek past State Aid to Education that has been lost.

Snow posted comments to the Daily Herald story that mentioned SB 2283.

Elgin-area Republicans may have a large potential campaign issue if the House Democratic Party leadership lets this bill die on the floor without its being called to a vote.

Snow is hoping the political powers wake up soon enough to realize the information that an Illinois State Board of Education staffer gave the House leadership failed to mention the huge injustice to the 25,000 minority students in U-46, 15,000 of whom are Hispanic.

When I contacted Snow he said,

“It’s ridiculous this bureaucrat from the State Board of Education may make Democrat leaders and politicians look like real jackasses by killing this bill and not allowing a vote on the House floor.

“I have met her, listened to her and anyone who listened to her committee testimony recently should be able to tell she is off the deep end wanting to preserve this injustice and not disclosing the ongoing impact to the State’s second largest school district.”

Snow’s comments in the Daily Herald are below:

posted by Larry Snow on Sat May 23, 2009 10:37 AM

Here is the amendment to SB2283 Amend Senate Bill 2283 on page 3, line 3,

“after ‘5%’, by inserting ‘and only those adjustments made after Tax Year 2008-2009 and payable in School Year 2009-2010 are eligible for a claim for reimbursement under this paragraph.’”

It is a fix for year after year, not a one-year fix. The immediate impact on U-46 is about 10 million dollars with no approval.

Superintendent Torres has been informed this has a huge impact for his school district.

Let’s see what he does about it, if anything, to prevent more cuts and help the students. Over the past years U-46 lost about 50 million in State aid.

Congrats to Sen. Michael Noland for becoming a chief co-sponsor.

Now let’s see him fight to get what’s right done within his own party.

What good are you if you can’t get a technical correction fix that is huge for your district?

Which Chicago democrat would let this abuse continue for the Chicago Public schools? Go get ‘em.

The local teachers union and school board have been snoozing on this for years.

Residents need your leadership, Sen. Noland. What House Democrats are going to help you get it passed?

posted by Larry Snow on Sat May 23, 2009 11:54 AM

U-46’s teachers’ union leaders and board members need to get out of snooze mode and beat the drums to get SB2283 passed. They should be in uproar over about 50 million being lost in the past because of a technical error.

If Speaker Madigan will let it be voted on in the House, after easily passing in the Senate, then U-46 will get the state aid funding it is being deprived of because of technical errors that need fixing.

Where is the Hispanic caucus in the House? Why aren’t they out in front to help their own on this bill? The fiscal office in U-46 should have been all over this, years ago. I am hoping Superintendent Torres has the guts and brains to go out and get this bill passed. It is H U G E for U-46.

Jesse Ruiz, chair of the State Board of Education should do something about one of ISBE’s employees, Toni Wagner making it her personal “job” and mission to prevent SB2283 and U-46 from recovering and receiving the millions of State Aid it rightfully deserves.

Wagner has opposed SB2283. which would help over 15,000 Hispanic students in U-46 by making a technical fix in the law. Anyone think if Wagner was Gonzalez there would be cooperation, not opposition?

posted by Larry Snow on Sat May 23, 2009 1:06 PM

Speaker Madigan was a true leader in getting referendum reform legislation passed in the past. He saw the injustice to taxpayers and got it fixed. I have praised him and the Democrats in the past for doing this and it is praise well deserved.

I disagree with any Republican sentiments to not press hard for SB2283 and let it fail because they can then potentially use its failure as a future political campaign issue.

It is a huge injustice U-46 has five out of five failing high schools for five years in a row (last time I looked) and they are being underfunded by millions in state aid because of a technical glitch in the School Code.

Speaker Madigan and Jesse Ruiz aren’t involved at this level of detail.

Good House Democrats voted it out of committee in spite of an underling ISBE employee ranting against doing so to the House committee. I didn’t need to be physically present in Springfield for that committee hearing. The committee hearing was transmitted on the internet. (continued in next comment)

posted by Larry Snow on Sat May 23, 2009 1:50 PM

If Republican legislators are afraid of publicly calling out an ISBE employee for preventing an injustice from being corrected, I am not. The injustice needs to be corrected and there’s not a lot of time left for more patty-cake politics that let’s an ISBE bureaucrat perpetuate a real injustice to the second largest school district in the State.

If this gets this injustice the publicity it deserves so it gets corrected, great. It doesn’t matter how much Wagner may be right about anything else in the past. Her opposition speaking for ISBE to SB2283 is as wrong as underfunding five out of five failing high schools in Illinois’ second largest school district.

I am hopeful if Speaker Madigan and his office get the correct information and facts and don’t rely on the biased opinion of an underling ISBE employee, the injustice to over 15,000 Hispanic students will get corrected. Properly funding education is a Democrat mantra. I am hopeful Speaker Madigan will stop the abuse and injustice once he knows that’s what is going on.

posted by Larry Snow on Sat May 23, 2009 3:43 PM

Superintendent Torres may want to direct someone in U-46’s fiscal office to take the fifteen minutes it takes to make the calculation showing the loss of state aid SB2283 will fix and get the facts straightened out with someone in Speaker Madigan’s office. Hopefully Mr. Ruiz, chair of the Illinois State Board of Education will also make sure the correct facts get to Speaker Madigan’s office.

The Democrats, with Speaker Madigan’s leadership, need to right this technical flaw wrong that is disadvantaging so many Hispanic children in U-46.

25,000 minority (including 15,000 Hispanic) children shouldn’t be receiving erroneous second rate funding because they are in second largest school district in Illinois.

Democrat leaders wouldn’t tolerate this for the largest school district in Illinois and shouldn’t tolerate this for the second largest as well.

Especially when it is on the floor of the House to pass the legislature.

Governor Quinn needs to be heard on whether he supports this technical fix in SB2283 that will help 25,000 minority children get a better education.

Even if Governor Quinn stays silent on helping these children, Speaker Madigan should make sure SB2283 is passed.

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In the photo on top newly elected State Rep. Keith Farnham (D-Elgin) was talking to Carpentersville School District 300 Chief Technology Officer Eric Willard. The head shot at the bottom is of Larry Snow.

House Speaker Mike Madigan is reacting to dissatisfaction from Illinois citizens.

On the day after California voters overwhelmingly (look at the graphs for the overwhelming nature–62% to 66%–of the results) rejected referendums to hike taxes, but more overwhelmingly (74%) approved freezing legislative salaries whenever the state was deficit spending, Madigan moved to abolish the Compensation Review Board.

So, he got one message.

Anyone think that Madigan will hear the other anti-tax message?

The Compensation Review Board is a legislative leader-appointed board that, believe it or not, was responsive to legislative leaders’ desire to pay their followers more.

Without having to endure a vote, as was the case before and apparently shall be in the future.

Judges will keep getting a cost of living increase because the judges filed suit when a past General Assembly froze legislative and judicial salaries and, (guess what?) won.

State Rep. Bill Black (R-Danville) pointed out that the judges having required a continuation of their COLAs was like having the “fox guard the chicken coop.”

But back to 1978.

There had been massive inflation during the mid-1970’s and from 1974 to 1978, legislators did not vote to increase their salaries.

Finally, the $20,000 salary set in 1974 fell too far behind the skyrocketing increase in the cost of living and legislators voted to raise their salaries 40%. I’ve written a bit about it here. (There are also period photos of me which some think make me look like Woody Allen.)

The public outcry was immense.

The Peoria Journal-Star ran pictures on the front page of every legislator in its circulation area for weeks.

Then citizen-activist Pat Quinn passed petitions that eventually led to elimination of one-third of the members of the Illinois House. Needless to say, the public was so angry that the resulting referendum passed.

At the same time, good legislators like full-time state representative Don Anderson of LaSalle County lost the next election.

After things had cooled down, sometime in the 1980’s, Peg Breslin sponsored the Compensation Review Board.

Later, after having a child, she was elected Appellate Court Justice, which, apparently an ideal office to hold and raise a child.

In the 1990’s, Breslin came back to lobby her former colleagues for a judicial pay raise. She pointedly reminded House members that she had sponsored the law that relieved them of the need to go on the public record with a vote to increase their own salaries.

Now, Breslin’s legacy is gone, except for the automatic cost-of-living increases Illinois judges ruled could not be taken away from themselves.

The bill passed, needless to say.

Breslin is now retired, replaced by another female state representative, Mary K. O’Brien, who has two children.

I’m pretty amazed that the issue I stressed when I ran for governor against Rod Blagojevich and Jim Ryan in 2002 is getting attention during this year when the media is pushing reform:

When my Libertarian Party running mate Jim Tobin and I kicked off our campaign in his National Taxpayers United of Illinois office in the South Loop, the sign we held up is the one you see below.

The sign went everywhere in the campaign and might have gotten some real play had Blagojevich and Ryan not conspired to skip the Illinois League of Women Voters gubernatorial debate after I managed to reach the 5% threshold in the Daily Southtown’s 1,000 person survey. (That was the largest in the entire campaign, by the way.)

It seemed perfectly obvious to me that legislative leaders should not be leaders for life.

Except for two years after Republican Lee Daniels managed to elect a Republican majority in 1994—the year that the GOP’s Contract with America clicked on the national level—Mike Madigan has been speaker since George Ryan held the office in the early 1980’s.

Pate Philip stopped all sorts of bad legislation in his leadership of the state senate during the 1990’s, but it still seems to me that there ought to be turnover.

While the old guy/gal may pick the new guy/gal, at least the newbies would have different friends.

When Daniels got deposed during a staff-campaign-work-on-state-time scandal initiated by Rich Means–part of which took place in McHenry County–successor Tom Cross won votes by promising not to try to follow Daniels’ example of being Republican leader as long as he could.

Cross promised term limits.

In 2008, that 2002 promise went bye-bye.

And, of course, nothing will happen on the issue because Madigan is not willing to see an end to his regime…even if it were ten years from now.

The Daily Herald has polled suburban legislators on how they stand on various reform proposals and how the term limits for leaders issue shakes out can be seen below.

First House members:

• Susanne Bassi – Favors
• Mark Beaubien (Republican representing eastern part of McHenry County) – Favors
• Bob Biggins – Favors
• Linda Chapa-LaVia – Favors
• Franco Coladipietro – Favors
• Sandy Cole – Favors
• Michael Connelly – Favors
• Tom Cross – Opposed (Big surprise there.)
• Keith Farnham – Opposes
• Mike Fortner – Favors
• Jack Franks – (Democrat representing northern & western McHenry County) Favors
• Paul Froehlich – Opposes
• Kay Hatcher – Favors
• Emily Klunk-McAsey – Did not respond to Daily Herald
• Sidney Mathias – Favors
• Rosemary Mulligan – Favors
• Elaine Nekritz – Favors
• JoAnn Osmond – Favors
• Sandra Pihos – Favors



• Randy Ramey – Opposes (Step-father is Pate Philip.)
• Dennis Reboletti – Favors
• Kathleen Ryg – Favors
• Skip Saviano – Favors
• Tim Schmitz – Favors
• Darlene Senger – Favors
• Ed Sullivan – Favors
• Mike Tryon – (Representing southeastern McHenry County) Opposes
• Mark Walker – Opposes
• Eddie Washington – Favors

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The top sign is the one used in the 2002 campaign. The bottom one was the first version. I concluded that 8 years as leader was better than 6, hence the change in toll free phone numbers.