By Steve Rhodes
So who doinked the state’s torture commission? Jon Markel did some poking around and came up with the following:
* The bill.
* Relevant section (page 38): “Section 10. The sum of $0 or so much thereof as may be necessary, is appropriated to the Human Rights Commission from the General Revenue Fund for expenses associated with the Illinois Torture Inquiry and Relief Commission.”
* Voting Yes/House.
* Voting Yes/Senate.
* State Sen. Dan Duffy (R-Lake Barrington), who has been opposed to the commission, actually voted against the bill that defunded it – and almost every Chicago Dem voted for defunding.
Finally:
* The floor amendment zeroing out the budget was filed on 5/29 by an unknown legislator.
I believe that would be The Unknown Legislator (R/D-Gutless).
UPDATE 12: 28 P.M.: A faithful Beachwood sleuther says:
“Looks to me like it was Rep. Sara Feigenholtz (D-Chicago):
“She filed House Amendments 4 & 5; 4 became the bill and 5 made changes to it.”
UPDATE 2:25 P.M.: From Markel:
“The $0 for the commission first shows up in the second house amendment to the bill which was filed by Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, not Feigenholtz, and then referred to a committee for review. That certainly doesn’t absolve Feigenholtz since she is the chairperson of the Appropriations Committee on Human Services, the very committee that the zeroing amendment was referred to and subsequently recommended for adoption. I guess that actually makes Feigenholtz more culpable since the committee is where the real line-by-line hashing out is suppose to occur.”
UPDATE 2:45 P.M.: From our other sleuth:
“[Feigenholtz] advanced this particular language; it’s mostly her fingerprints.”
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Weed Whack
“For crying out loud, our last three presidents smoked pot,” Rich Miller writes in the Sun-Times today, “and their lives seemed to work out okay.”
Sounds like a PSA in the making!
*
Progress.
Criminal Injustice
A) “A man sent to prison for murder 21 years ago, then released last fall after a key witness recanted, accuses Chicago police in a lawsuit of manipulating the witness and falsifying evidence,” the Tribune reports.
B) “A former west suburban man who was wrongfully imprisoned for rape in the 1980s has been awarded a $5 million settlement, it was announced today.
C) “A $2.5-million settlement check from the Illinois State Police to former Death Row inmate Randy Steidl must be in hand by June 15, according to records in a civil rights lawsuit pending in federal court.”
Supreme Coinkydink
“The Illinois Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a Republican challenge to have the state’s new Democratic-drawn legislative map tossed as unconstitutional,” the Tribune reports.
“The remap challenge was decided on a 4-3 party-line vote.”
Apparently they cited Bush v. Gore as a precedent.
*
“The court’s Democratic majority justices, without a written explanation, rejected a request by the GOP leaders seeking to file a motion to have the map thrown out and to make changes affecting future elections.”
Well, that’s not exactly true. Here’s the explanation right here.
Sunrise, Sunset
Yesterday’s gangsters were just as bored as today’s.
Good Call
“Therapy For Depression Can Work Over The Phone.”
Yes, if you’re calling 1-800-HOT-CHIX.
*
Or Domino’s.
Madigoon
Last time I looked, Michael Madigan worked for a bankrupt company too.
Ghost of Daley
“Concluding the company committed ‘theft’ by overbilling taxpayers ‘millions’ of dollars, the state has banned McDonough Associates Inc., a 45-year-old engineering giant with ties to the Daley family and dozens of other politicians, from getting any state work for three years,” the Sun-Times reports.
“Beside cutting off McDonough this week from what’s been a lucrative stream of business, the Illinois Department of Transportation has sent a bill for more than $1.9 million to the firm, demanding reimbursement for overbilling.
“It also has referred its findings to ‘the appropriate authorities’ for possible criminal prosecution, IDOT spokesman Guy Tridgell said.”
The company’s chairman served as both Streets and Sanitation commissioner and CTA board chairman under the Mayor Richard J. Daley.
Reverse Psychology
Isn’t the disease actually poverty mixed with drugs and guns? Gangs are a symptom; they’ve got it backwards.
Special Ed
A federal civil rights law that allows some public school students extra time on tests and assignments is applied less often in the Chicago area’s poorest schools and most frequently in affluent districts, a Tribune analysis found.
“The so-called Section 504 accommodations spring from federal law and are aimed at students considered disabled. But thanks to help from educators and savvy parents, the assistance often has gone to those in affluent, predominantly white school districts in suburban Highland Park, Winnetka, Wilmette and Hinsdale, new federal data show.
“Meanwhile, not one child in some of the region’s poorest, high-minority districts has benefited from the program, raising concerns that schools have created opportunities for the privileged while ignoring the disadvantaged, according to the data.”
COMMENT: From a faithful Beachwood reader:
“As a parent of a child with learning differences, as they’re called now, I know you have to fight tooth and nail to get services – from diagnosis through to defining accommodations to ensuring that the student has the tools they’re supposed to get, including extra time if that’s what’s appropriate – and that’s not easy.
“The system is there, but it does not surprise me one iota that families with more resources are better at working the school system to get the school’s attention. Not that kids don’t deserve accommodations, but that the borderline kids with adept parents are more likely to get what they need than the desperately needy kids with overwhelmed parents.”
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Triple Crowner Downer
“As great as horse and rider have been, the coin’s other side shows connections who steal seashells and bust balloons,” our very own Thomas Chambers writes in TrackNotes today about I’ll Have Another’s quest for history.
“A loan shark and a cheater.”
Loving You
Ray Bradbury’s 2009 Columbia College Commencement Speech.
The Chicago Lakefront Trail
A biking adventure.
The Week in Chicago Rock
Short but sweet.
How Bank of America Execs Hid Losses
In their own words.
GOP Roadblock
Vote to block transparency on political TV ads.
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The Beachwood Tip Line: Black and white bloc.
Posted on June 8, 2012