June 18th, 2008 11:32am
Aaron Chambers
Illinois Auditor General Bill Holland today took another whack at the state’s dysfunctional Department of Healthcare and Family Services. For starters, Holland’s audit said the department was slow to provide its financial statements to auditors.
From his audit summary:
The Department did not provide the auditors with timely and accurate financial statements. Financial reporting matters were first brought to the Department’s attention on June 19, 2007. On May 27, 2008 the Department ultimately agreed with the accounting presentation recommended by the State Comptroller and the Office of the Auditor General.
The Department’s actions resulted in significant delays in the financial reporting process, were dilatory and were a disservice to the users of the State’s financial reports.
The Department made inappropriate payments of Workers’ Compensation Act claims from its appropriation for health care coverage. These payments totaled approximately $20 million.
The Department did not pay the fiscal year 2007 hospital improvement access payments on a timely basis. All fiscal year 2007 payments totaling $1.2 billion were paid on September 25, 2007.
The Department did not require Cook County to comply with an Intergovernmental Agreement that was executed between the Department and the County. Cook County owed the Department $10 million at June 30, 2007.
The Department did not exercise adequate internal control over voucher processing. A total of $1.6 million in 2008 medical services was paid from fiscal year 2007 appropriations. Further, an estimated $17.6 million in interest is owed to medical providers at June 30, 2007.
The Department did not pay interest on intercepted State income tax refunds. The Key Information System is not capable of automatically calculating interest on intercepted State income tax refunds.
Holland is on a roll.
June 17th, 2008 09:32am
Aaron Chambers
I recently told you about a major political fight over the re-appointment of former Chicago cop Salvador Diaz to the Prisoner Review Board, just as the board prepares to vote on whether to parole local cop killer Ted Bacino.
The State Journal-Register has much, much more today:
A collection of law enforcement and victims’ rights groups is decrying what they view as an effort to make the Illinois Prisoner Review Board more lenient.
In a letter sent to state senators and Gov. Rod Blagojevich, the organizations say the “recent debacle” over reappointing a former Chicago police officer to the 15-member board shows that the process is becoming politicized.
“The incident was an absolutely unacceptable act of political manipulation and patronage that endangers the Illinois public and the political reputations of those pressured into supporting such an effort,” says the letter signed by 12 groups. “We ask your most sincere efforts to prevent patronage and political deal making from being used when it comes to the Prisoner Review Board.”
Sen. Rickey Hendon, a Chicago Democrat who led the fight to oust Diaz repeated his stock explanation that Diaz violated protocol by failing to ask Hendon for his blessing. He said his determination to remove Diaz from the parole board was not part of an effort on his part to steer the board leftward. (more…)
June 13th, 2008 12:15pm
Aaron Chambers
If Rockford Mayor Larry Morrissey has been anything toward state government leaders — even when they haven’t been Rockford’s friend — it’s diplomatic.
When unpopular Gov. Rod Blagojevich tried to deep-six Morrissey’s chief legislative priority last spring, Morrissey had nary a critical word about Blagojevich. And though Rockford’s own state senator, Republican Dave Syverson, has for the second year in a row failed to advance Morrissey’s objectives in the Senate, Morrissey hasn’t offered much criticism about Syverson, either.
And so I was particularly surprised to see Morrissey join a recent staged event in Rockford dedicated to bashing House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago. From Chuck Sweeny’s column:
Winnebago County Board Chairman Scott Christiansen said Madigan was stifling democracy and demanded, “Mr. Speaker, pass the (word I can’t use) bill.” Mayor Larry Morrissey, not to be outdone by the county, said maybe it’s time for voters to change the state’s rules by having a constitutional convention, something they’ll be asked on the Nov. 4 ballot.
“Who here voted for Mike Madigan?” the mayor shouted. “I’m angry, I’m (word I can’t use) off.”
It’s true that voters in Rockford did not elect Madigan. Voters in Madigan’s district on the southwest side of Chicago elected him to the House. Other Democratic representatives — including Rep. Chuck Jefferson, D-Rockford — elected him speaker of their chamber.
It’s also true that Madigan quashed a recent plan for a new statewide capital construction plan — a plan backed by Gov. Rod Blagojevich and the state’s other three legislative leaders. The plan could have meant more than $100 million in funding for local infrastructure projects.
In a news conference Saturday night, Madigan said he supports a new capital plan. But he said Blagojevich — his fellow Democrat and political adversary — must first modify his governing style.
He also undercut plans to expand gambling and lease the state lottery — two ways in which supporters of the defeated plan hoped to raise money to support it. Madigan prefers an income tax hike.
“It’s the fairest tax. If you make money, you pay the tax. If you don’t, you don’t pay the tax,” he said, adding he was not actually proposing an income tax hike.
But it’s also true that Madigan has arguably sent more state dollars to Rockford than any other legislator — including Jefferson, Syverson and former Rep. Doug Scott, D-Rockford — since Rep. Zeke Giorgi, the city’s last great Springfield mover and shaker, died in 1993. (more…)
June 11th, 2008 07:00am
Aaron Chambers
Gov. Rod Blagojevich will try once again today to kickstart talk about correcting a budget plan that he says is $2.1 billion out of balance. At 10:30 a.m., Blagojevich plans to meet with legislative leaders in his Chicago office, just as he did in the first such meeting last week.
But just as he did last week, House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, is expected to skip today’s meeting and instead send a surrogate. So when Blagojevich takes he seat this morning at a table with legislative leaders, he won’t see the face of one man whose support probably is necessary to win approval of any budget change — a tax or fee increase, perhaps, or an expansion of gambling — that the others all may agree on.
For his part, Madigan is busy promoting the notion that lawmakers ought to consider impeaching Blagojevich. A memo Madigan sent to House Democratic candidates says, “Criminal activity in the Blagojevich administration is no longer
theoretical - it is proven.”
It also says, “Blagojevich is clearly not an innocent victim of circumstances,” and that, “One thing we learned from the George Ryan case is that we should excise a tumor when it is first discovered; not leave it in the body to continue to spread and do further harm.” (more…)
June 10th, 2008 06:16pm
Aaron Chambers
This couldn’t help matters between Madigan and Blago …
House Speaker Michael Madigan is circulating a memo to legislative candidates spelling out how they can discuss whether Gov. Rod Blagojevich should be impeached - with talking points that compare corruption under the governor to a tumor that must be removed.
The 14-page rundown of Blagojevich’s alleged “misdeeds and malfeasance” is sure to deepen the feud between the two Democrats and lend substance to talk of impeachment.
A memo sent to some House Democratic candidates, obtained Tuesday by the Associated Press, offers detailed talking points on the merits of impeachment.
“One thing we learned from the (imprisoned former Republican Gov.) George Ryan case is that we should excise a tumor when it is first discovered; not leave it in the body to continue to spread and do further harm,” the memo reads.
June 9th, 2008 03:06pm
Aaron Chambers
Sheila Nix, a deputy governor to Gov. Rod Blagojevich, is leaving her $135,000-a-year post to, ahem, spend time with “family.”
“In these positions, you have to be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in order to be able to do your job,” Nix said. “Obviously, we spend a lot of time in Springfield and I’m away some. It was really more just a situation where I felt like after four years, it was the right time.”
The governor’s senior staff spend “a lot of time in Springfield”?
C’mon!
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| “Say What?” |
Anyway, Nix’s exit neatly coincides with the conviction last week of Tony Rezko, a Blagojevich insider, on federal corruption charges. And it follows the recent departure of press secretary Rebecca Rausch, who called the governor’s office — the subject of multiple federal probes — “a great working environment.”
Nix dutifully trumpeted the governor as a guy determined to help people.
Nix said she does not believe Blagojevich has changed how he goes about his work because of the trial of Rezko, who was a top fund-raiser for the governor.
“The governor is focused on doing his job,” she said. “That’s what he’s doing, and that’s what he’ll continue to do.”
This is the same governor who enters and departs the Capitol using its lowest-profile door — the one in the rear of the building, next to a trash compacter — during his infrequent visits here. From that door, the governor accesses a basement tunnel, which he uses to get to and from his office.
Now, for the best part. Nix defended Blagojevich’s heavy reliance, early in his administration, on advice from now-convicted Tony Rezko. (more…)
June 5th, 2008 09:17am
Aaron Chambers
Gov. Blagojevich insists there’s a $2.1 billion hole in the budget lawmakers approved on Saturday.
Yet, he has not vetoed — or even threatened to veto — that spending plan. Nor has he called — or threatened to call — lawmakers back to Springfield in special session, as he did repeatedly last year. Remember that circus?
So what gives?
First and foremost, Blagojevich is far more politically vulnerable this summer than he was last summer (if you can imagine that). The trial of Tony Rezko, Blagojevich’s former fundraiser and adviser, is now complete, with Rezko found guilty on 16 of 24 counts.
The feds clearly signaled during that trial, which lasted most of the spring, their keen interest in Blagojevich’s activities. Witness after witness testified about Rezko’s extraordinary influence over Blagojevich’s administration. Rezko hand-picked workers and advisers for the governor. Lon Monk, the governor’s former-chief-of-staff-turned-lobbyist, allegedly checked with Rezko before the governor’s office made decisions.
Oh yeah, and there was that pair of $25,000 donationsAli Ata made to Blagojevich just as Blagojevich gave Ata a high-ranking state post. (more…)
June 2nd, 2008 08:49am
Aaron Chambers
Gov. Rod Blagojevich has scheduled a news conference for 11 a.m. at his Chicago office to comment on the budget approved Saturday night by Democratic legislators.
As you probably know, that budget is out of balance by some $ 2 billion.
There is much speculation that Blago will veto the budget and call lawmakers back to Springfield, were they would start from scratch with a new budget.
Democrats shut Republicans out of negotiations over the budget they sent to Blago Saturday. But any budget approved after May 31 requires a three-fifths majority for passage, and that requires GOP votes. (more…)
May 31st, 2008 08:59am
Aaron Chambers
In my Saturday column, I looked at how prosecutors are concerned about what they view as an effort by powerful Democrats to make the state’s parole board more liberal.
The fate of local cop-killer Theodore Bacino met brass-knuckles Illinois politics this week, leaving Capitol insiders wondering why powerful Democrats want to remove a tough-on-crime former cop from the state’s parole board.
It’s not entirely clear why Sen. Rickey Hendon, a top lieutenant of Senate President Emil Jones Jr., led the fight Thursday to block Salvador Diaz from another term on the Prisoner Review Board.
What is clear is that Hendon reignited concern among prosecutors that he and fellow Democrats are attempting to push the board to the left by removing members viewed as unsympathetic to the pleas of prisoners seeking freedom.
On June 19, the board is expected to vote on Bacino’s latest request for parole.
I also reported on this stunning claim:
The prosecutors who challenged Hendon — and by extension, Senate President Jones, a fellow Chicago Democrat — reportedly paid dearly.
After the vote, Jones ordered $3 million removed from the state budget for the Cook County state’s attorney’s office, according to John Gorman, a spokesman for that office.
This money is intended to help Cook County prosecutors cover the cost of videotaping interrogations in murder investigations, Gorman said. He said the cut appeared to be in retaliation for his office’s lobbying effort to keep Diaz on the board. […]
Jones spokeswoman Cindy Davidsmeyer disputed Gorman’s account.
“The budget that passed the Senate a week ago did not include that money,” she said Friday. “Secondly, the budget is not even final yet. It’s still being negotiated.”
Davidsmeyer also made this comment, which did not appear in the column: “In the previous year and years before, we have sent the funding over to the House and it’s been cut over there. So this year when we sent our budget over last week, we did not include it. That’s the history.”
For more background on the effort to oust Diaz, just weeks before the parole board’s Bacino vote, go here. (This story is slightly dated. The Register Star supposedly ran an updated version of this news story today, but I can’t find it on the Web site.)
Now, let’s look at some of the politics I couldn’t squeeze into today’s column. (more…)
May 31st, 2008 06:30am
Aaron Chambers
The powers that be of Illinois government do little in moderation, especially when it really counts.
Today, on the last day of spring session, they’re poised to do it all. They’re gearing up to pass not only a spending plan of roughly $60 billion for the next fiscal year, but also a $31 billion multi-year capital construction program.
Oh, and to help raise money to cover that spending, they may also approve a massive expansion of gambling and agree to lease the Illinois lottery to private investors.
The last day of session is a long, long day. Negotiations continue behind closed doors as lawmakers dart from committee to floor debate and back. Staff rush to put into writing conceptual agreements brokered by legislative leaders. Then they rush those budget plans back to rank-and-file lawmakers, who vote on them even as they attempt to read and understand them.
When voting is over — often just minutes before midnight — they party. They head to a nightclub near the Capitol, and dance, drink and eat until sunrise. Then they say goodbye and head home for the summer.
Or not. (more…)
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