With Illinois' state pension liability 17 percent more than it was last year, the vice president of a Chicago-based think tank recently said that 401(k)-style plans for public employees would go a long way toward easing the pension crisis.
Already struggling under a multi-tiered fiscal burden, Illinois taxpayers are now confronting incontrovertible evidence of serious fiscal setbacks in their state as a new report revealed staggering amounts of pension debt and escalating red ink.
Now that the election dust has settled, Paul Schimpf, a Republican from Waterloo who won the race for the open 58th District state Senate seat, is ready to get to work in the Assembly to turn the state's troubled economy around.
The Illinois House failed to garner the votes needed to overturn Gov. Bruce Rauner's veto of Senate Bill 250, which would have automatically registered Illinois residents to vote when they make government transactions, such as renewing a driver's license.
Paving the road to improving recreational transportation in Southern Illinois’ Shawnee National Forest, the Illinois House recently approved HR 1269, a resolution to allow all terrain-vehicle (ATV) use in the forest, spearheaded by state Rep. Brandon Phelps (D-Harrisburg) and four additional lawmakers.