After 20 minutes of closed door debate, the Cook County Democratic Party announced their endorsement of J.B. Pritzker for governor, following a push by a small group of party Committeemen calling for an open primary with no endorsement.

“I share your concerns about an open primary,” 11th Ward Democratic Committeeman and Cook County Commissioner John Daley said during governor candidate state Sen. Daniel Biss’ open session question and answer period. Biss, like each of the eight other candidates running against Pritzker, had called for no party endorsement.

Happy Saturday! I enjoyed Illinois’ great Amtrak connections and shuttled between Chicago and Springfield this week. Chicago’s education issues are tied up with Springfield, while Springfield is weighed down by Chicago’s education demands. But first, some business from last week...

Editor’s Choice It Is: Results Of The Great Twitter Poll

A mad onslaught of thirty-two people converged on our Twitter account last week to cast their votes on what this email should be focused on for future editions. And you said for it to neither focus on Chicago or Springfield, but to be “Editor’s Choice”. I’m supposing that the thousands more of you reading this every week, according to our email statistics, are so confident in our ability to please your need for good reading, that you’re comfortable with casting this email’s fate to the the winds.

As soon as he receives SB1 on his desk, Gov. Bruce Rauner’s actions are limited by the Illinois Constitution. Unless there is some sort of last minute negotiation, the likely outcome of the Cullerton-Rauner showdown will be a veto of SB1, bringing everyone back to the table to create a whole new education funding bill.

Education advocates are not a unified for support of Democrats’ school funding bill, SB1, and one Democratic sponsor says he thinks there might be room for negotiation.

Contacted Wednesday, education advocacy organizations were not necessarily carrying the same message. Not surprisingly, Chicago Teachers Union representatives were pushing for Gov. Bruce Rauner to sign SB1, so were statewide advocacy groups like the Illinois Principals Association and the Illinois Federation of Teachers. But suburban advocates, such as the Legislative Education Network of DuPage County (LEND), were more agnostic.

Statehouse rhetoric on the enactment of school funding legislation has centered on an early August deadline, so that funds can be transferred to school districts before their school years start. But information from the State Board of Education as well as the Comptroller’s office suggest that the early August deadline is arbitrary, and that the vast majority of school districts will have plenty of wiggle room if an agreement is not forged in the Statehouse over the next two weeks.

A press release from a pair of Chicago Democratic Representatives Tuesday afternoon set off a flurry of chatter that Chicago-area House Democrats may not attend the special session beginning at noon today to protest Republican attempts to eliminate Chicago Public Schools funding. But a spot check of Chicago-area Democrats found that most will be in Springfield this afternoon.

Updated: July 26, 2017

An Illinois Gaming Board rule limiting property ownership to video terminal operators– companies that operate video gambling machines– seems to disproportionately affect one company and individual, Rick Heidner, in particular. The Gaming Board’s motivation to change the rules are unclear, as Heidner mounts a high-intensity lobbying effort to change the rules to his advantage.

The Chicago Board of Ethics announced $38,000 in fines for seven individuals and companies it found in violation of the city’s lobbying rules, as well as fines for another 9 registered lobbyists who did not complete ethics training by a July 1 deadline. The announcement Wednesday afternoon followed over 90 minutes of closed door deliberations

The Joint Committee on Administrative Rules sped through its agenda in less than twenty minutes, pausing to defer rules from the Illinois Gaming Board and to question a Board of Education representative about the appropriateness of an emergency rule. One rule regarding payments to Medicaid providers, that had been expected to draw attention, was passed without any questions.

Tomorrow’s meeting of the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules in Chicago (JCAR) will take up 31 items, but only two, a rule that changes payments to Medicaid providers and a rule dealing with cross-ownership of bars with video gaming and gaming terminal operators, are expected to draw discussion. A third item not even on the agenda, a rule creating the Community Reinvestment Program, which would eliminate a home senior care program, the Community Care Program.

The Illinois Commerce Commission convened on Wednesday in Chicago for a pair of policy discussion panels on 2016’s Future Energy Jobs Act (FEJA) and its impact on renewable energy. The two panels, which drew a packed hearing room, first concentrating on the status of the immediate impact of FEJA’s changes to the renewable energy market in Illinois, and then second on how technology will improve renewable energy adoption in Illinois.

Panel 1: Illinois’ Current Renewable Energy Reading & FEJA’s Renewable Objectives

Links to Presentations

• Anthony Star, Director, Illinois Power Agency


• MeLena Hessel, Policy Advocate, Environmental Law & Policy Center


• Becky Stanfield, Senior Director, Western States, Vote Solar


• Andrew Barbeau, President, The Accelerate Group

While each of the presenters focused on a different component of renewable energy policy, all noted the policy and technical challenges that will come with the increase of distributed generation as rooftop solar and campus/microgrid-scale battery use increases.

Becky Stanfield from Western States noted that while Illinois was ranked 37th among states for solar installation, it is a national leader in wind generation, at 6th place with 4 gigawatts of generation, 5.5% of total generation capacity in Illinois. By 2030, she projected 3 gigawatts of new solar would be installed along with 1.3 gigawatts of new wind production.

Following the presentations, the first panel had more than 45 minutes for questions and answers, including a first: Accepting questions from the audience by Twitter.

Commissioner John Rosales asked the first panel: “How do you see community solar working?” referencing a provision in FEJA that allows shares of solar panel output to be sold directly to consumers.

MeLena Hessel from ELPC replied that other states implement community solar programs and that Illinois merely needs to choose an existing model and improve upon it.

“Who would regulate those companies?” asked Rosales.

Anthony Star, from IPA responded, “Under the law, IPA will propose terms and conditions to ICC for approval,” but the study to develop  a process, “is still in its infancy,” he said, with much more work to do before something is proposed.

Both Hessel and Stanfield jumped in to point out that ICC will need to ensure consumer protection controls, since the solar energy product will be marketed to retail consumers. “The last thing a developer wants is a disgruntled customer. If you don’t have standard consumer protections, that can’t help the process,” said Stanfield.

“When you talk about consumer protection, what role do you see for the commission to ensure predators are stopped and education has an effect?” asked Comm. Miguel DelValle. “On the [electricity] choice side we don’t see that, because there’s still a lot of marketing problems out there.”

The panel provided unclear answers, “Hopefully we’ll see some overlap for consumer protections between consumer protection for choice and community solar,” said Hessel.

Comm. Sherina Maye Edwards then asked, “What in FEJA points to success [with renewables]?”

Andrew Barbeau from Accelerate replied, “While FEJA is a great first step, we didn’t raise [Renewable Portfolio Standard] targets, the broader question is how do we have a diverse mix of generation. If we focus on putting the customer first, and not the generators, that’s a great start.”

Stanfield then said, “The two big unfinished pieces of business from FEJA is integrated system planning for the distribution system and batteries, how do we deploy batteries to serve all the things we’ll need?”

The Citizens Utility Board then asked the day’s only question by Twitter, “What policy change would you make from the status quo to advance Illinois’ energy goals?”

From Barbeau: “To determine a way to value distributed generation, and how to accommodate the load, since we didn’t tackle load planning and batteries.”

Hessel: “We’ve been talking about transmission, but you don’t see that in FEJA, how to incorporate that into our policy.”

Stanfield: “Also electric vehicles are part of the system and we need to have a strategy for that.”

Star: “We seem to write our legislation every 10 years. How quickly will things happen…10 years might be too long.”

A question from the moderator: Are there any factors that make land attractive for solar?

Hessel: “Proximity to the substation. After that, it’s being flat, not shaded. For brownfields, depending on the contamination, the real advantage for brownfields is that you don’t have to dig into the ground for solar, you can use ballast.”

Star: “On the non-brownfield solar, a large portion of the area of the state is territory of rural electric coops. For people looking for sites, anecdotally we’re hearing confusion, wondering if the land is in a rural coop or a utility. Coops are not regulated by the state.”

Panel 2: Integration of Renewables in Illinois, a 3D View: Distribution & Transmission, Development of Technology, & Deference

Links to Presentations

• Shay Bahramirad, Director, Distribution System Planning, Smart Grid and Innovation, ComEd


• Amy Francetic, Senior Vice President, Corporate Affairs & New Ventures, Invenergy


• Matthew R. Tomc, Director & Assistant General Counsel, Ameren


• James P. Gignac, Environmental & Energy Counsel, Illinois Attorney General’s Office

The second panel concentrated more on the technologies necessary to implement FEJA’s renewables components and the related regulation challenges. James Gignac from the Illinois Attorney General’s office set the tone by pointing out that the cost of wind electricity production dropped by 36% in 2016 and that, “Fossil [electricity production] is being retired much faster than renewables are being added.”

“Flat demand for electricity and low cost of gas has created an oversupply, dropping prices. The market is signaling through low prices that less efficient generation should exit the market. The effect of renewables [being added] is secondary,” to the creation of demand for renewables, Gignac said.

Comm. Rosales asked, “Is there a way with energy storage that there would be an opportunity for there just to be an [Independent System Operator] or [Regional Transmission Organization] to streamline the renewables [delivery], since there would be energy storage?”

Matthew Tomc from Ameren jumped in, “That’s where we see the rapid change in technology. Once you have storage at a utility-scale level, which is where you can address renewables, which struggles with intermittence. How can you use that technology to meet customer needs. You could see storage at the utility, local and customer level.” Then, he added, “The commission’s mission is to look after consumers to make sure services are reliably delivered.”

Gignac countered, “We don’t have to wait for large scale deployment of batteries to see an increased amount of wind and solar on the grid. Forecasting, improvement of data analytics, demand flexibility, all those things work towards making renewables grow.”

Amy Francetic, whose company backs startups in energy data analytics, then said, “What is unique in battery storage, is you don’t have to ramp them up or down, you just turn them on. Once you have that system available to respond to demand, you can use it for backup, but also demand response to shave the prices off your energy bill. For a building, campus or microgrid, they can reduce the overall energy bills for the day.”

Comm. Rosales then added, “Is it more expedient to [serve] that baseload [demand] with gas, based on what the price will be? The cheapest power is produced at scale in rural areas. The production of rural wind and solar is cheaper than rooftop solar. Because the siting and installation costs are spread out. The challenge is delivering it to the demand centers, That’s why you see it so big in Texas and Oklahoma. Critical to renewables will be investment in long-haul transmission to bring it to where it is needed.”

Chairman Brien Sheahan directed the final question to Gignac from the A.G.’s Office. “What are your thoughts on investment in the cost of the distribution network in facilitating the integration [of renewables]?”

Gignac said, “The traditional generation we have now, we have costs we’re paying in to ensure reliability of those resources. That’s why we pay for spinning reserves or reserve margins when a big unit comes off line. As we integrate and shift generation [to renewables] we’ll have new costs on distribution, like on grid regions. That will be a shift from what we’re already paying for large centralized power plants.”

A small item, tucked away on pages 175 and 179 of the recently passed Budget Implementation Act (BIMP), provides an interesting win for public transportation systems across the state and creates a new kind of bypass to Comptroller management of state payments. The language directs the Treasurer to direct deposit funds into the Downstate Public Transportation Fund and the Public Transportation Fund “as the revenues are realized from the taxes indicated” rather than follow the normal procedure of directing funds from the General Revenue Fund (GRF), which is managed by the Comptroller.

While all eyes were focused on the state budget, Chicago politics continued to chug along, if largely unnoticed. Here are four things that happened that maybe you might want to think about.

1. CPS Makes Incomplete Pension Payment

Just before the Independence Day Weekend, Chicago Public Schools closed out their fiscal year by making an incomplete payment to the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund. Paying only $464 million of the $713 million due, it was a denouement with surprisingly little fanfare considering the hystrionics of previous months about how CPS wouldn’t have enough money to pay its bills.

The Pension Fund is allowing CPS to make installment payments over time. Meanwhile, the state owes the school system hundreds of millions of late payments, and the system owes over $8 billion in debt.

So, let’s be clear here: CPS ended up the fiscal year $249 million short, and the pension system is allowing it to make installment payments over time. This has never happened before, so effectively, CPS ended up the year bankrupt. But since everyone is looking the other way and pretending it’s no big deal, it isn’t.

2. School Funding Bill In Statehouse

While state legislators pay themselves on the back for passing a budget, looming in the background is an unsigned school funding bill, SB1. Passed by the House and Senate, the bill still needs to be transmitted to Governor Bruce Rauner by Senate President John Cullerton for his signature. Gov. Rauner has promised to veto the bill, essentially because it favors Chicago too much, sending CPS too much money. Without a school funding bill, schools across the state don’t get money, and many expect their first payments on August 1.

Exactly when Cullerton plans to send Rauner SB1 for signature is an open question. Does he wait until the last minute, hoping to threaten the governor with a school closure crisis? Or does he send it sooner, with the expectation that a new special session will have to be called to retool the bill? Subscribe to the Springfield Daily Line to find out!

3. Emanuel Announces New Police/Fire Training Academy

Of all the things found in the U.S. Department of Justice and Police Accountability Task Force reports that all police officers like, it’s the idea that Chicago needs an up-to-date police academy. And hey! The city is about to begin negotiations with the Fraternal Order of Police for a new contract. So, this week Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced a new $95 million police and fire academy in the Garfield Ridge neighborhood.

But, as the Chicago Tribune reports, “Asked how the city would pay for the project, city spokeswoman Julienn Kaviar said ‘the city will identify funding as the project progresses.’”

That means, they don’t know yet. And since construction isn’t expected to begin until 2018, the city has some time to figure it out.

4. Cook County Wants To Do Muni ID

For almost a year, the Chicago City Clerk has been working on launching an identification system that could be used for immigrants, homeless and others to allow them to access social and banking services. With plenty of momentum behind the plan, it seemed like a sure thing, until a pair of Cook County Commissioners and the County Clerk announced their own plan to create a County ID. They also noted that traditionally, the County Clerk (not the City Clerk) was the keeper of vital records (like birth, marriage and death records). So, the County should be the one running this program.

“This is not a competition,” County Commissioner John Fritchey said. “It’s about how we can do this best and how we can do this most efficiently.”

This week, a group of better government groups, calling themselves The Coalition for Police Contracts Accountability held a press conference to put additional pressure on Mayor Rahm Emanuel to discard his still-to-be-revealed “agreement” with the Department of Justice on a police reform plan and instead pursue a court-enforced consent decree with a third party.

The legal differences between a consent decree and an agreement are complicated and at times contradictory, but what police reform groups are all demanding is some group that is not the Trump Administration’s DOJ to oversee and enforce a potentially decades-long reform plan for the Chicago police department. Using Los Angeles’ experience as a guide, such a consent decree could cost tens of millions of dollars per year for city taxpayers, but is the gold standard for making sure police culture improves and community members are convinced reform is underway.

At this point, dozens of long-standing, legitimate community organizations have come forward to demand a consent decree, as has the Illinois Attorney General, several aldermen and the mayor’s own Police Board President. Standing with the mayor to oppose a consent decree is the president of the Fraternal Order of Police, the leader of rank and file at the ground level of reform efforts.

Ultimately, police reform and control of the Chicago police department is about mayoral power. When observing Emanuel’s resistance to even begin a public dialogue with police reform advocates, the issue starts to take on characteristics of Emanuel’s other big power boondoggle: control of Chicago Public Schools.

Emanuel is but a hair’s breadth away from losing control of CPS to an elected school board. The Illinois House has passed one version of an elected school board and earlier this month the Illinois Senate passed another. What’s left is for the House to reconsider the Senate version. If Gov. Bruce Rauner signs it, Chicago will have another elected body to worry about in 2023.

Emanuel has steadfastly opposed an elected school board, saying in press conferences such a body would be controlled by special interests like the teachers’ union, but he never expressed a willingness to openly debate or discuss the idea. He could have discussed it on “Chicago Tonight” with Chicago Teachers Union president Karen Lewis. Or he could have toured the city, in open, widely-advertised forums, to discuss it.

Instead, Emanuel instructed his lieutenants, CPS CEO Forrest Claypool and CPS Chief Education Officer Janice Jackson, to speak on his behalf against the measure. When he addressed the issue, it was brief, using highly-constructed talking points–I’ve heard some of them at press conferences myself.

Now, as punishment for not engaging the public, the state legislature is about to take away from Emanuel one of the most important duties of any big city mayor: Educating children. Maybe Emanuel doesn’t care because it won’t happen until 2023, after the end of his prospective third term. But the result seems punitive, because our Mayor never made a real argument about something so important.

We’re getting the same treatment now on another hugely important mayoral duty: police reform. Except this time, instead of Claypool and Jackson, we’re delivered Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson and Corporation Counsel Ed Siskel. It’s tiring for those of us who want to understand the mayor’s thinking, because we can tell that we’re just getting warmed over talking points, not an actual discussion of the merits.

Maybe it’s not Emanuel’s intention, but his unwillingness to engage in a public manner, opening himself up to criticism on a matter so important, makes him seem arrogant. And like with the elected school board issue, there are other organizations that could potentially take away his control of the police department.

Already one group has filed suit to seek a consent decree. Two weeks ago, an even bigger fish, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan (who has an office full of plenty-capable attorneys) reportedly threatened Emanuel with filing suit herself. And the new organization announced this week, The Coalition for Police Contracts Accountability, is backed by the ACLU, Better Government Association and Businesses for the Public Interest. All organizations with the resources to file and carry out a long court battle.

Just like with his control of the school board, the longer Emanuel resists engagement with the public, the more likely it seems that he’ll lose.

Updated: June 26, 2017

Cook County Clerk David Orr’s announcement Wednesday that he plans to retire after 39 years of elected office, 26 of them as Clerk, and not run for reelection in 2018 has set things in motion, next come the quakes.

Political retirements in Chicago are like shifts deep within the Earth’s crust. Starting out as a small movement, the tectonic pressures force a series of cascading rumbles, often resulting in devastation and change on the surface, never again are things the same.

Many have had their eye on the Clerk job, a position with lots of people to hire and lots of goodwill–you don’t collect taxes or fine people, but you make sure elections are clean–it’s the kind of job you could show up for 20 hours a week and the public would never know the difference. Sounds fun, right?

Lots of Cook County politicians think so, and candidates are already lining up, working to gain crucial Democratic Party support before too many commitments are made. Cook County Recorder Karen Yarborough, an African-American from the West Suburbs with close ties to Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan had already announced her candidacy even before Orr announced his retirement. It seems like Cook County Commissioner Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, hoping to cash in his high name I.D. and goodwill from his 2015 mayoral campaign loss, is serious about a run. And 49th Ward Alderman Joe Moore, an acolyte of Orr’s, told the Chicago Tribune that he’s considering it, too.

We’ll probably hear lots more names before July is out, since the Cook County Democratic Party plans to announce their slate by August 11.

Victories by Yarbrough, Garcia or Moore would set off even more aftershocks.

If Yarborough won, there would still be two years left in her term as Recorder. County citizens voted last November to merge the Recorder job with the Clerk, so someone would get a cushy two year paid gig to just do whatever Clerk Yarborough wants.

If Garcia won, he’d leave behind an open Commissioner spot, which his close friend, Ald. Rick Muñoz (22) has not been shy in coveting. The spot would be filled by appointment by Democratic Ward Committeemen, many friendly to Muñoz. That would leave the 22nd Ward aldermanic job open, which Mayor Rahm Emanuel would fill by appointment before the 2019 election, just a few months after the 2018 general election. But since we’d know if Garcia won during the March 2018 primary, likely a dozen of candidates (if not more) would line up for the Little Village aldermanic campaign. It would be a madhouse.

If Moore won in the Democratic primary, it would set off a mad scramble for 49th Ward Alderman, a position that has attracted at least two serious challengers against Moore for the last 12 years. Lots of people in the highly economically and racially diverse Rogers Park want that job.

Although David Orr is 72, he is only now retiring. Congressman Bobby Rush is 70. Congressman Danny Davis is 75. Toni Preckwinkle is 70. All of them have expressed their intention to run for reelection in 2018. Imagine the earthquakes when they retire.

Corrections: This article originally mis-stated David Orr's age and has been corrected to state that County Commissioner vacancies are filled by Ward Committeemen, not the Board President.

A coalition of neighborhood community groups that had been tasked by the Emanuel Administration with designing a community oversight board for the Chicago Police Department announced Thursday their support for a consent decree, but then also admitted they haven’t come up with a blueprint for public oversight.

Zoning Committee forged through four hours of testimony Thursday to approve dozens of zoning changes and the first precinct bans on room sharing through online platforms like Airbnb. While much of the meeting’s pace was kept to a slow walk because of repeated testimony by Leading Citizen George Blakemore, almost an hour of testimony came from more than a dozen Jefferson Park residents. They turned out to oppose a planned 13-story mixed use building on Lawrence and Lipps Avenues, near the Jefferson Park Transit Center.

The Cook County Democratic Party will meet Thursday and Friday for their “pre-slating” meeting, an opportunity for candidates of countywide and statewide offices to make their pitches to the 80 Ward and Township Committeemen, as they seek the County Party’s endorsement. The speeches, open to the media at 134 N. LaSalle, in the 7th floor conference room, promise to deliver drama and a couple of political shifts. The County Party will hear candidate’s pitches this week, then meet again on August 10 and 11 to vote on slating.

Ever since he defeated Esther Saperstein for 49th Ward alderman in 1979, David Orr has held elected office. But Wednesday afternoon, the 74 year-old Cook County Clerk called a press conference to announce that when January 2019 rolls around, he’ll be retiring, since he won’t run for reelection in 2018.

Dear Reader,

I’m excited to announce that next month, The Daily Line will open a bureau in Springfield to publish a new newsletter, the Springfield Daily Line, focusing on state government news. Our bureau will be led full-time by experienced state government reporter Rae Hodge, who just completed a Fulbright Scholarship studying journalism at Cardiff University. Before heading over the pond, Rae worked for the Associated Press and then operated her own news service in the Frankfort, Kentucky statehouse.

Everyone knows the amount of Illinois statehouse news coverage has declined precipitously. Our plan for the Springfield Daily Line is to produce new reporting from new angles currently uncovered. We’re going to produce something completely different from any existing publication, creating a must-have report for our paying subscribers–just as we have in Chicago.

Exactly what do we plan to cover? We will focus on stories that most impact those who depend on government for their business success. That means, like in Chicago, we will provide fine-grained detail on legislation and policies moving through the General Assembly, publish as many bill briefings and primary documents as we can get our hands on, and include more coverage of state boards like JCAR and the ICC than you’ll find elsewhere. Our plan is unearth detail uninteresting to the regular citizen, but critical to those who know how can government turn on the little things.

Rae and I have aggressive plans for growth in Springfield. By no means do we intend for her to be the only person on our team. We’ll be adding additional reporters as our subscriber base grows, with an eye towards increasing our daily coverage of government policy-making. If our experience in Chicago is a good indication, and with talent like Rae leading our team, our coverage is going to get better and more interesting very quickly.

When we launched our full-time Chicago coverage in March 2015, we signed on enough subscribers to ensure a full-year’s operations within a month. Help us beat that goal as we prepare for our Monday, July 17 Springfield launch. We’re not planning to offer Springfield monthly subscriptions during 2017, so sign up now for a full year’s subscription and receive a 10% discount.

Subscribe Today

Got news? We’re taking your state news-related press releases at [email protected]. Send it there and our Springfield news team will get them.

You can also follow @TheDailyLineIL on Twitter and on Facebook.

As always, please drop me a line if you have any questions!

Mike Fourcher
Publisher