The Naperville City Council picked through the numbers again Monday night.

In anticipation of a vote on new taxes for the city at tonight's regular meeting, the council held another budget workshop to attempt to close remaining gaps.

The budget for Fiscal Year 2011, which begins May 1, began with a $14.1 million gap that was reduced through cuts and personnel reductions to $5.5 million. Three proposed taxes and fees, a gas tax, a refuse fee, and a shift in funding from the city's Cultural Fund to the General Fund would close that gap to $1 million.

SPRINGFIELD - A year ago, new Gov. Pat Quinn's reform commission was traveling the state with former federal prosecutor Pat Collins at the helm, building a head of steam behind its push to overhaul the state's political engine by limiting campaign donations and a series of other good government ideals.

But ethics reform quickly ran aground at the Capitol. Political observers say the commission's idealism collided with political reality, and reality won.

The high-profile rejection of many of the commission's provisions was stunning to followers who hoped Collins, best known for putting former Gov. George Ryan behind bars for corruption, would be able to bulldog the reforms through the General Assembly.

Illinois House members are now on record when it comes to free public transportation rides for seniors. The question is how should voters look at that record?

We believe they should be lauding the 18 legislators from the Daily Herald circulation area who voted to end this two-year perk perpetuated by former Gov. Rod Blagojevich and seriously question the 11 who voted against it.

The RINO hunt is back on and the coveted trophy is Scott Brown. Inevitably and predictably, the new senator from Massachusetts - Mr. 41, Mr. I-Drive-A-Truck, tea party poster dude - has disappointed his base by, alas, representing his constituents.

It's the purity test all over again; only this time, the stakes are high and the weird are turning seriously pro.

AURORA -- The state unemployment rate currently stands at 11 percent.

Over the past few years, Illinois has seen many businesses -- even those with long and prosperous histories -- downsize, cut back, or close their doors. And new businesses are not taking root to replace them.

These are the issues Democratic Rep. Lou Lang, the assistant House majority leader, has been tapped to tackle as head of the state's Job Creation Task Force. In this role, Lang has been holding meetings with business owners and workers around the state.

SPRINGFIELD -- Illinois Democrats embarrassed by the nomination of Scott Lee Cohen as lieutenant governor are accepting applications to replace the disgraced candidate.

State party chairman Michael Madigan said Friday the state central committee wants to hear from people interested in running for the No. 2 post with Gov. Pat Quinn in the fall election. People may provide information about their qualifications on the party's Web site.

State central committee members -- two from each of the state's 19 congressional districts -- will decide which candidates address them at a later meeting.

Gov. Pat Quinn says the Legislature's top two Democrats aren't "cheerleaders" for an income tax increase.

But Quinn has said he won't back down from an income tax increase if House Speaker Michael Madigan and Illinois Senate President John Cullerton ask him to do so because lawmakers hesitate to support one in an election year.

Quinn on Friday said lawmakers need to put people before politics.

Gov. Pat Quinn says the public will have a chance to vet his potential lieutenant governor running mates via a web site that will feature biographies and background information of those interested in the state’s number two post.

The state Democratic Party, led by chairman and House Speaker Michael J. Madigan, announced a short time later that applicants for the job could download an application from the party's Web site and send it back for posting.

Madigan spokesman Steve Brown said anyone who answers the short questionnaire can have their information posted to the site, but the Democratic State Central Committee will decide who to interview for the job.

WASHINGTON -- Silver Cross Hospital is an "excellent facility" that looks like it will meet the needs of Veterans Affairs.

On Tuesday, an assessment team from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs visited Silver Cross Hospital in Joliet to decide whether it would make a suitable veterans facility.

On Wednesday, VA Undersecretary Dr. Robert Petzel informed U.S. Rep. Debbie Halvorson, D-Crete, of the results.

Chances are, if you've gone to a PTA, Rotary, Chamber or community event since July, you've bumped into Kathy Birkett.

According to district numbers, since the Indian Prairie School District 204 superintendent took the post last summer, the number of people who feel the superintendent is visible has shot up to 48 percent -- a dramatic increase from the 11 percent who thought the same in 2008-09. At that time, the district was led by Superintendent Stephen Daeschner.

"Our superintendent is highly visible. She calls it the PTA world tour that I think she's currently on," said Janet Buglio, director of communication services for District 204. "We think that's a really critical piece of the success of the communications program is community engagement through the superintendent."

SPRINGFIELD -- Hoffman Estates Democrat Tammy Duckworth has declined the governor's invitation to run as his lieutenant governor nominee in the upcoming elections.

Gov. Pat Quinn told reporters Tuesday that Duckworth had informed him she would stay on as an assistant secretary at the U.S. Veterans Affairs Department in Washington. Quinn said Duckworth felt obligated to continue with the mission given to her by President Obama.

Gov. Pat Quinn's administration launched a new state Web site feature offering information on the state budget in advance of the governor's March 10 speech and letting the public weigh in with comments or suggestions. Here are some comments posted Wednesday at www.budget.illinois.gov.

SPRINGFIELD --- The Senate today approved pushing Illinois primary elections back to March following an experiment that first helped Barack Obama clear a path to the presidency in 2008 and then left Democrats with the Scott Lee Cohen debacle for lieutenant governor earlier this month.

The proposal, sponsored by Sen. Deanna Demuzio, D-Carlinville, would make the statewide primary election the third Tuesday in March, where it had been for decades.

House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, pushed the primary date to February so that Obama would get the benefit of racking up a victory in a populous Midwestern state early in the national primary season. That worked. But the short campaign season backfired for Democrats this year when primary voters chose Cohen as the lieutenant governor one day and tawdry details about his past emerged and caused him to drop out.
 

The African American Leadership Roundtable will present Naperville's first African American Heritage Festival, a two-day celebration April 16-17 that includes a dance performance and gospel fest at North Central College.

The festival promotes African-American heritage in art, history and culture and will include workshops; an art exhibit featuring works from Aurora's William H. Bigham Galleries; a "living" wax museum display of historical figures from Naperville-based Agape Connection; performances and exhibits by College of DuPage Afro-Academic, Cultural, Technological and Scientific Olympics medalists (www.cod.edu/act-so); a performance by Chicago-based New Branch Theatre Company; poetry readings and storytelling.

It's a perfectly legal, but little-known, perk available to the men who have served as Speaker of the House: for five years after they retire, taxpayers provide a fully staffed office.

Although the law has been around for more than 30 years, the spending for Dennis Hastert's office has received increased scrutiny because of a struggling economy and Hastert's work as a lobbyist.

SPRINGFIELD — The Illinois Supreme Court today rejected a bid by imprisoned former Gov. George Ryan to keep a portion of his lucrative government pension that was built up before his corrupt reign as governor and secretary of state.

The high court’s 6-1 decision cost the disgraced former Republican governor $70,824 a year, sending an unmistakable message from the court to Illinois’ governing elite that cronyism and corruption do not pay.

In an effort to encourage residents to participate in its functioning, the DuPage County Board conducts several evening meetings each year. One of those is coming up next week.

The board will convene at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the third-floor County Board Room of the Jack T. Knuepfer Administrative Building, 421 N. County Farm Road in Wheaton.

Normally the board meets at 10 a.m. on the second and fourth Tuesday of each month. Each meeting provides 30 minutes for public comment.

SPRINGFIELD - The discussion on how best to overhaul Illinois' much-maligned political mapmaking process got off to a rocky start Thursday with Democrats and Republican-backed political activists bickering over proposals.

Leading Republicans from the House and Senate joined with the Illinois League of Women Voters to announce the filing of constitutional amendments that they hope will go before voters for ratification in November.

All the votes should be counted, but a winner in the Republican primary for Illinois governor is still not certain more than two weeks after voters went to the polls.

Scott Lee Cohen's letter withdrawing his nomination as Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor was received today by state election officials.

Dan White, executive director for the Illinois State Board of Election, said the letter was dropped off this morning at the state offices.

Without yet claiming victory in the Republican gubernatorial primary, state Sen. Bill Brady sounded the main themes of his fall campaign after a series of meetings Friday with GOP leaders - including Arizona U.S. Sen. John McCain and U.S. Senate candidate Rep. Mark Kirk - at the Union League Club in downtown Chicago.

"I'm not the official candidate today," Brady said. "So we've been delicate with how we've dealt with the situation. I hope we've handled that right. Kirk Dillard and the voters of Illinois certainly deserve that respect."

Scott Lee Cohen, the Chicago pawnbroker and onetime Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor, submitted a letter Friday to state Democratic Party officials withdrawing his candidacy.

The letter, given to a representative for state party chairman and House Speaker Michael Madigan, will be handed over to the Illinois State Board of Elections when state offices open Tuesday following the Presidents Day holiday, a Cohen spokesman said.

"We didn't want this to continue through the weekend," said Cohen's spokesman, Baxter Swilley. "We gave it to the state party, and they will file it. We consider the matter closed."

PLAINFIELD -- After public hearings that drew input from hundreds and two postponed votes over the past month, the Plainfield School Board passed a deficit reduction plan Thursday that cuts 154 teaching and staff jobs.

The decision will save more than $21 million and balance the district’s budget by 2012, according to the plan.

The board approved the plan in a 5-2 vote. Michael Kelly and Eric Gallt cast the dissenting votes.

 Scott Lee Cohen, the pawnbroker whose surprise victory in last week's Democratic lieutenant governor primary was followed by scandalous revelations about him, quit the race tonight during the half time of the Super Bowl, saying he didn't want to "put the people of Illinois in jeopardy in any way."

(AP) — The Democratic nominee for Illinois' lieutenant governor dropped out of the race Sunday night, less than a week after winning the nomination, amid a political uproar about his past.

In announcing his decision at a Chicago bar packed with people watching the Super Bowl, Scott Lee Cohen said the Democrats were not certain they could win with him on the ticket.

Since Cohen won the Democratic nomination on Tuesday, it has become widely known that he was accused of abusing his ex-wife and holding a knife to the throat of an ex-girlfriend — a woman who was herself charged with prostitution. He also admits using steroids in the past.

 The little-known pawnbroker who won this week's Democratic primary election for Illinois lieutenant governor was arrested in 2005 after his prostitute girlfriend alleged that he put a knife to her throat and pushed her against the wall -- an incident that could create a major headache for Governor Pat Quinn.

In the three primaries for the Will County Board, two incumbents, a handful of newcomers and one very familiar face won in their respective races.

In the county board's district 3, a three-woman slate prevailed in the Republican primary: Incumbent Ann Dralle, Laurie McPhillips of Plainfield and Suzanne Hart of Naperville. Hart is the former Will County recorder of deeds and well-known in local political circles. Hart is a Naperville Park District commissioner.

Hart won 25.17 percent of the vote. McPhillips got 24.44 percent, and Dralle had 22.81 percent.

A sitting associate judge, a former local mayor and a well-known Democrat won their races for judge.

In the Plainfield-area subcircuit 1, Will County Judge Robert Livas won a hard-fought Republican primary with 45.60 percent of the votes cast, or 3,842 votes.

His opponents, Katherine L. Maloney, had 40.83 percent of the vote, or 3,440 votes, and Phillip Spiwak earned 13.57 percent of the vote, or 1,143 votes.

 As Illinois' fiscal crisis deepens, the word "bankruptcy" is creeping more and more into the public discourse.

One year ago, the state of Illinois hit one of the lowest points in its 191-year history.

Then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich had been led away in handcuffs, charged with trying to sell Barack Obama's U.S. Senate seat. His Springfield colleagues moved to excise the poison, swiftly impeaching him.

Into that void walked the anti-Blagojevich, Patrick J. Quinn.