A View from the Suburbs                                           

At first glance, it would seem the DuPage County legislative leaders did little for their constituents

By MADELEINE DOUBEK

Suburban residents didn't really get much out of the first legislative session their leaders controlled, did they?

Well, let's see. There was no suburban-crafted regional airport authority. Nothing done about an O'Hare runway ban proposed by Senate President James "Pate" Philip of Wood Dale. No funding for a long-sought convention center in Schaumburg. Not even a riverboat casino for Rosemont Mayor Donald E. Stephens, or Arlington International Racecourse owner Dick Duchossois, or the Fox Lake group fronted by former U.S. Attorney Fred Foreman, or other clout-connected groups in Waukegan and North Chicago.

There is the prospect, years into the future, of another toll road providing western access to O'Hare International Airport and months' worth of investigations into Chicago-controlled airport operations that could be entertaining.

And there were horse-racing law revisions, but Duchossois and his minions complain those changes barely help them break even at their racing palace.

Nope. Not much of a suburban session. At first glance, it would seem Philip and fellow DuPage County suburbanite, House Speaker Lee A. Daniels, did little for their suburban constituents and neighbors.

Ah, but more than a first glance is required. And those who analyze the session's suburban effect also should set aside the notion that suburban residents from the Wisconsin border to the Fox River to the flight patterns of O'Hare want exactly the same things.

On the airport issue, it must be understood that there are plenty of people in the suburbs and, as Daniels understands, plenty who contribute mightily to GOP campaign funds, who want O'Hare to remain the revved-up economic engine that it is.

Those who want flight caps and noise controls and a runway ban likely will need to scale back their demands and await the outcome of a court fight over the legality of Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley's compact with Gary, Ind. That pact was Daley's attempt at an end-run around suburban Republican airport control.

As for the rest of the first legislative session controlled by suburban Republicans, there was no pork. But like lots of voters across the state and nation, suburban residents prefer a low-fat legislative diet these days.

Suburban and statewide voters in 1994 said the critical issues of concern to them were crime, education and taxes.

What did Daniels and Philip serve up in 1995?

A compromise truth-in-sentencing measure requiring that murderers serve more of the sentences they receive and an expansion of boot camps for juvenile offenders. A GOP-crafted effort to restructure management of Chicago schools, along with a process to allow every school district in the state to seek waivers from state board of education requirements. And property tax caps for Cook County, similar to those placed on the collar counties, that have been applauded by voters.

Those who look at the 1995 legislative outcome and see little for the suburbs may not understand that that is exactly the point. To conservative backers of Philip and Daniels, less in government is more.

And to those backers, suburban legislators campaigning in 1996 will point to a budget they say is balanced without the need for new taxes. They will point to increases in education and child welfare funding and to a reduction in the hospital provider tax.

Suburban medical providers believe the tax, designed to boost the state's federal allotment for Medicaid, is little more than an effort to make them subsidize struggling city hospitals that have an

42/July 1995/Illinois Issues

overwhelming majority of poor patients.

Daniels does not deny that the actions taken this session could cause grave harm to poor Illinois residents already living on the margins. But he knows his supporters do not back tax hikes.

"Many times it breaks your heart to think that anybody would suffer or be hungry," Daniels said. "But we are not an unlimited source of money. We have to live within our means and that's what we have done."

Those are words to live by in many of the suburbs.

House Speaker Lee Daniels was smiling at the earliest session's end in 62 years

Suburban legislators also point with pride to the fact that they worked out a deal with Gov. Jim Edgar to cut the Medicaid debt by more than $300 million. (Even before they had done so. Democrats were howling about the state's dead-beat debt status and skewed priorities.)

Democrats spent hours complaining of being iced out of the budget negotiations, but Daniels was smiling as he sipped a can of Fresca at the earliest session's end in more than 60 years.

"For the most part suburban residents have been tax exporters and have been paying the freight as most middle-class people have in the state or in this country," he said. "We addressed areas of tax cap and clarification of that. We addressed areas of where some of our tax dollars go. We reformed the Medicaid system to reduce the provider tax which principally comes out of the suburban areas. We balanced our budget. We reduced our debt," Daniels continued. "I think suburban residents, whether they're retired teachers or people that have a concern about our welfare system or want to talk about criminal justice initiatives, are very proud." *

Madeleine Doubek is political editor of the Arlington Heights Daily Herald, a suburban metropolitan newspaper. She has reported on politics since 1988 and covered the final days of this past legislative session.