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PEOPLE

Edited by Jennifer Davis

Have calculator, will travel

Known for his 13-year career as Gov. James Thompson's budget director, Robert Mandeville is making a new name for himself as the guy everybody goes to when there's a fiscal cleanup job He's become a numbers crunching troubleshooter.

Robert Mandville

Currently, he's hanging his shingle outside the offices of the Illinois State Board of Education. As executive assistant for agency operations, Mandeville will help embattled State School Superintendent Joseph Spagnolo in the day-to-day operations of his agency.

Spagnolo's spending habits have been scrutinized. A state audit earlier this year cited the board for issuing dozens of contracts without putting them out for bid and failing to monitor millions in federal funds.

Mandeville most recently chaired a pension reform committee and helped the State Universities Retirement System after its director resigned in the face of a critical 1995 audit.

Edgar and Daley to co-chair Midwest-Asia Aviation Coalition

Let's see. It took three months, $2.7 million and a little bit of bad blood for Gov. Jim Edgar and Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley to finagle a compromise on Meigs, Chicago's tiny airfield. Now, the two plan to co-chair a coalition seeking improved air service from the Midwest to Japan and Asia.

"Greater access to the expanding economies of Asia will mean more investments, more trade and more jobs for Illinois and the Midwest," Edgar said in a statement.

The United States and Japan are currently renegotiating air service agreements, and, of course, these two top politicians want to get their two cents worth in.

First, Meigs. Now, the world.

Veterans wanted

Steve Denton and veterans: 1; state: 0. Denton, a U.S. Army veteran from Springfield, took the state to court and won. The Illinois Supreme Court recently upheld a 1955 law giving veterans "absolute" preference for state jobs when candidates receive the same "grade" by the state's hiring agency.

Denton applied for a position with a state drug education program in 1991. A woman, who the state says had more experience, got the job, even though both candidates scored an "A" on tests administered by Central Management Services, the state's screening agency.

Under the high court's ruling, the state must now offer Denton the job.

State Supreme Court chief calls for equal funding of schools

The state Supreme Court passed the ball to lawmakers on reforming school funding, but that's not stopping the new chief justice, Charles E. Freeman, from calling on the state to increase its share of school funding and equalize spending between rich and poor districts. "We can't continue to allow this vast disparity to grow," he was quoted in the Chicago Tribune on the 43rd anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, which desegregated schools. Freeman is the first African-American to hold the top post on the Illinois Supreme Court. He replaces Justice James D. Heiple, who resigned as chief last month after censure by the Illinois Courts Commission for Hashing his court badge during traffic stops. Freeman will serve as chief justice until December 31, 1999.

38 / June 1997 Illinois Issues


Shifts at the Top

Debra Detmers is U.S. Rep. John Shimkus' new district director. Detmers, who started June 1, will oversee all aspects of the Republican congressman's Springfield and Collinsville offices. She was director of the index department for Secretary of State George Ryan. She replaced Brad Carlson.

Dave Stricklin is managing U.S. Rep. Glenn Poshard's campaign for governor. Stricklin, who has moved his base from Washington, D.C., to Chicago, started March 24. He has been the Marion Democrat's press secretary since 1989. He took on the additional title of chief of staff in 1993.

Bill Utter is Chicago Mayor Richard Daley's new director of communications. Utter, a former Chicago Tribune reporter and WBBM-Channel 2 producer and assignment manager, has worked for Daley in the past, including as the city's spokesman during the World Cup.

Dan Webb has resigned from the Western Illinois University Board of Trustees. Webb, who was appointed by Gov. Jim Edgar in October 1995, resigned in April. He currently is capital partner and director of the litigation department at the Winston & Strawn law firm in Chicago.

Appointments

Illinois Department of Public Aid Director Robert Wright was reappointed April 24th. Wright has served as that agency's director since February 1994 and as acting director since June 1993. His title will not change after the new Illinois Department of Human Services goes into effect July 1. However, the department will then be about a quarter of its current size, overseeing Medicaid and child support enforcement.

Douglas Dougherty is Lt. Gov. Bob Kustra's new assistant for economic development initiatives. Dougherty, who was appointed in April, was executive director of the Rural Affairs Council. Patrick Fucik, former legislative liaison for the Illinois Department of Agriculture, replaces Dougherty.

John Guyon was named the state's southern Illinois tourism industry adviser in April by Kustra.

Dora Larson has been appointed to head the newly created Victim Services Unit in the Illinois Department of Corrections. Larson, the former executive director of the Protecting All Children Together (PACT) coalition, has championed victim's rights since her 10-year-old daughter was murdered in 1979 by a 15-year-old repeat child molester.

Bob Kleeman has been appointed chief of the Illinois Attorney General's special prosecution bureau. In addition to targeting government corruption and fraud, the new bureau will encompass several existing prosecution units including the Medicaid Fraud unit. Kleeman, a former DuPage County assistant state's attorney, has been in private practice in Elmhurst and Chicago.

Illinois Issues nominated for journalism awards

Illinois Issues was among the finalists for reporting and design in this year's Peter Lisagor Awards for Exemplary Journalism. Tom Brune, Jennifer Halperin and Donald Sevener were finalists in reporting for "Patronage Lite," on the governor's appointments to boards and commissions. The top winner was Chicago magazine for "Race Against Death." Illinois Issues' designer Daisy Juarez was nominated for her illustrations in "Been there, dialed that," on telecommunications deregulation. Thomas J. Linden of Grain's Chicago Business took the top prize for "Power Play."

 Mike Royko,1932-1997

In 1985, on our 10th anniversary, Illinois Issues chose 10 outstanding Illinoisans. It's no surprise Mike Royko was among them. He was, as we described him then, "the quintessential Chicagoan."

Of course, he always will be. His legacy is 34 years of biting wit in newspaper columns that often targeted pompous politicians and hypocritical higher-ups.

Royko died April 29, six days after surgery for a brain aneurysm. He was 64.

In 1971, he wrote Boss: Richard J. Daley of Chicago, which New York writer Jimmy Breslin described as "the best book ever written about an American city by the best journalist of his time." In 1972, he won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary.

Following is an excerpt from Boss:

[Daley's] press aide, Earl Bush, blamed the misunderstanding on the press. "It was damn bad reporting," he said. "They should have printed what he meant, not what he said." This approach to journalism would have been difficult in covering Daley, since he is given to saying things like: "Today our real problem is the future." Once, while discussing antiwar dissent, he said, "I don't see any more serious division in our country than we had in the Civil War and at other times." And while telling a neighborhood rally about plans he had for their community, he said, "We want to make Austin in the future what it has always been in the past." Printing what he meant, and not what he said, might have been journalism's greatest challenge. 

We're sorry Royko is out of the fight.

Illinois Issues June 1997 / 39


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