Briefly - by Rodd Whelpley

Ryan Kirby, a senior at Hamilton High School in Hancock County, received a $2,500 scholarship at ceremonies in Washington, D.C, last month for his oil and colored-pencil rendering of a pair of wood ducks. His painting, Autumn Calm, won first place in the Federal Junior Duck Stamp Contest.

The annual contest is part of the Federal Junior Duck Stamp and Conservation Program, administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. The junior duck stamp is sold by the service to stamp collectors and conservationists.

Kirby has won Best of Show in the state competition for the past three years. Hamilton High School has produced six state winners and one other national winner in the past nine years. Their teacher was Steve Mullins of Carthage.
Beverley Scobell

Report
Art and the three Rs
Participating in arts programs leads to higher grades and better social skills for students, according to a study funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the GE Fund. And the arts have an even greater impact on students from low-income backgrounds.

According to the October "Champions of Change" study, arts education reaches students who might otherwise be disengaged from school. Participation in the arts provides a challenge, encourages creativity and develops an appreciation for lifelong learning.

One of the study's seven segments focused on a Chicago arts program that was instituted in 1993 and grew to include 37 schools, 53 arts organizations and 27 community groups. The Chicago Arts Partnerships in Education developed teacher-artist relationships in an effort to create integrated instruction among such topics as reading and painting or math and music.

The Chicago study tracked student performance on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, and the Illinois Goal Assessment Program. By 1998, more than 60 percent of sixth-graders in schools that had instituted the program were performing at grade level compared to 40 percent of students in other schools. By ninth grade, reading scores of students in the program were a full year ahead of their counterparts.

Beyond improving grades and test scores, the program contributes to speaking skills, motivation and decision-making, according to a survey of the principals, teachers and artists involved in the project.

Other segments of the national study included an assessment of after-school programs for disadvantaged youth and an examination of a program that teaches students to create, perform and produce an original opera.
Burney Simpson

The collection marks the first time such a significant exhibit featuring Illinois' contemporary women artists has been displayed in the nation's capital. It represents an extensive range of artistic talent and experimentation developed through several media, including watercolor, oils and etchings, wax and nails, as well as wire and thread.

The state tour will open at the Lakeview Museum of Arts and Sciences in Peoria, then move to the Southern Illinois Art Gallery/Illinois State Museum at Rend Lake, University Galleries in Normal, the Illinois State Museum in Springfield, the Rockford Art Museum, the Parkland Art Gallery in Champaign and the Quincy Art Center.
Josh Bluhm

WEBSOURCE
Museum stores online
Part of the fun of visiting a museum is wandering through the gift shop — now often called the museum store — and taking home a reminder of the experience. But several of the state's museums now shelve their wares online. So if you are still working through your Christmas list, check out these e-shops.

One of the best places to start is Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry at www.msichicago.org. From the home page, go to its store, The Big Idea, which offers a variety of gifts for adults and children. The children's book selection has titles sure to stir the imagination, including 200 Gooey, Slippery, Slimy, Weird, and Fun Experiments; Gross Facts To Blow Your Mind; and Girls and Young Women Inventing. For gifts about Chicago — photos, books, posters, videos and even red Studs Terkel socks — go to the home page of the Chicago Historical Society at www.chicagohistory.org/chshome.html and visit the Museum Store. Both of these museums offer online ordering.

Chicago's Field Museum asks shoppers to phone or fax orders, but you dinosaur lovers can order online at www.fmnh.org/store/default.htm. Click on Dinosaurs. There, you can buy a dinosaur T-shirt, a fossil hunting kit or a model of a T. rex skull or a Utahraptor claw. The museum's most famous Tyrannosaurus rex, Sue, has her own page with lots of "Sue" gifts.

Other Illinois museums offer limited merchandise online. It takes some digging, but a good starting point is www.museumlink.com/illinois.htm.
Beverley Scobell

Winter swan songs
Bright, cold winter days are a great time to watch for birds along Illinois' waterways and wetlands. This year, if bird watchers spot a rare swan while winter walking, the state Department of Natural Resources would like to know about it.

The trumpeter swan has been visiting Illinois more regularly the past few years, and the department wants to monitor the bird's status. Trumpeter swans are the largest waterfowl species native to North America, with wing spans of six to eight feet. They weigh 20 to 30 pounds. The long-necked, white birds used to be common in the Midwest, but were hunted nearly to extinction. The swans were reintroduced to this region of the country and are protected in Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin. Trumpeter swans don't nest in Illinois, but the state wants to protect them while they're wintering here.

"The biggest danger to the trumpeter swan while in Illinois is being shot by hunters," says Sue Lauzon, executive director of the Endangered Species Protection Board. Responsible waterfowl hunters recognize the trumpeter swan, she says, so it's unlikely the shootings have been accidents. The natural resources department encourages people to report sightings of the rare birds as well as any incidents of poaching. But bird watchers should keep their distance. "We ask people not to feed the swans or move too close to them. It's important in this stage of reintroduction that they remain wild," says Lauzon.
Beverley Scobell

From the headlines...
The Chicago Tribune reports that as far back as 1993 aides of then-Secretary of State George Ryan had evidence that state employees were selling driver's licenses illegally in response to pressure to raise large amounts of campaign cash for Ryan.

In an October 31 story, Andrew Zajac, Gary Marx, Ray Long and Laurie Cohen wrote that an investigation headed by the Lake County state's attorney and by Ryan's hand-picked inspector general, Dean Bauer, uncovered information that scores of licenses were sold in exchange for campaign contributions at the Libertyville license facility. That was five years before federal prosecutors began securing indictments in the Illinois driver's license-selling scandal at three other facilities.

According to the Tribune's examination of records and interviews conducted by the newspaper, Bauer removed secretary of state employee's briefcase containing $2,400 in cash and campaign fund-raising tickets during a raid of (the Libertyville offices. Bauer says he removed the briefcase for safekeeping, not to hide potentially damaging evidence that might have linked politics to alleged corruption.

Federal authorities carted truckload of records from Lake County prosecutors two days after the Tribune broke the story.
The Editors

Anniversary may revive the memory of an Illinois civil rights leader
The centennial of the death of the state's first African-American legislator may go largely unnoticed this month. John W.E. Thomas, the first black to serve in the Illinois General Assembly, died December 18, 1899. Yet his significance has been all but forgotten, done in by a Capitol rotunda statue, a likeness of Adelbert H. Roberts, Illinois' first black state senator. Tour guides sometimes refer to Roberts as the first African American to serve in the Illinois General Assembly. He was first elected from Chicago in 1924. But Thomas won his House seat from Chicago in 1876.

Illinois civil rights pioneer John W.E. Thomas has been all but forgotten.

According to David Joens, a Thomas scholar in the Illinois Legislative Studies Center at the University of Illinois at Springfield, Thomas was a leader in the early civil rights movement of the state. "Thomas led an exemplary life of public service and commitment to the community."

Thomas was born a slave in Alabama in the 1840s. He moved to Chicago in 1869, opening a grocery store and founding the first school for African-American children. During this period, he became involved in Republican politics. He was elected to the General Assembly, though African Americans comprised less than 2 percent of Chicago's population and were a minority in his district. He was defeated in 1878 and 1880, but was re-elected in 1882 and in 1884.

During Thomas' final term, he sponsored the 1885 state civil rights law that eventually guaranteed basic civil liberties to all Illinoisans, regardless of color.

State Rep. Connie Howard, a Chicago Democrat and leader of the Illinois House Black Caucus, says there are no definite plans to commemorate Thomas, but she intends to bring the matter before the members of her group. "I certainly think [Thomas] is a man who needs to be recognized," says Howard.
Josh Bluhm

Top 10 contributors in Illinois state politics January 1, 1997-December 31, 1998.
1. Illinois Education Association $1,902,000
2. Illinois State Medical Society $1,449,000
3. Illinois Hospital Association $769,000
4. Illinois Manufacturer's Association $690,000
5. Illinois Trial Lawyers Association $625,000
6. Illinois Federation of Teachers $608,000
7. Associaiton of Beer Distributors $534,000
8. Illinois Bankers Association $517,000
9. Cable TV Association of Illinois $483,000
10. Illinois Realtors Association $454,000.
Last month, the Sunshine Project, a Joyce Foundation-funded think tank based at the University of Illinois at Springfield, released its list of private-sector organizations that put the most money into Illinois politicians' campaign coffers. The new list reveals that the state's top 10 contributors continue to be a stable group of players. These eight organizations have been among the top 10 since 1993: Illinois Education Association, State Medical Society, Illinois Hospital Association, Illinois Manufacturers' Association, Illinois Trial Lawyers Association, Association of Beer Distributors, Illinois Bankers Association and Illinois Realtors Association.

ARTS for at-risk youth
ARTS stands for At Risk Talented Students, a new public-private partnership that has just been funded by Peoria County to help teens avoid trouble.

The program, established by the regional school superintendent's office, a private health club and a local social service agency, will involve up to 200 inner-city Peoria children on six tumbling, dance and drill teams.

"It keeps them busy during the afterschool hours, helps build their self-worth and gives them a sense of community," says Mary Ann Penn, who also coordinates a five-county arts in education event that showcases talent from more than 18,000 students. "From my work with that [program] over the years, I've seen a lot of talent among inner-city children, particularly in the performing arts."
Jennifer Davis

County government and political reporter
The Peoria Journal Star

10 December 1999 Illinois Issues

FALL ACTION
Legislators made short work of their annual veto session
Lawmakers returned to Springfield last month to reconsider legislation Gov. George Ryan declined to sign last summer. The fall session gives the General Assembly a chance to raise new issues, too. But as Illinois Issues went to press, it appeared legislators planned to put off controversies until next year.

Tobacco
Lawmakers controlled the impulse to divvy up an expected $9.1 billion windfall from major tobacco companies. Instead, they agreed to set up a special interest-bearing account for those dollars, which are expected to be paid to the state over the next 25 years. The account will be overseen by state Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka.

The funds stem from a settlement between the tobacco companies and the states, which sued to recover some of the costs of treating smoking-related illnesses. The state could receive the first check for $ 111 million as early as this month. Two more checks totaling $300 million could be issued next year.

Generic drugs
New generic drugs will continue to be reviewed by a special state panel — for the time being. Gov. George Ryan's proposed changes to a measure that would have neutered the panel were neither accepted nor overturned. Ryan argued the panel was necessary in certain cases.

That issue is likely to come up again.

Alternative schooling
Most students who are suspended or expelled would be offered a chance to attend public alternative schools under a proposal introduced by Chicago Democratic Sen. Barack Obama. The measure is a response to a controversy in Decatur. Under a zero tolerance policy, the school board expelled six high school students for fighting at a football game.

The fall session was scheduled to run through December 2. Lawmakers will return next year for their spring session, which could end as early as mid-April.
Burney Simpson

Illinoisians named to journalists' board

Chris Wills of the Associated Press and Ray Long of the Chicago Tribune will serve on the founding board of the Association of Capitol Reporters and Editors. Both cover the Illinois Statehouse. The board of this new associaiotn of journalists who cover the 50 state caspitols met in Chicago last month. Genevieve Anton, the Denver bureau chief of the Colorado Springs Gazette, will serve as president.
Membership dues will be $40 for professionals and $20 for students. Because dues will be collected no earlier than March 1, anyone who joins now will get free membership services for the next several months. For information on membership, contact Holly Heyser at heyser@richmond.infi.net. She is a reporter at the Virginia state capitol for the Virginian-Pilot of Norfolk.

Lincoln library
Plans for a $115 million Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library in downtown Springfield were unveiled last month with this drawing from the project's architect Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum Inc. of St. Louis. The complex will be a short walk to the north of the Old State Capitol. The 160,000-square-foot complex will feature a library that will house the state's Lincoln collection, including 46,000 items, and a domed visitor's center with exhibits, two theaters, a restaurant, retail space and underground parking. Exhibit space will feature figures, murals, animation and actors recreating such seminal events in Lincoln's life as the debates with Stephen A. Douglas.

"The strong, rough stone on the exterior is representative of Lincoln's strength and vigor," says Gyo Obata, the chief architect for the project. "The interior will be softer, more elegant, to show his other side when he visited the troops during the Civil War or played with his children."

Groundbreaking is scheduled for next winter. The library is set to open in 2002, the visitor's center in 2003. Funds for the project include $50 million from the state, $10 million from the city of Springfield and $35 million in donations from corporations and Lincoln afficionados. Gov. George Ryan said at the unveiling that federal money was being sought for the remaining costs. Planners estimated the library could generate as much as $250 million annually.
Burney Simpson

Follow-up
• The state purchased 1,662 acres in Kankakee County owned by ComEd, the first tract bought under a new open lands program. (See Illinois Issues, March, page 23.)

• The Illinois Supreme Court let stand the decision by the court's Committee on Character and Fitness that white supremacist Matt Hale cannot practice law in Illinois. (See Illinois Issues, April, page 38, and July/August, page 30.)

• The National Education Association and eight other groups filed suit in Sangamon County challenging the constitutionality of Illinois' new education tax credit. (See Illinois Issues. June, page 9, and November, page 36.)

• The law allowing a riverboat casino in the Cook County suburb of Rosemont faces a court challenge from Lake County developers that threatens to unravel the legislative agreement that authorized dockside gambling and horse racing subsidies. (See Illinois Issues, July/August, page 41.)

Illinois Issues December 1999 / 11