STATEHOUSE INSIDER ISSUES & INSIGHTS FROM THE LEGAL / LEGISLATIVE SCENE

PETER M. MURPHY IAPD General Counsel

Park Districts Celebrate Success
Tax cap Relief Measures Sent to Governor's Desk

This year's legislative session has been an extremely productive one for Illinois park districts and forest preserves who experienced success on a number of fronts. The legislative platform introduced in January to the General Assembly comprised a series of very substantial changes to the Park District Code and a majority of those were approved by the General Assembly during its 93rd session. The first initiative, House Bill 3679 was introduced to forward the concept of design-build for Illinois Park Districts. This bill was subsequently amended in the Illinois House of Representatives so that it contained authority for park districts to explain the purposes of their referenda. Prior to this time, referendum language had been severely limited to the name of the fund (e.g. corporate or recreation) and the percentage increase being requested. Now, Illinois park districts will be able to explain the purpose. And this will go a long way in educating voters by providing them with the basic information they need to make a decision on the merits of the requested tax increase. This initiative was overwhelmingly approved in both the Illinois House and Senate.

Park districts made great strides with bringing common sense to the Properly Tax Extension Limitation Act or, as it is commonly referred to, the tax cap. The General Assembly approved Senate Bill 83, which returned to the park districts that did not have a bond extension on the tax rolls in 1994 the legislative authority to continue to issue limited non-referendum bonds. This bonding authority is critical to these park districts' ability to continue to improve the infrastructure of their districts.

Park districts participating in a special recreation association were also given leeway under the tax cap. Senate Bill 1881 authorized park districts and municipalities to levy for disability purposes outside the constraints of the property tax cap. This legislation is critically important to enable these special recreation associations, who so admirably serve the disabled population in Illinois, an opportunity to fully fund the costs that were so rapidly escalating in this service area. In addition, this legislation will assist park districts in their ability to continue their inclusion efforts. Approval of this legislation means that more disabled Illinoisans will be able to be served by local park districts throughout Illinois. In addition, it will enable park districts who have never participated in a special

Legislative Effective Dates The end of a legislative session marks the time of year when the question of the effective date of legislation arises. In a nutshell, the date when a law takes effect must be distinguished from the date when it is enacted (passed). When a law takes effect depends on several factors. The State Constitution provides that a bill passed in any calendar year before the intended session ending (date and time) with no effective date in its text will take effect on a uniform date set by statute. Illinois statute now sets that date as January 1 of the following year. However, such a bill may set an effective date in its text, which can be earlier or later than January 1. In the case of a bill passed after May 31 in a calendar year, the Constitution says the resulting law may not take effect until June 1 of the following year, unless it contains a specific earlier effective date and is passed by three-fifths of the members elected to each house. A bill that is potentially controversial may not reach this extraordinary majority (36 in the Senate and 71 in the House), in which case the bill fails to pass and would have to be reintroduced next year. In the case of a bill that is totally vetoed by the Governor and then overridden by the General Assembly, its effective date is determined as if the governor had approved it.

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ISSUES AND INSIGHTS FROM THE LEGAL/LEGISLATIVE SCENE

recreation association the opportunity to do so. This initiative received strong legislative support in both the Illinois Senate and the Illinois House of Representatives.

The General Assembly also approved Senate Bill 196, which authorizes park districts to allocate their various tax rates to the corporate fund in any one year. This legislation was introduced to impact Cook County only and was subsequently amended in the House to have a statewide impact.

All of the bills discussed in this article were sent to the Governor and were under his consideration at press time.

Minimum Wage Increase

Senate Bill 600 was amended in the House at the end of the legislative session to raise the minimum wage effective 1/1/04 to the level of $5.50. The minimum wage would then be raised to $6.50 on 1/1/05. The youth wage would be set by statute - rather than by the Department of Labor - at 50 cents less than the adult wage. Approximately 450,000 Illinois workers are at the current minimum wage of $5.15.

Verbatim Recordings

Over the last four years there has been a great deal of discussion about the Illinois Press Association's push for verbatim recordings of closed sessions. This initiative, Senate Bill 1586 proposed again in 2003, would require units of local government to make an audio or videotape of their closed session proceedings.

The legislation does provide that the verbatim record of the closed session may be destroyed, without notification or approval of the records commission or the state archivist under the Local Records Act, no less than 18 months after completion of the meeting, but, only after the public body approves the destruction of a particular recording and the public body approves the minutes of the closed session. In passing this legislation, the Illinois Press Association asserted that many public bodies in Illinois do not follow the constraints of the Open Meetings Act as it pertains to closed sessions. Their assertion was primarily directed at the types of topics that public bodies discuss after going into closed session for a specific purpose. The verbatim record of a meeting closed to the public is not subject to being open for public inspection or subject to discovery in any administrative proceeding other than one brought to enforce the Open Meetings Act. In the case of a civil action brought to enforce the act, the court may conduct such in camera examination of the verbatim record as it finds appropriate in order to determine whether or not there has been a violation of the act.

Should the Governor approve this proposal, it is recommended that all public bodies meet with their legal counsel to discuss and review their closed-session procedures. Associations representing public bodies uniformly oppose this legislation as being a misguided attempt to control a small minority of wrongdoers. Clearly park district boards and forest preserve district boards have not had previous problems in complying with the Open Meetings Act and its closed session provisions.

Defribrillators Mandated

Other legislation of interest introduced into the General Assembly included the proposal requiring public entities to have on their premises Automatic External Defibrillators (AED). This legislation, originally introduced as House Bill 43, had broad sweeping requirements that included mandating an AED at every recreational facility and field throughout the state of Illinois. Both public and private providers of recreation facilities and activities were included within this legislation as well as golf courses. The legislation was subsequendy amended in the Illinois Senate to make it more practicable.

Point and click WWW. advocacyguru.com Advocacyguru.com is a website created by Stephanie Vance who spoke at the Illinois Association of Park Districts' 2003 Legislative Conference. It provides a plethora of information and tips on how to become an effective legislative advocate, and visitors to the website can elect to have an electronic advocacy tip sheet sent to them periodically through email. This site also provides a wealth of information on other advocacy sites that are available and pertain to state and particularly national issues. Ms. Vance is located in the Washington, D.C. area and has extensive experience in dealing with Congress and its staff on a variety of issues.

In its final form House Bill 43 was amended onto Senate Bill 777 and approved by both the Illinois Senate and the House. This legislation now requires indoor physical fitness facilities to have an AED on their premises. "Physical fitness facility" is defined as any indoor facility that is owned and operated by a park district; municipality; other unit of local government; public or private elementary or secondary school; college or university or technical or trade school; and that is supervised by one or more persons, other than maintenance or security personnel, employed by these units of local government for the purposes of directly supervising the physical fitness activities taking place at these indoor facilities: a swimming pool, stadium, athletic field, track and field facility, tennis court, basketball court or volleyball court, or such outdoor facilities located adjacent thereto.

The law also requires that before July 1, 2004, every public entity that operates a physical fitness facility must adopt and implement a written plan for responding to medical emergencies that occur at the facility during the time that the facility is open for use by its members or by the public. The plan must comply with the act and rules adopted by the Department of Public Health in order to implement the provisions of the act, and the facility must file a copy of the plan with the department. There are civil penalties for violation of the act.

In addition, this act is phased in over a period of time. All privately owned or operated physical fitness facilities must be in compliance by July 1, 2004. Publicly owned physical fitness facilities can be phased in over a period of time on the following schedule. A public entity owning or operating four or fewer indoor physical fitness facilities must have at least one such facility in compliance with the act on or before July 1, 2004. The second facility must be in compliance by July 1,2005, the third by July 1, 2006, and its fourth facility in compliance by July 1, 2007. A public entity owning and operating more than four facilities must phase in their facilities at 25 percent of the total per year in accordance with each of the aforementioned years.

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STATEHOUSE INSIDER

"Losing open space to development is a significant concern — 82% believe we need to acquire Open Space before it is lost to development. " - Public Altitudes Toward Open Space: The Unmet Demand for Open Space in Illinois, 2003

Senior Centers

Senate Bill 633/2413 provides for the very first time a mechanism for funding needed capital improvements at senior citizen centers operated by park districts and other units of local government. Two funding sources have been identified, one through link deposits at the State Treasurer's Office and the other through the Court Ordered and Voluntary Compliance Payment Projects Fund collected by the Attorney General. Both State Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka and Attorney General Lisa Madigan were extremely helpful in the passage and promotion of this important legislation. This fund has the potential to grow into a significant source of support for senior centers much in the same way OSLAD has for the development and acquisition of open space.

Wetlands

The environmental community made important strides this session on the isolated wetlands issue. An amendment to House Bill 422 would establish a wetland permitting program that would have the following features:

• A permit from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources will be required to destroy any wetland not protected by the U. S. Amy Corps of Engineers. This ensures that wetlands abandoned by the federal government will have some level of protection, but will avoid any duplication by automatically exempting from the state program anything requiring federal approval.

• Specific exemptions apply for all agricultural activities, utility corridors, mining and quarry activities, farm ponds, artificially created waters and many others. All farming activities are exempt.

• Wetlands will be classified so that the highest quality areas receive the greatest protection and degraded wetlands receive less protection.

• Local control is not compromised. Counties with existing wetland protection authority (Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry and Will counties) retain existing authority. Counties would work together to seek uniform wetland protection standards over time.

• A Wetlands Advisory Committee will advise the state in implementing the program. The committee would advise the IDNR on implementation rules and would assist counties in coordinating - and ultimately unifying their wetland protection regulations. After 2007, the committee may advise the state to seek full delegation of the federal wetland protection program in Illinois.

• Fees will be established by rule. The IDNR will revisit the fee structure on an annual basis to ensure that fee levels are in line with the costs of implementing the program.

This legislation passed the House and is pending approval in the Senate during the veto session.

Civil Service Act

Another park district friendly piece of legislation passing this year House Bill 1168, which increased the population threshold for application of the Park District Civil Service Act before it had an unintended impact on districts.

This arcane legislation should be repealed in the future.

National Front

Administration Unveils Surface Transportation Program Reauthorization Bill

Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta unveiled on May 14 the administration's request for reauthorization of the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA21). Known as the Safe and Flexible Transportation Efficiency Act (SAFETEA), this massive funding bill calls for almost $250 billion to be spent over six years in highway construction, mass transit improvements, transportation enhancements and many other programs that are vital to park and recreation interests across the nation.

The Administration's bill, however, differs in many respects from congressional intentions for the reauthorization. House Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee Chairman Don Youns, (R-Alaska) is urging the House to support a funding level far above the administration's proposal - $350 billion vs. $250 billion. This significant disparity has some congressional sources thinking that the differences are so irreconcilable without an additional gas tax — a very thorny issue in itself— that there may be no long-term reauthorizarion this year, but a stopgap, one-year reauthorization at current levels.

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