State Reports

Items listed under State Documents have been received by the Documents Unit, Illinois State Library, Springfield, and are usually available from public libraries in the state through interlibrary loan. Issuing agencies may have copies available. For items listed under Other Reports, write to the publisher as noted.

State Reports

• Starting an Office Recycling Program, Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Public Information, 2200 Churchill Rd., P.O. Box 19726, Springfield 62794-9276 (June 1990), 12 pp.

This brochure, which focuses on waste paper recycling programs, describes five steps that may be taken to plan and implement a successful program: appointing a recycling coordinator, selecting a buyer, developing a convenient collection system, educating employees about recycling and the program, and reinforcing the newly developed recycling habit.

• The Handicapped Parking Program, Office of the Secretary of State, Springfield 62756 (October 1990), 20 pp. Handicapped license plates have been issued by the Office of the Secretary of State since 1975. In addition, the office has also been issuing parking cards since July 1984. Cards for persons with permanent disabilities are issued every four years; they are white with blue lettering. Cards for temporary disabilities are white with red lettering. Local governmental agencies may also issue handicapped parking cards. As of January 1990 all states were required to honor parking cards from other states. The number of accessible parking spaces that a business must provide as well as the dimensions of those spaces are explicitly spelled out in state law. This pamphlet provides information about these regulations and answers a number of questions that both handicapped drivers and businesses concerned about the needs of the handicapped will find extremely helpful.

• Illinois Home Energy assistance Program Annual Report — 1989, Department of Commerce and Community Affairs, 620 E. Adams, Springfield 62701; 23 pp. In 1989 the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services provided $80.2 million to the state's home energy assistance program (IHEAP), a reduction of over 9 percent from the previous year. Funds for the heating assistance component of the program were distributed through community action agencies, community-based organizations, local governments and the state Department of Public Aid to 128,259 households throughout Illinois. The emergency services component served 12,885 households. In addition, an average of $198 was provided to each of 160,000 eligible AFDC (aid to families with dependent children) and AABD (aid to the aged, blind and disabled) recipients. Finally, $10 million was used to help operate the 1989 residential weatherization program.

Other Reports

• Creating Jobs, Creating Workers, The Chicago Assembly, Center for Urban Research and Policy Studies, University of Chicago (December 1990), 287 pp.; available from the University of Illinois Press, 54 E. Gregory Dr., Champaign 61820; $15.

The Chicago Assembly is a new collaborative effort between the Center for Urban Research and Policy Studies and the Metropolitan Planning Council. Each year it will focus attention on a critical policy issue in the Chicago region. The first in this series brought together 75 of the region's leaders to look at the problem of the mismatch between emerging job opportunities and the skills of the labor force. This volume includes the seven papers presented at the meeting, statements by the commentators and the text of the Assembly Conference Report, which contains a number of findings and recommendations.

• Sacrificed for Convenience: Illinois Student-Workers At Risk, National Safe Work-place Institute, 122 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 1450, Chicago 60603 (December 1990), 73 pp.

This important and timely report looks at a number of aspects of the growing problem of teenagers who work too many hours and frequently too late into the night. For many it means that their school work suffers; many others drop out of school entirely. In addition to presenting data on the problem, the report describes how other states are dealing with the problem and offers recommendations on how work and school can be better balanced in the lives of Illinois teenagers.

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State Reports

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• Sustainable Manufacturing: Saving Jobs, Saving the Environment, by Valjean McLenighan for the Center for Neighborhood Technology, 2125 W. North Ave., Chicago 60647 (1990), 67 pp.; $10.

Collaboration among the Center for Neighborhood Technology, the Chicago metal finishing industry, regulators and local economic development groups resulted in a waste reduction strategy that complies with environmental regulations and is economically feasible for small manufacturers. Similar efforts to address the public interest in retaining a healthy manufacturing base and assuring a healthy environment are being repeated throughout the country. This publication describes the cooperative strategies used to attain these ends and offers suggestions for those interested in making an effort to reconcile a seemingly insoluble environment versus industry dilemma.

• Administration and Finance of Illinois Townships (91 pp.), by Norman Walzer and Nancy Baird, and Administration and Finance of Illinois Counties (116 pp.), by Norman Walzer, Nancy Baird and John Gruidi; both available from the Illinois Institute for Rural Affairs, Western Illinois University, Macomb 61455.

Local government officials as well as concerned citizens should find these two reports of interest. Both are based on surveys of officials in the relevant governmental entity and both provide similar data: governmental structure, economic trends, revenues and expenditures, management practices, and issues and concerns. Numerous tables, graphs and maps are included, which help clarify the mass of information. The questionnaire used in each case is also reprinted.

• The Realpolitik of Regulation: A View From the Cauldron, by Susan C. Stone for the Institute of Government and Public Affairs, 1201 W. Nevada St., Urbana 61801 (November 1990), 16 pp.

This monograph is based on a lecture presented in March 1990 as pan of the Ameritech Fellowship Program, which focuses on research in the area of regulation. Other presentations in the four-year-old program have been made by Elizabeth Bailey, Brian Berry and R. Scott Fosler. Stone, who served for almost six years on the Illinois Commerce Commission, focused her remarks on the history of regulation in Illinois, the reforms of 1983-85 and their impact, and the kinds of improvements that still need to be made.

Anna J. Merritt

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