The eagle is back

Avid birders know January is eagle watching time along the Illinois banks of the Mississippi River. But this year, there will be a new people perch: the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge, which once carried Route 66 across the Mississippi River near Madison.

The pedestrian and bike bridge closes for the winter, but will open for Eagle Days, January 22-23. There will be telescopes for viewing eagles wintering along the river, events, including Native American storytelling, and demonstrations with live eagles.

Several other good eagle spotting sites and events are hosted by river cities, including Rock Island, January 8-9; Hamilton, January 14-16; and Starved Rock State Park at Utica, January 22-23.
Beverley Scobell

WEBSOURCE Virtual presidential libraries Now that the new Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library will be built in Springfield (see Illinois Issues, December, page 11), a Web site is sure to be part of the design. And of the 10 presidential libraries maintained by the federal government, three offer Web sites the Lincoln planners might consider. The Franklin D. Roosevelt Library and Digital Archives at www.fdribrary.marist.edu/ has more than 10, 000 documents online as well as photos, films and FDR's famous Fireside Chats. Our longest serving chief executive, FDR was the one who began the Presidential Library system in 1939 when he donated his personal and presidential papers to the federal government. The John Fitzgerald Kennedy Library and Museum's Web site at www.cs.umb.edu/jfklibrary/ offers a home page that clearly points scholars and students, as well as the curious, to online and library resources. The most recent library, the George Bush Presidential Library and Museum at www.csdl.tamu.edu/bushlib, is also a, well-organized site, with clear links to guide online visitors to millions Of primary sources. However, since the Lincoln; Library will not come under the National Archives and Records Administration, which oversees the libraries of presidents since Herbert Hoover, Web designers might also Hook at the privately funded Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center site at wwwrbhayes.org, which until now could claim to be the only library dedicated to a 19th century president. Beverley ScobeLL

8 / January 2000 Illinois Issues

CLEAN OUT THE BUNKER National food drive wants your Y2K overstock Once your Y2K bugs have been exterminated, the next big thing to prepare for may be YG02WASTE. That's the promotional slogan local food banks across the country are considering using for collection drives this month. The millennium food drive is being organized and promoted by America's Second Harvest, a Chicago-based food bank network that collects "shelf staple food" and distributes it to the needy. The idea is that those who gathered food in preparation for any Y2K problem may find they have a lot of extra canned soup and pasta. "People may be reasonably stockpiling," Carol Gifford, the organization's spokesperson, said in a December interview. "But if nothing drastic happens, they'll have a place to donate food." The drive is scheduled for January 15 to February 15. Details were being finalized at press time. Updates can be found at the group's Web site at www.secondharvest.org. Burney Simpson

STIX
Better recruiting methods are needed at the Illinois Math and Science Academy
African Americans and Latinos have been underrepresented at the Math and Science Academy, an elite residential high school in Aurora.

The state auditor general reviewed the school's admissions policies and practices for the years 1996 through 1998 and found that, when compared to the number of African-American and Latino ninth-graders in Illinois, these two minority groups were underrepresented in both applications and admissions to the academy. At the same time, Asian Americans were comparatively overrepresented.

The academy was created to serve 10th- through 12th-graders talented in math and science. (See Illinois Issues, October 1995, page 24.) Under state law, the academy must ensure adequate ethnic, gender and geographic representation.

According to the audit report, the academy does reflect the state's regions and gender distribution. But, while the academy's minority student selections were representative of those who applied to the academy during the years reviewed, the pool of applicants was not representative of the state's ninth-grade population.

The auditor general's report recommended that the academy boost its efforts to recruit underrepresented populations and consider expanding outreach in those regions where underrepresented populations live. The report also recommended that the academy consider conducting an analysis of those schools that have had few applicants to the academy.

The academy's staff agreed and said they will seek public and private dollars for additional recruiting efforts.

African American 22.5% 8.6% 10.6% 22.4% 11.5% 10.0% 22, 0% 12.8% 12.4% Asian American 3.1% 30.2% 26.8% 3.1% 31.2% 25.0% 3.0% 27.8% 26.9% Latino 12.0% 4, 3% 5.5% 12.7% 4.3% 7.1% 12.9% 2.9% 5.0% White 62.2% 54.2% 53.2% 61.7% 47.0% 51, 3% 61.9% 50.2% 49.2%

REPORT
Welfare-to-work warnings
Illinois' welfare reform efforts deserve high marks, according to one indicator. Last month, the federal government named this state one of 27 to share a $200 million high performance bonus for adding new wage earners.

Illinois will receive $21.6 million, a more than 10 percent share of the bonus. For other indicators of this state's progress on the welfare-to-work front, check into Families, Poverty, and Welfare Reform: Confronting a New Policy Era, published in 1999 by the Center for Urban Research and Policy Studies at the University of Chicago. The book is a compilation of papers presented in 1995 for the Chicago Assembly symposium on families, poverty and welfare reform,

Much has happened since that assembly. In 1996, President Bill Clinton signed into law federal welfare reforms that, as the book notes, "ushered in a new policy era of block grants, work requirements and time limits." Illinois officials have their hands full in the aftermath of these reforms. Initially, this state was one of seven, and the only Midwestern state, to get less money under the new federal welfare program, according to the book's editor Lawrence B. Joseph. In 1996, Illinois received $601.1 million, but the state received only $585.1 million in 1997 under the new system.

Caseloads are dropping. Between 1993 and 1997, Joseph writes, the average monthly number of families receiving benefits fell by more than a million, "while the number of single-parent families in poverty declined by only about 367, 000." He warns that "lower caseloads do not necessarily indicate that families are becoming economically self-sufficient or are working their way out of poverty." Indeed, the assembly's conclusion is that a reduced number of people receiving welfare doesn't necessarily mean policy- makers are shrinking poverty.

The assembly members represent diverse points of view, but they do agree that "government has a responsibility to maintain a safety net for those in need, especially for children." And they agree that welfare reform in Illinois should involve the private sector and include job training, social supports after employment and access to child care and health care.

Maureen Foertsch McKmney

Illinois Issues January 2000 / 9

Students will be nudged further into the computer age if the state's colleges and universities win approval from elected officials for a proposed spending plan.

The Illinois Board of Higher Education settled last month on a $2.5 billion budget request for fiscal year 2001, which begins July 1. That plan must be approved by lawmakers and signed by the governor.

The board committed some $20 million to encourage students to enter information technology and other programs that train for in-demand occupations.

It designated another $443.8 million for upkeep and capital improvements on the state's campuses.

But high-tech initiatives are a major focus of the plan. "Technology is fast overtaking the economy," says the board's spokesman, Don Sevener. "Higher education needs to keep up with that."

On the technology wish list:
• $3.2 million for the Illinois Virtual Campus, an Internet-based program that directs users to online and other "distance learning" courses offered by Illinois colleges and universities.

• $2.6 million for a new information technology grant program at the Illinois Student Assistance Commission.

• $1.2 million for a technology and careers program at Illinois State University.

• $835, 900 to develop the Illinois Virtual High School, an Internet offering that would give rural and nontraditional high school students access to advanced courses.

The board also wants to contribute $8 million to a computer science and engineering facility at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and provide dollars for new or improved technology buildings at the College of Lake County, Illinois Central College and Lincoln Land Community College.

The proposed 2001 budget would increase spending by 6.6 percent over fiscal year 2000. But Sevener says the board is "cautiously optimistic" legislators won't make serious cuts.
Rodd Whelpley

Photograph courtesy of The Telegraph in Alton

The Alton Civil War prison was demolished in 1880.

Alton kiosk commemorates Civil War prison
The city of Alton has completed work on an eight-panel kiosk on the site of the former Civil War prison commemorating those who experienced that time in its history: Confederate prisoners, Union guards and townspeople.

Alton was the site of the first Illinois State Penitentiary, which was used by the state from 1833 to 1860. (See Illinois Issues, June 1995, page 26.) In February 1862, it was reopened as a military prison. During the next three years, more than 11, 760 Confederate prisoners entered the gates of the Alton Federal Military Prison. Nearly 2, 000 are known to have died and been buried in Alton's cemeteries.

Don Huber, the Alton Township supervisor, gathered information and photographs for the display to help visitors, many of whom are looking for ancestors who were sent to the prison. The city also has a Local History link on its Web site at www.altonweb.com that allows genealogists and history buffs to search prison records.
Beverley Scobell

Follow-up
-Officials at St. Louis-based Monsanto labeled a class-action suit filed by a group of farmers against bioengineered corn and bean seeds "absolutely baseless." (See Illinois Issues, September page 12.)

-Illinois' new 25 percent education tax credit passed its first legal test when Franklin County Circuit Court Judge Loren Lewis upheld the constitutionality of the law, dismissing a suit filed by the Illinois Federation of Teachers. (See Illinois Issues, June, page 9; September, page 9; and November, page 36.)

-The Illinois Supreme Court ruled that large-scale livestock facilities are agricultural rather than industrial operations, and as such can't be regulated by counties. (See Illinois Issues, June, page 9.)

10 / January 2000 Illinois Issues

Special session (s)
Is the Capitol big enough?
The state's two top Republicans ended the year with a showdown over the politically contentious subject of guns. A special session called to re-enact an anti-crime statute struck down by the Illinois Supreme Court turned into a contest of wills between Gov. George Ryan and Senate President James "Pate" Philip. The two kept lawmakers in Springfield more than a week late last month as they squared off on the penalty for illegal possession and transportation of firearms, one provision in the 1994 law overturned by the court in early December. Gov. Ryan, long a supporter of gun control, held out for a felony, meaning the offense could carry a one- to three-year prison term. Sen. Philip, who argued hunters could be ensnared along with gunrunners, held out for making the offense a misdemeanor for first-time offenders, meaning they could serve up to a year in jail.

But most Statehouse observers see this as a political turf battle between two strong-willed GOP leaders — and a struggle over the definition of the Republican Party. Should it fight for gun rights or stress anti-crime efforts? The calculations on these two strategies break along regional and ideological lines. "This is about the base of the party," says Kent Redfield, a political scientist at the University of Illinois at Springfield. The question for the Republicans, he adds, is whether to focus on GOP Primary voters or General Election swing voters. So it was a rough year's end for Ryan. "This is probably the toughest issue I've had to deal with since I've been in Springfield," he told the press shortly before Christmas.

Given the extra political weight of this debate, it's difficult to remember that the court struck down the Safe Neighborhoods Act because lawmak- ers failed to follow a state constitutional requirement that legislation be confined to a single subject. The court contended the law's provisions that dealt with criminal statutes, such as gunrunning, had no relationship with two other key provisions. One of those provided civil penalties for fraud in the Women, Infants and Children program. The second helped clear the way for the state to create secured lockups for pre-teen violent offenders.
Burney Simpson

Fell session
Local taxing authority approved
Small towns can impose a sales tax for building projects under a measure approved over Gov. George Ryan's objections. (See Illinois Issues, November, page 10.) Voters in non-home rule municipalities can now decide whether to levy a one-half of 1 percent sales tax.

In his veto message, Ryan argued the measure would lead to a confusing patchwork of local taxes. But supporters countered it would give smaller towns the ability to raise money without going to the legislature. Furthermore, according to Ken Alderson, executive director of the Illinois Municipal League, approving the referendum power in the December legislative session was essential because some projects in Ryan's Illinois First program may require local matching funds before municipalities can receive state dollars.

Still, Alderson doesn't anticipate a rush of towns calling for referendums on the sales tax. "We don't see a ground swell. This won't be used willy-nilly. This is another tool for non-home rule communities to raise revenues."

Child support increases defeated
Supporters of an effort to send more child support dollars to working families on welfare failed to overturn Ryan's veto. (See Illinois Issues, November 1999, page 9, and this issue, page 42.) Chicago Democratic Rep. Julie Hamos, the chief sponsor, vowed to reintroduce the measure.

Currently, the state keeps most of the child support it collects. Hamos would allow families to keep two-thirds of the money collected. Ryan argued that would cost the state too much.
Burney Simpson

A mandate
Illinois lawmakers issued a stern warning to Public Aid Director Ann Patla during their fall session Improve the state's child support disbursement system before they return to Springfield in mid-January.

Officials are trying to snap back from the mess that occurred when the state went online October 1 with a centralized child support disbursement system, a switch, it turns out, that was made three months earlier than necessary

Seven states—Alabama, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Nebraska, Ohio and Oklahoma—decided to wait until December 31 to go online with central databases. Those states faced no fines or sanctions for waiting, Michigan and Nebraska got extensions on the deadline, and South

Carolina got a permanent exemption right off the bat because federal officials considered that state's system, to be in compliance.

It's been more than a decade since Congress called for a nationwide system of tracking deadbeat parents with computer databases that would, for example, let officials in Illinois monitor child support payments made in California. As part of welfare preform efforts, federal officials also want establish an efficient system for delivering payments.

The states were not encouraged to seek extensions on implementing their systems, says Michael Kharfen, spokesman for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. "We told them they'd have to meet a high threshold of evidence,"

Illinois did not seek an extension because state officials believed they were ready. Had they taken more time, Illinois, like North Carolina, might have avoided having what Kharfen calls "the most notable" problems. Since those problems cropped up in the central clearinghouse in DuPage County, thousands have been kept waiting for checks. The state has issued emergency payments totaling about $8 million. Early last month, the backlog had shrunk, but the number was still close to 9, 000 checks. In their warning, lawmakers outlined how they believe the process should work. More stringent proposals — a management review and interest payments on delayed checks — were rejected.
Jennifer Davis
County government and political reporter
The Peoria Journal Star

Illinois Issues January 2000 / 11