THE ILLINOIZE: Wednesday Free for All
Good morning! Yeah, it’s me again.
Patrick sent me a picture of his new editor. I’m not sure he’s qualified after only a week of life, but he is adorable.
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YOUR WEDNESDAY FREE FOR ALL
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Illinois prepares for ‘likely’ arrival of omicron variant, but for now delta remains top Covid-19 concern (Chicago Tribune)
Chicago’s top public health official said Tuesday she’s more concerned about the delta variant of the coronavirus than omicron, which has not yet been detected in the United States, because “delta is doing a job on Chicago and on the upper Midwest.”
Chicago is reporting 493 daily COVID-19 cases, down from about 600 daily cases last week in what has otherwise been a mostly upward trend in recent weeks. The dip reflects a drop in testing over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, Dr. Allison Arwady said at a Tuesday news conference.
She said she expects the omicron variant to be formally detected in the U.S. “in days or weeks.”
Chicago is “well placed” to detect the omicron variant, Arwady said, and “we likely will soon.” Chicago health officials are analyzing more samples sent from local hospitals and continuing to test wastewater. In the meantime, researchers are trying to learn more about how omicron behaves and spreads.
Op-ed: Illinois should use COVID-19 relief funds to provide the right care for our most vulnerable children (Chicago Tribune)
Now that the Illinois General Assembly has given Gov. J.B. Pritzker control of billions of dollars in federal COVID-19 funds without legislative oversight, I have a suggestion for how to spend some of the money: Let’s invest it in our children. A good place to start would be addressing the crisis-level placement shortage for children in the care of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, a problem that has caused untold suffering for thousands of our most vulnerable children.
From 2013 to 2018, DCFS unwisely eliminated more than 500 group home and residential beds for children. At the time, DCFS said that it would replace these lost beds with therapeutic foster home beds.
Most child advocates, me included, support therapeutic foster care as a preferred placement for many children over group homes and residential care. Unfortunately, while DCFS was busy shuttering needed group homes and residential placements, it failed to develop therapeutic foster homes or any other clinically sound alternative. In addition, since 2015, DCFS’ emergency shelter capacity decreased from 159 beds to fewer than 40.
This has been devastating for children.
Illinois Tollway’s $20 million toll-collecting machines are now collecting dust (Daily Herald)
In roughly four years, a fleet of over 100 automatic payment machines along the Illinois tollway has sunk from essential tools to expensive white elephants.
The machines' short but eventful lifetimes span two different tollway administrations under former Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner and Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker. Their price tag is more than $20 million, split between purchase and maintenance costs.
Back in early 2017, the tollway board under Rauner decided to replace its aging coin buckets with "more technologically advanced automatic toll payment machines that will provide more payment options and better service to our customers," spokesman Dan Rozek said at the time.
"The new ATPMs will cost less than $100,000 each and will offer more payment options than the current coin machines, which are at least 20 years old, accept only coins, and are difficult to repair because replacement parts have to be specially manufactured."
Gradually the new machines popped up across the system from DeKalb to Oak Lawn. But not everyone was happy with the innovations.
But do they take pennies? My apologies if you were behind me at a toll plaza when I was in high school.
Rep. Mike Murphy resigns (The Illinoize)
When Rep. Mike Murphy (R-Springfield) was named the new President & CEO of the Greater Springfield Chamber of Commerce in November, he indicated he was likely to resign from the Illinois House. Murphy officially resigned Tuesday.
…Murphy was drawn into a primary with Rep. Avery Bourne (R-Morrisonville) and had indicated he wouldn’t run against Bourne in an intra-party fight. He had also considered a run for Springfield Mayor in 2023.
It isn’t clear who Sangamon County Republicans will choose to replace Murphy, but it is expected to be a potential candidate for either the 48th Senate district against incumbent Democrat Sen. Doris Turner (D-Springfield) or the 96th House district against Democrat Rep. Sue Scherer (D-Decatur).
Debit card payment option for unemployment benefits going away, IDES (The State Journal-Register)
Unemployment benefits no longer will be made available on debit cards, the Illinois Department of Employment Security says.
The change will take effect Dec. 27 for benefit recipients who opted for a debit card option as their preferred method of payment, IDES said in a news release.
After that date, debit-card benefit recipients will begin to receive paper checks.
The department will continue to make direct-deposit payments to recipients who chose that option.
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