When state lawmakers began the spring legislative session in January, they had grand ideas about finally changing the way Illinoisans pay for public schools and deregulating the state’s electrical utilities.
But after months of tireless debate, lawmakers adjourned early Sunday morning with the ignominy of having done neither.
Perhaps more than any legislative session in recent history, Illinois lawmakers could be remembered more for what they did not do than for what they did, having also failed to act on other areas such as regulating managed health care and giving parents a tax credit for their children’s college education.
And there was the plight of Illinois Supreme Court Justice James Heiple, who escaped impeachment charges after a lengthy series of House hearings.
Still, the legislative session had its highlights.
– Driving: Lawmakers endorsed a reduction in the state’s legal blood-alcohol intoxication limit for motorists to 0.08 percent from 0.10 percent and approved increased damages from taverns covered by dram shop insurance.
Prompted by a fatal accident in Crete last year, the legislature also toughened rules and penalties for hit-and-run accidents. And in response to the 1995 school bus-train accident that killed seven high-school students, lawmakers ordered Metra trains slowed to 50 m.p.h. from 70 m.p.h. through Fox River Grove.
– Campaign reform: Senate Republicans sent plans for comprehensive campaign reforms to summer hearings, but lawmakers approved plans to put financial reports on the Internet and removed the requirement that members of the public give their names and reasons for wanting to inspect campaign finance forms.
– Health issues: Lawmakers also voted to ban certain late-term abortion procedures. The General Assembly also recommended to Gov. Jim Edgar that health insurers cover longer hospital stays after breast cancer surgery. And DNA test results from physicians will be kept confidential from employers or insurers.
– Gambling: Much talk but no action resulted from attempts by gaming lobbyists to expand casino gambling to Chicago, Rosemont and Lake County, and to add slot machines at Arlington International Racetrack.
– College: Edgar received measures that would allow parents to prepay their children’s college tuition, guaranteeing coverage of the future cost of attending public universities and community colleges across the state.
– Insurance: Legislators authorized some 600 state banks and financial institutions to begin selling insurance for the first time since the Great Depression.
