SPRINGFIELD – Legislation sponsored by State Senator Dave Koehler (D-Peoria) that would ensure that special education students in Illinois are able to complete their schooling passed out of the Senate on Wednesday.

“Students all across Illinois have faced significant challenges over the last year as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic,” Koehler said. “It is no different for special education students, except that an interrupted school year may mean that they are unable to finish their education under current regulations.”

SPRINGFIELD – State Senator Dave Koehler (D-Peoria) pledged to continue work on his initiative to demand that excessive profits received by Managed Care Organizations during the COVID-19 pandemic be returned to the state.

“As we begin to move into a post-COVID-19 world, we’re seeing that managed care organizations brought in record-breaking profits while many communities across the state struggled to receive basic care and necessary resources during the pandemic,” Koehler said. “If we are able to reallocate excess profits from these companies, we can help hospitals stay open and keep providing lifesaving care in our low-income and rural communities.”

The legislation was filed in response to decreased health care service use during the period where elective surgeries and procedures were postponed. Decreased use resulted in MCOs paying fewer claims and therefore retaining unprecedented amounts of enrollment-based profit, the scope of which was revealed via a Better Government Association investigation. Those wishing to read more about the results of the investigation can visit the BGA’s website.

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SPRINGFIELD – To protect the wellbeing of public school employees, State Senator Ram Villivalam (D-Chicago) passed legislation in the Illinois Senate that would offer the same terms and conditions as the federal Family and Medical Leave Act.

“Illinois should expand access to family and medical leave for working families,” Villivalam said. “Our educators and school staff work on the frontlines every day to provide a quality education for our youth and deserve their leave with no strings attached.”

CHICAGO – State Senator Cristina Pacione-Zayas (D-Chicago) announced Wednesday a $250,000 construction project to improve and update a stretch of Kimball Avenue as part of the Illinois Department of Transportation’s multi-year construction plan.

“This project will bring some much-needed improvements to this part of the city, including accessibility updates,” Pacione-Zayas said. “It’s always good to see IDOT make infrastructure improvements that make our roadways a little more accessible and generate good jobs at the same time.”

SPRINGFIELD – State Senator Cristina Castro (D-Elgin)  spearheaded a measure to create a program that will help people with serious mental illness or substance use disorders by enabling access to affordable housing and support services.

“The Housing is Recovery Pilot Program will help break the cycle of institutionalization for those struggling with mental health issues and addiction,” Castro said. “We need to ensure those most vulnerable have a roof over their head and the services they need.”

Often, people with a serious mental illness or substance use disorder lack affordable housing, causing increased institutionalization, incarceration or risk of death from an overdose. House Bill 449 would create the Housing is Recovery Pilot Program to help prevent people with a serious mental illness or people who are at high risk of overdose due to lack of support services from being institutionalized or dying.

CHICAGO— State Senator Elgie R. Sims, Jr. advanced legislation out of the Senate, that would give community college boards of trustees and local housing authorities permission to develop affordable housing for community college students.

“There are many advantages to living on campus for students,” said Sims. “We all know that housing provides a place to lay your head, but the benefits go far beyond that, as studies show that students who live on campus complete more credit hours and have higher grade point averages. While also making campus resources like the library, labs and support services more easily available.”

Traditionally, community colleges do not have the right to own student housing. In order for community colleges to develop affordable housing for students, the process must be administered through a local Housing Authority or nonprofit organization.

SPRINGFIELD – An antiquated part of the criminal code that penalizes Illinoisans living with human immunodeficiency virus would be repealed under a measure co-sponsored in the Senate by State Senator Mike Simmons (D-Chicago), which cleared its final vote in the General Assembly Tuesday.

“The law this measure repeals is a relic of homophobia,” Simmons said. “HIV is an illness that must be treated, not stigmatized. The Senate did the right thing today by passing this measure, and I urge Gov. Pritzker to act quickly to sign it.”

House Bill 1063 repeals the portion of the criminal code that gives prosecutors the ability to charge people living with HIV with a Class 2 Felony for having consensual sex, sharing needles, or donating organs or bodily tissues and fluids. HIV is currently the only communicable disease subject to such criminalization.

“The fact that no other condition is treated this way under the law should tell everyone all they need to know about the motivations behind criminalizing HIV positivity,” Simmons said. 

The Senate passed House Bill 1063 on Tuesday. It awaits the governor’s signature to become law.

SPRINGFIELD - Senate Majority Leader Kimberly A. Lightford (D-Maywood) continued her years-long effort to create a more equitable education system in Illinois by passing legislation that would form a commission to assess whether public institutions of higher education serving disadvantaged communities need a different funding model and are receiving their fair share of state funding.

“If we want our Black, Latino, and low-income students to have the same opportunity as their white peers, our universities that serve them must have fair funding,” Lightford said. “We have to close the funding gaps between our schools that serve a large number of historically disadvantage students and the universities that don’t.”

Senate Bill 815 follows up on the Illinois Legislative Black Caucus Education and Workforce Development Pillar law that passed earlier this year.