By: Diane Benjamin
On April 22nd the Illinois House passed HB 2523 116 to 0. For once every Democrat and every Republican agreed: https://ilga.gov/legislation/votehistory/102/house/10200HB2523_04222021_027000T.pdf
What is HB 2523?
This bill amends the language in the original bill that created the Police Officers Pension Investment Fund. Remember when pension funds were consolidated to hopefully perform better?
The original bill banned any lobbyists from being appointed to this board, except for ONE. That ban doesn’t apply to any representatives of the lobbyist group the Illinois Municipal League. HB 2523 bans them too.
I’ve written numerous stories about IML. They lobby for government which frequently means they don’t care what citizens think. They are a non-profit organization which in the past also fails to file tax returns. Local government uses them to justify actions and ignores them when what IML says doesn’t fit their agenda.
Why does this matter?
In just another case of Illinois corruption the top IML officials will receive a government pension even though they don’t work for the state of Illinois.
Excerpt:
Brad Cole of the IML is on this Board: https://insurance.illinois.gov/Newsrls/2020/03/IPOPIF-MTG-MINUTES-02-24-2020.pdf
Cole’s salary increased almost $100,000 in one year meaning taxpayers are on the hook for his even larger pension.
Since this bill passed the House it was gone nowhere in the Senate. https://ilga.gov/legislation/BillStatus.asp?GAID=16&GA=102&DocNum=2523&DocTypeID=HB&SessionID=110&LegID=131332&SpecSess=&Session=
One source told me Pritzker doesn’t want the Senate to act on this bill. Senate President Don Harmon is complying.
Bipartisan unanimous legislation even gets blocked in Illinois. The ghost of Madigan? Pritzker and Cole are buddies? Harmon doesn’t represent citizens?
Take your pick.
Maybe our representatives can explain how people who don’t work for the State of Illinois qualify for excessive pensions at out expense too.
Get in touch with Tom Fitton at https://www.judicialwatch.org/. JW might jump on this!
Go for it, lots of people would need to
I SENT YOUR ARTICLE TO THEM!
So remind who funds the IML. How do they make their money so they can award such large salaries? I know local city governments pay membership dues so would it be fair to say those membership dues are pretty steep to be able to afford such salaries!
And events they hold government pays to attend
Reads like the cast from “A den of thieves”! I guess here in Illinois the more corrupt you are, the further you get. Could be WHY Koos wants to stay mayor!!
Public pensions need to end. Everything else is a temporary fix. Public employees need to be on a defined contribution plan not a defined benefit plan. Just like the rest us. Corporations figured this out decades ago.