cap interest rates charged by consumer finance companies at 99 percent on loans under $4,000 and 36 percent on loans above that amount.
payday loans will be limited to $15.50 for every $100 borrowed over a two-week period. …will not be allowed to issue pay day loans if monthly payments will exceed 25 percent of a person’s gross monthly income.
Click on the following for more details: Law caps payday, car-title loan interest rates - Galesburg, IL - The Register-Mail
Great story—watch there will be some curbs to FOIA’s.
Nearly 600 cases have piled up at the Illinois attorney general’s office from governments and people who want rulings on whether public bodies must release records under the state Freedom of Information Act.
Attorney general backlogged on FOIA rulings - Springfield, IL - The State Journal-Register
they have eliminated all expired leases in which the state was occupying office space on a month-to-month basis….Since early 2009, CMS [Department of Central Management Services] said, it has consolidated, rebid and renegotiated 197 leases across Illinois… will save the state $20 million…CMS said it was paying $66 million a year on holdover leases. In total, the agency said it’s entered 132 new leases costing about $58.7 million
Kirk has largely disappeared from public view since apologizing for misstating his military credentials. He did give a speech Monday but wound up fleeing from reporters afterward when they wanted to ask questions about the issue.
Meanwhile, Giannoulias is sharing the spotlight at fundraisers with Vice President Joe Biden, Education Secretary Arne Duncan and others with ties to Obama. White House
Click on the following for more details: Pantagraph.com | News from Associated Press
BP is moving ahead with a controversial and potentially record-setting project to drill two miles under the sea and then six to eight miles horizontally to reach what is believed to be a 100-million-barrel reservoir of oil under federal waters.
BP’s project, called Liberty, has been exempted as regulators have granted it status as an “onshore” project even though it is about three miles off the coast in the Beaufort Sea. The reason: it sits on an artificial island — a 31-acre pile of gravel in about 22 feet of water — built by BP.
Click on the following for more details: BP Is Pursuing Alaska Drilling Some Call Risky - NYTimes.com
Great summary of the public pension issue.
Two sides of Illinois’ pension systems need to be fixed to bring the state out of its retirement funding quagmire: the benefits, which some say are overly generous, and the funding, which is $78 billion in the red.
The first half got a boost last month when Gov. Pat Quinn signed changes applying to most — but not all — of the pension systems in Illinois. But the second, and more urgent, half of reform remains untouched.
The law creates a second pension tier for public workers hired after Jan. 1, 2011. The second tier increases the retirement age from 60 to 67, caps the final salary used to calculate pension payments and trims the annual pension increase to be more in line with inflation.
The constitutional issue
… But a short piece of text called Article 13, Section 5 of the Illinois Constitution is standing in their way.
It’s brief: “Membership in any pension or retirement system of the state, any unit of local government or school district, or any agency or instrumentality thereof, shall be an enforceable contractual relationship, the benefits of which shall not be diminished or impaired.”
Click on the following for more details: Pension changes face series of hurdles - Springfield, IL - The State Journal-Register
Due to information revealed during the background investigation, Sheikh Kifah Mustapha's appointment as a volunteer ISP Chaplain has been denied," ISP spokesman Master Sgt. Isaiah Vega said in an e-mail. "Specific details of background investigations are confidential and cannot be discussed."
Click on the following for more details: Pantagraph.com | News from Associated Press
