Page 25 - May2021

The Illinois legislature is scheduled to ad- journ on May 31. The legislators have been busy working on a variety of issues, from budget con- cerns to criminal justice reform to energy poli- cy to healthcare to education issues and many others. It looks like they will even have
an opportunity to place a constitutional amendment on the ballot to eliminate any so-called “Right to Work” legislation. In addition to these important issues,
there is a once-a-decade topic that is high on the list
of concerns for all legislators: the all-important process of redistricting. This complicated procedure of redrawing all the legislative maps throughout the state is currently under- way and needs to be finalized before June 30, or an indepen- dent commission will draw the maps.
Since there is a supermajority of Democrats in the House and the Senate, it is a virtual certainty that the Democratic majorities in both chambers will pass a map and Governor
Pritzker will sign it. This will determine the boundaries for state House and Senate districts, as well as congressional districts. Illinois will lose one congressional seat in this next redistricting, so the current 18 districts will be drawn into
17 seats for the next decade. Central Illinois Democrat- ic Congresswoman Cheri Bustos has announced her retirement, which should give the Democrats more flexibility as they attempt to draw one fewer Repub- lican seat.
A bipartisan group of legislators has begun conversa- tions about how to fix some of the problems with the lame- duck session policing bill. As of this writing, it is yet to be de- termined if a “trailer bill” will be passed. Whatever is passed, it has been stated by some legislators that they do not want to change the “spirit” of that new law. We will work with them on improvements to the law.
Redistricting tops the list of concerns
DAVE SULLIVAN
CHICAGO LODGE 7 ■ MAY 2021 25