Category: IL in Fiscal Ruins
-
Workman’s Comp at Menard Correctional Center: the tip of the iceberg?
“In the past three years, $30.6 million was awarded to about 725 state employees in settlements who filed workmen’s compensation claims for repetitive trauma injuries caused by typing or unlocking prison cells. An additional $4.3 million was paid to all state claimants who missed work while recuperating from doctor-ordered time off or corrective surgery for…
-
IL Legislature Finally Passes Income Tax Hike!
The political mess-up with IDOC and the resultant suspension of Meritorious Good Time defined the whole of 2010. Parole, work release, home monitor, direct treatment, educational programs and alternatives to incarceration were negatively impacted by legislative inaction in addressing this problem. Meritorious awarding of inmate credits for schooling and various treatment programs proceeded and committee…
-
IL Senate President details new IL tax deal!
It looks like Quinn and the legislature are close to accomplishing the impossible: a permanent tax increase deal for IL. They are actually working out a long-term fiscal blueprint for paying for all outstanding bills, pension costs, and restructuring Illinois with a moratorium on new expenditures and programs for years! They are changing the process…
-
IL Death Penalty May be near End
Mixed news at IDOC today: First a hazardous materials scare at Pontiac Prison: a suspicious powder was found someplace on the prison grounds shortly after 3pm according to Pontiac news report here, and the Bloomington Pantagraph, here. Although a decontamination tent was set up in the parking lot, no one was reportedly injured and it…
-
No action in January expected
Rumors still persist within IDOC that the MGT suspension will be lifted this month. We remind readers that the argument that IL prisons are overcrowded, that the IL budget is overdrawn, and that the ratio of correctional officers to prisoners is dangerously out-of-proportion, and that something has to be done; those are all true. but…
-
Remember: Just Because a New Year Cometh…
With the inauguration of Govenor Quinn approaching on January 10, 2011, rumors are swirling around Illinois prisons that his first official act as governor will be to lift the MGT suspension. The argument that IL prisons are overcrowded, that the IL budget is overdrawn, and that the ratio of correctional officers to prisoners is dangerously…
-
Largely Unreported – The Georgia Prison Strike
On December 9, 2010, thousands of prisoners in at least 10 Georgia state prisons peacefully “went on strike”, refusing to leave their cells to report to work and other daily activities while calling for reforms in jail conditions and medical treatment. The prison strike was organized by inmates using cell phones purchased from guards extended…
-
Union irked after prison not sold
THOMSON, Ill. — What’s next for the Thomson Correctional Center? No one bought the state prison at an auction Tuesday. That’s good news to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, which wants to purchase the facility. That’s bad news to the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees — the state’s largest public employee union…
-
Workers filing for compensation at Menard prison
CHESTER, Ill. — Workers at the Menard Correctional Center in southern Illinois received more than $1.5 million in workers compensation settlements for injuries to their hands, wrists and elbows, according to public records. Guards say the injuries were caused by repetitive actions, like locking and unlocking cells, The Belleville News-Democrat reported Monday. The newspaper cited…
-
Why Hoping MGT will return in January Won’t “Make It So”
May 31, 2012, State Legislature passes new law paving way for Early Release programs! Read latest at http://richardwanke.com Meritorious good time in the IL Department of Corrections (IDOC) was taken away in January 2010. Since then, inmates have been clamoring to know when it will return. IDOC staff have no idea when it will return. IDOC…