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* Tribune…
Without any opposition, the Illinois Senate on Tuesday passed a measure that would tighten identification standards for human remains that are being handled by funeral homes and enhance punishment for businesses that break the law.
The legislation comes after a funeral home in central Illinois last year was found to have given dozens of families the wrong remains. The owner of Heinz Funeral Home in Carlinville had his license revoked by the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation after the discovery for “professional incompetence,” among other things.
The measure passed in the Senate Tuesday by a 55-0 vote would tighten funeral home regulations designed to ensure the human remains in their possession are identified properly. The bill now moves to the House for consideration. […]
The legislation would make it a Class 4 felony, punishable by up to three years in prison, for funeral service providers to intentionally mishandle certain documents related to someone’s death.
* WGEM…
A bill in the Illinois state Senate would make it easier for people to learn their risk of getting cancer through genetic testing.
The bipartisan legislation passed unanimously through the state Senate Insurance Committee on March 12. It now heads to the floor.
If it becomes law, insurance companies in Illinois would be required to cover genetic testing if the patient has a family history of cancer. Out-of-pocket costs would be capped at $50. Illinois Medicaid patients would also be covered with no out-of-pocket costs.
“This measure will increase early detection and improve prevention of all types of cancer. With this bill, we are moving the needle further in the right direction,” said state Sen. Julie Morrison, D-Lake Forest, the bill’s sponsor.
* Daily Herald…
As electric vehicle charging networks are taking shape across the country and in Illinois, state Sen. Dan McConchie wants to ensure the infrastructure is accessible to all drivers.
With accessibility regulations for electric vehicle chargers still in progress at the federal level, current stations often are inaccessible to drivers with disabilities. McConchie first caught wind of the issue when he heard from the attorney general’s office that one Illinois resident who uses a wheelchair had bought a Tesla and had it outfitted so it could be used — but could not find a publicly available charger nearby that was accessible to wheelchair users. […]
The bill is silent on whether the rules would apply retroactively to existing chargers.
“It would be my hope that companies who have installed existing units would go back and make sure that there is some accessibility, because at some point I do suspect that there will be some retroactivity down the road, even if it’s not immediate,” McConchie said. […]
The bill unanimously cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee last month, and likely will go before the full Senate for a vote next week.
* 25 News Now…
A bill that would expand tax breaks from newly constructed homes to newly remodeled homes will now head to the Illinois House of Representatives after it passed out of the Senate.
The bill, sponsored by Peoria Democrat Sen. Dave Koehler and outgoing Peoria Republican Win Stoller, changes the property tax code to include tax breaks for remodeled or improved homes in areas of urban decay.
As currently written, the state’s property tax code allows local governments to grant an abatement period of up to 10 years for taxes in a certain area of urban decay. Within that area and during that period, newly constructed single-family or duplex homes receive a percentage of their taxes discounted, maxing out at 2%.
Koehler and Stoller’s law would put newly remodeled homes and duplexes under the same umbrella, granting them the 2% discount. The goal is to encourage property owners to invest in homes in that area to revitalize spots like Peoria’s Southside, where many homes need repair.
* KFVS…
The Illinois state Senate passed two bills Tuesday they believe will help limit teen vaping.
One bill, sponsored by state Sen. Julie Morrison, D-Lake Forest, bans companies from selling vaping devices that look like normal household items. The other bill, sponsored by state Sen. Meg Loughran Cappel, D-Shorewood, bans people from shipping them in Illinois except to retailers and distributors. […]
Both bills now head to the state House of Representatives.
* Sen. Robert Peters…
To streamline expungement proceedings, State Senator Robert Peters advanced a measure out of the Senate on Tuesday making record expungement a smoother process for youth involved with the juvenile court systems. […]
Peters’ measure supports the idea of making changes in how court systems handle young people involved with the law by helping them get back on track and be a part of the community again, emphasizing rehabilitation and reintegration.
Often youth involved in the criminal justice system lack long-term legal representation, are unfamiliar with legal proceeding options and miss notifications of future expungement proceedings. His measure, Senate Bill 3463, requires juvenile court record expungements to be scheduled at the same time as initial court decisions to avoid multiple court appearances.
The measure passed the Senate with bipartisan support and heads to the House for further consideration.
* WGEM…
Illinois lawmakers are looking at a proposal making it easier for international doctors to practice in the state.
The state House Health Care Licenses Committee unanimously passed a bill on April 3 creating a clinical readiness program to help doctors trained internationally find a residency program in Illinois, which they need to complete their licensing requirements.
The bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Theresa Mah, D-Chicago, said the idea came out of a working group. It’s the latest step to ensure the state doesn’t lose out on talented physicians. […]
Mah said she is working with the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation on another amendment to improve the bill. It will go back before the Health Care Licenses Committee before potentially heading to the House floor.
* Sen. Julie Morrison…
To help physicians meet patients’ end-of-life wishes, State Senator Julie Morrison passed a measure to create an electronic registry to store treatment preferences for critically ill individuals.
“How much or how little treatment a person receives at the end of their life should be up to each individual instead of the one-size-fits-all approach,” said Morrison (D-Lake Forest). “This measure will enable physicians to access forms detailing patients’ wishes in a single, accessible location.”
Senate Bill 2644 would establish a statewide electronic registry that would contain Physician Orders for Life Sustaining Treatment forms, which detail what type of medical treatment a critically ill patient does and does not want. POLST forms can help health care practitioners to uphold a person’s wishes regarding their care.
Currently, POLST forms can be maintained in hard copy or electronic format through the Secretary of State’s office. Morrison’s measure would establish a single location to hold all POLST forms, making it easily accessible to physicians throughout the state.
“I worked closely with the Illinois State Bar Association, the Illinois Hospital Association and the Alzheimer’s Association to develop this legislation,” said Morrison. “It is my hope that creating this statewide registry will ensure an individual’s wishes are honored.”
Senate Bill 2644 passed the Senate Tuesday. It now heads to the House for further consideration.
House Bill 2363 to phase out fluorescent lighting advanced through the Illinois House Energy and Environment Committee and is headed for a vote on the House floor.
According to analysis by the Appliance Standards Awareness Project, the switch to LED bulbs would save Illinois consumers more than $1.5 billion on utility bills, avoid 2.2 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions by cutting energy waste and avoid 419 pounds of mercury pollution by 2050. […]
[Abe Scarr, Illinois director of the Public Interest Research Group] notes a typical small office could see $900 a year in savings by switching to LED bulbs and schools could save $3,700 a year.
* Sen. Steve Stadelman…
State Senator Steve Stadelman’s legislation aimed at combatting electronic stalking has successfully passed the Senate and advances to the House. […]
Electronic stalking, a form of harassment and intimidation facilitated through various digital platforms and communication channels, has become increasingly prevalent in today’s society.
In this modern technological era, electronic devices are commonly used to track keys, wallets, luggage, and other personal items. However, these electronic devices can also be used for people to stalk others.
The measure seeks to include electronic stalking as a method of criminal stalking, providing crucial legal protections for victims in the digital age. […]
Senate Bill 2683 passed the Senate and heads to the House for further consideration.
posted by Isabel Miller
Wednesday, Apr 10, 24 @ 8:49 am
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I appreciate the intent of the electronic stalking bill, but that will certainly be abused as currently written in SB2683 by people with extra money laying around to file lawsuits. For example, won’t this allow people to be taken to court for stalking for posting publicly available flight tracking data on websites?
On the plus side, it doesn’t appear to me that there would be anything preventing me, as a consumer, from taking the manufacturer of my car and my car insurance company to court for stalking since the manufacturer is electronically tracking my movements through my vehicles location and my insurance company is purchasing this information to potentially raise my rates. If the potential raising of my insurance rates causes me emotional distress, this looks like it would be stalking under the bill as written.
Comment by Benniefly2 Wednesday, Apr 10, 24 @ 9:35 am
House Bill 2363
“beginning January 1, 2027, no person shall sell, offer 2to sell, or distribute in the State as a new manufactured 2product a pin-base type compact fluorescent lamp or a linear fluorescent lamp”
Great for the environmental lobby folks like PIRG – but problematic for public buildings such as schools, courthouses, park districts gyms… Lighting infrastructure has an effective life of decades. At my work we have slowly been moving to LED – but we have tons of perfectly good t-5 fixtures. Yes, there are electricity savings and Com Ed grants – but the retrofit costs related to this Bill with a hard stop on sales would be huge. Let this change happen voluntarily.
Comment by Donnie Elgin Wednesday, Apr 10, 24 @ 9:55 am
@ Benniefly2 -
You might want to read the entire text of the bill.
Comment by JoanP Wednesday, Apr 10, 24 @ 10:09 am
@Donnie
T-5 fluorescent or linear w/ballast does not have a useful life of decades. They might ‘work’ in that they will produce some amount of light for that long, but they become incredibly inefficient over time. After 10 years, you might as well still be using incandescent bulbs. Regularly spot checking those also is terribly inefficient in labor costs, much less energy efficiency. In higher wattage systems, the loss through the ballast just from the freq conversion is often more than the total usage of an equivalent LED.
CFL came out and was in widespread use almost 20 years ago. The average useful life of a linear bulb w/ballast is 10-15 years. That was 5-10 years ago when those replacement should have already at least started for most places.
There’s very few reasons for most places to not already have moved to LED. There’s certainly no reason to suspend this bill or to carve out allowances for institutions which already aren’t operating on industry best practices.
Your proposal instead exports the individual choices of inefficiency to the larger grid. You could modify your proposal to allow those existing lights only for places which supply their own power from solar/renewable energy, but you’d find out pretty quickly that would also unintentionally force an upgrade to LED, because that inefficient choice has a real cost.
Comment by TheInvisibleMan Wednesday, Apr 10, 24 @ 10:51 am
I did read the what I think is the whole thing at the following link before my original post and I stand by comment at the moment:
https://www.ilga.gov/legislation/103/SB/10300SB2683.htm
Course of conduct” means 2 or more acts, including but
9 not limited to acts in which a respondent directly,
10 indirectly, or through third parties, by any action, method,
11 device, or means follows, monitors, observes, surveils, or
12 threatens a person, workplace, school, or place of worship,
13 engages in other contact, or interferes with or damages a
14 person’s property or pet. A course of conduct may include
15 using any electronic tracking system or acquiring tracking
16 information to determine the targeted person’s location,
17 movement, or travel patterns. A course of conduct may also
18 include contact via electronic communications. The
19 incarceration of a person in a penal institution who commits
20 the course of conduct is not a bar to prosecution under this
21 Section.
22 “Emotional distress” means significant mental suffering, anxiety or alarm
Someone only needs to do one of these things twice and my car surveils my location and movements every time I start my car and sells it to data brokers without my direct consent and/or insurance companies. You can ask them to not do that on their website, but they say they will only turn it off if there is data privacy laws already in place in the state in which you reside. So for Illinois, that means they won;t stop it even if requested at the moment.
It is a much longer bill than that, and I did read the whole thing, but it is right there on the first page. I kept looking for exceptions to my examples in the bill but I couldn’t find them.
Comment by Benniefly2 Wednesday, Apr 10, 24 @ 11:54 am
House Bill 2363
This bill does not just affect businesses or other public buildings. It also affects residences. My basement and garage has, I think, seven florescent fixtures with two bulbs in each. These are the longer workshop style fixtures.
I have already converted one small (24 inch, 2 bulb) fluorescent light to LED in our house, and I think it cost us around $500 for the LED bulbs and the rewiring. Even if I were to replace rather than convert all the fixtures, I think that is still a significant expense. While I am supportive of this and personally have been switching to LED as I replace bulbs and fixtures in my home, some people may not be able to afford to convert their residences by 2027. Although, I have no idea how many homes in Illinois have multiple flourescent fixtures like mine.
Comment by Steve Polite Wednesday, Apr 10, 24 @ 12:21 pm
HB2363 doesn’t do anything to require earlier adoption of LED lights. If you install a fluorescent bulb later this year, you can keep it as long as it works.
The bill just prohibits the -sale- of bulbs (at various implementation dates). So as people need to replace fluorescent bulbs in the future, they will do so with LEDs
93% of fluorescent bulbs you can swap in a LED with no modification to the ballast.
Comment by Abe Wednesday, Apr 10, 24 @ 6:58 pm