SPRINGFIELD, Ill –State Rep. Debbie Meyers-Martin, D-Olympia Fields, issued the following statement after being sworn in as a member of the 101st Illinois General Assembly on Wednesday:
“Much of my life has been dedicated to public service and improving the lives of others. I am truly honored to enter this next chapter and be given the opportunity to serve as the representative for the 38th Illinois House District.”
“I expect the journey ahead of me and my colleagues will not be the easiest. There will be disagreements, negotiations and compromises. But these are challenges I have encountered before during my time as a village president and trustee. I am ready to be a fierce advocate for the values of our district, and my hope is that the recent unproductive partisanship that has set the state and its residents back becomes a thing of the past.”
“Our State can no longer afford to go backward while others move forward. We must face the issues plaguing our state head on. And some of the best opportunities forward for Illinois are to invest in our public education system and help spur meaningful economic development. These issues are directly linked, as creative young people who have opportunities to thrive in Illinois will become our next generation’s entrepreneurs.”
“In addition to education and economic issues, I intend to work with my colleagues to find worthwhile solutions that expand access to affordable health care for women, children and seniors as well as raise wages for middle class families. Among others, these are the issues I know to be priorities of my constituents, whose voices I look forward to making heard in Springfield.”
UIS is happy to welcome the Illinois House of Representatives for its inauguration ceremony on Wednesday, January 9, 2019.
Sponsor: University of Illinois Springfield
Location: Sangamon Auditorium
Date: Jan 9, 2019 12:00
Live webcast: uiswowza1.uis.edu
Guns, hemp, and stalking are among the themes of the more than 250 new Illinois laws signed by Governor Bruce Rauner that took effect on New Year’s Day.
We took a look at some of the biggest changes to come out of Springfield in the past year, and how they’ll affect life in the Prairie State in 2019.
Last February, a gunman opened fire on students and teachers at a high school in Parkland, Florida, killing 17 before being apprehended by police. The attack came just a few months after another gunman killed nearly 60 people at a country music festival in Las Vegas. As the shock waves reverberated throughout the country, Illinois state lawmakers filed a flurry of bills to address what many called an “epidemic of gun violence.”
While many didn’t have enough support to make it out of the statehouse, both Republicans and Democrats came together on a few changes that are now state law.
Among those is Senate Bill 3256, which became PA-100-0606. It puts a 72 Hour waiting period in place on all gun purchases in Illinois. Before, only handgun purchases had been subject to that long of a wait, commonly known as a “cooling off” period.
State Rep. Jonathan Carroll, a Democrat from Northbrook, was the bill’s House sponsor. He says heat-of-the-moment purchases can lead to gun violence. With the uptick in gun crimes committed with rifles like the AR-15, Carroll says a longer waiting period was needed to try and stop those crimes before they happen.
“That way people, if they’re gonna make a purchase, have time to think about potential catastrophes that could happen,” he explained. “Data shows us that actually, that kind of waiting period does cut down on those types of shootings.”
Another is aimed at getting guns out of the hands of dangerous people, whether they purchase them or not. State Rep. Kathleen Willis sponsored House Bill 2354, known as the new Lethal Order of Protection law, PA-100-0607. It allows police, family members, or friends of a violent person to ask a court to take away his or her guns for up to six months if they pose “an immediate and present danger“ to themselves or others.
The Addison Democrat says mental health commonly plays a central role in mass shootings.
“Somebody who shoots themselves or does mass shootings has some kind of mental health crisis going on…so this is something that allows people to be proactive,” she said.
Groups like the NRA and even some Republican state lawmakers were concerned the measure was a government overreach. Willis says she worked with them before the bill became law.
“It’s a temporary order, there is due process in it. We worked with them to make sure we had all the checks and balances in there so it would not be abused.”
Those “checks and balances” are in the form of sworn affidavits. Under the new law, anyone who wants one of these types of restraining orders has to first swear to a court that they’re telling the truth about a person, and would be punished if they lie.
Source: www.nprillinois.org
