News from Senator Peter Roskam Senate Republican Whip
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		315 West Wesley Street	309H State House
		Wheaton, Illinois 60187	Springfield, Illinois 62706
		630-690-4500	217/782-8022
		http://www.peterroskam.com/contact.html
	For Immediate Release
	Date:  August 15-19/mkp

WEEK IN REVIEW

SPRINGFIELD – Police and prosecutors around Illinois are getting new tools to combat the illegal production and use of methamphetamine, the new street drug that is ravaging communities and individual lives, according to State Senator Peter Roskam (R-Wheaton).

Governor Blagojevich has signed into a law a series of bills that target this extremely addictive and easily attainable drug that has devastated lives throughout much of the state from the rural south to the suburban north.

The methamphetamine production process creates toxic and hazardous waste that endangers law enforcement personnel, emergency response teams and the environment. Additionally, methamphetamine laboratories may contain a variety of highly flammable toxic chemicals and vapors. House Bills 3504, 3507, 3531, 3532, 3526 and Senate Bill 562 address these issues by providing instructions for methamphetamine clean-up and restitution payments, developing new protocol for laboratory seizures, securing anhydrous ammonia facilities, and clarifying Illinois statutes for law enforcement.

Specifically, House Bill 3504 addresses the lofty expenses associated with securing methamphetamine sites by creating the Methamphetamine Law Enforcement Fund. Under this new law, parties found guilty of methamphetamine manufacturing will face a $100 fine to assist with associated clean-up costs. House Bill 3507 further provides instructions for dispersing methamphetamine restitution payments equitably. Because local agencies suffer the brunt of the costs sustained when a methamphetamine site is secured, restitution payments will first cover regular and overtime costs incurred by local law enforcement agencies and private contractors, followed by state agencies, and last to federal agencies.

House Bill 3531, 3532, and 3526 are products of recommendations from the Methamphetamine Crisis Task Force, a group of lawmakers responsible for conducting statewide hearings during the summer and fall months of 2004 on the escalating problem of the manufacture and use of methamphetamine throughout the state of Illinois. During the hearings it became apparent that communication and protocol between and among agencies responding to methamphetamine laboratory seizures had a negative affect on the children present. House Bill 3531 addresses this concern by requiring DCFS, the Department of State Police, and the State Board of Education to jointly develop a sample protocol for handling situations where a child may reside at the place a police raid occurs.

Much like its predecessor, House Bill 3532 establishes one statewide protocol for methamphetamine laboratory cleanup and determines if housing is environmentally safe to live in. Essentially, it establishes an “environmental standard” a site must conform to in order to be declared safe. House Bill 2526 attempts to limit accessibility to anhydrous ammonia, which speeds the production of methamphetamine, by requiring the Department of Agriculture to establish a program to improve security at anhydrous ammonia facilities.

The final piece of the package is Senate Bill 562, which moves methamphetamine-related provisions into a single law designed to assist judges, law enforcement authorities, prosecutors, and defense attorneys as they deal with a rapidly-increasing number of cases. The law provides law enforcement with new tools to help keep pace with the rapidly evolving practices of methamphetamine manufacturing, in order to undermine methamphetamine producers’ ability to avoid detection, arrest, and prosecution.

These laws should also foster cooperation among those responsible for the regulation and clean up of methamphetamine laboratories, while aiding local law enforcement’s ability to protect community streets and neighborhoods from the destructive effects of methamphetamine abuse.

In other news, several military and veterans bills sponsored by Senate Republicans became official state law this week. They include:

(HB 815) - Changes qualifications for the Illinois Veteran Grant (IVG) to include all individuals in the Armed Services, a reserve component of the Armed forces, or the Illinois National.

(HB 3724) - Requires public institutions of higher education to allow a student called to active military service to complete any unfinished courses at a later date at no additional charge.

(SB 1627) - Provides that an employee that has been employed by the same employer for 12 months shall be entitled to up to 30 days of family military leave.

(HB 2190) - Requires health insurers to cover treatment for post traumatic stress disorder.

(HB 3472) - Creates a new scratch-off lottery game for the benefit of Illinois veterans. Revenue is to be used to make grants, fund additional services, or conduct additional research projects in the areas of post traumatic stress disorder; homelessness; health insurance costs; disability benefits; and long-term care.

(HB 4058) - Updates the list of veterans qualified for admittance to a veterans home to include modern wars. This legislation offers common sense protections and benefits to help our veterans and active military personnel sort through the many financial, personal, and health related complications that may arise as a result of their past or present deployment.

Other bills signed into law this week include:

• Health/Adoption (HB 3628) - States that adoption agencies must be charitable, not-for-profit organizations.
• Crime/Battery (HB 892) – Prohibits those convicted of domestic battery from legally purchasing a firearms.
• Waste disposal (HB 918) – Prevents local governments from changing the siting rules after the siting was approved.
• Agriculture/Asian Carp (HB 1181) – States that it is unlawful to release any aquatic life into the wild without first securing the permission of the Department of Agriculture.
• Labor/Mandatory Breaks (HB 3485) – Mandates that hotel room attendants must receive break time.
• Police Radar (SB 1221) – Prohibits the use of radar jamming devices.
• Courts (SB 1443) - Permits the county board to raise the court automation fee from $5 to $15. (SB 1444) - Permits the county board to raise the maximum court document fee from a maximum of $5 to $15.
• Minorities (SB 2043) - Requires CMS to develop and implement a Hispanic Employment Plan.
• Economic Development (HB 0361) – Provides that the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity may, subject to appropriation, establish, maintain, and advertise a program devoted to encouraging the rapid establishment of businesses and employers in business parks by developing standards for the development, location, and maintenance of business parks in the State and by certifying business parks that meet or exceed those standards.
• Volunteer Workers (HB 594) – Protects volunteer emergency workers from termination if they are late to, or absent from, work.
• Education/Safety (HB 2693) – Creates the School Safety Drill Act to establish minimum requirements and standards for public and private schools to follow when conducting school safety drills and reviewing school emergency and crisis response plans.
• Health/Blindness (HB 0395) – Creates a tax check-off for the Blindness Prevention Fund. Requires the Department of Public Health to make grants to charitable or educational entities in Illinois for the purpose of funding public education on the importance of eye care and the prevention of blindness and the provision of eye care to children, senior citizens, and other needy individuals whose needs are not covered by any other source of funds.
• Health/Primary Care (HB 3415) - Requires DCFS to file a parent-child visiting plan when DCFS has temporary custody.
• Mobile Home Tax (SB 485) - Provides that the owner of each mobile home must pay an annual tax to the county treasurer.
• Business (SB 0504) – Provides that an operating agreement may establish designated series of members, managers or limited liability company interests having separate rights, powers or duties with respect to specified property or obligations of the limited liability company or profits and losses associated with specified property or obligations, and to the extent provided in the operating agreement, any such series may have a separate business purpose or investment objective.
• Crime/Burial (SB 1210) - Punishes an unauthorized person from entering sheds, crematories, or employee areas in a cemetery.
• DUI (SB 1495) - Requires a sentence of imprisonment for reckless homicide in a DUI situation unless a judge finds that extraordinary circumstances exist for giving that person probation.
• Mercury (HB 511) - Phases out vaccines containing mercury beginning in January 2006 with a total ban to take place in January 2008.
• Traffic Fines (HB 769) – Provides that in Cook county the Secretary of State may not remove the notation indicating a driver’s failure to pay any traffic fine or court cost until receiving notice of payment.
• Disabled Parking (HB 1316) – Increases the fine for the unauthorized use of parking spaces reserved for disabled persons.
• Personal Contact (HB 1589) – Requires all state agencies employing automated telephone answering equipment to answer incoming telephone calls, and to provide during normal working hours the option of speaking with a live operator.
• Immunity (SB 251) - Specifies civil immunity for land owners when people use their land for hunting, recreational shooting, or any related activity.
• AIDS/HIV (HB 2578) – Requires the Illinois HIV/AIDS Policy and Research Institute at Chicago State University to conduct a study to determine whether there is a correlation between incarceration and HIV infection.
• Emergency Safety (SB 46) - Provides that stairwell enclosures in buildings greater than 4 stories must have no stairwell door locked at any time or require stairwell doors that are locked to be equipped with an electronic lock release system.
• Autism (SB 1698) - Requires professionals who diagnose any individual with an autism spectrum disorder to report the diagnosis to IDPH.
• State Government (SB 1935) - Requires the Department of Revenue to prepare an annual report listing all revenue and fee collections of the Department for the prior fiscal year.

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