Aug. 29, 2012

By Jayette Bolinski

SPRINGFIELD — Illinois communities that bought into the promise of cheaper rates from a clean-coal plant in southern Illinois may experience buyers’ remorse when their bills arrive, according to a report unveiled Wednesday.

But others say the report’s findings are flawed because they are based on comparisons to current market rates, which are low because of decreased demand for power.

The Prairie State Energy Campus, a 1,600-megawatt coal-fired plant in rural Marissa about 40 miles southeast of St. Louis, has experienced project delays and increased construction costs, more than doubling the price tag to nearly $5 billion. Original estimates put the cost at $2 billion.

The increased costs will be passed on to consumers, raising rates by at least 40 percent more than what investors originally expected them to be, according to a report by the Massachusetts-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, which researches environmental and energy issues.

The costs are “real, immediate and likely to continue,” said Tom Sanzillo, one of the report’s authors.

More than 200 municipalities and electric co-ops, serving 2.5 million customers in eight states, invested in the project, which was spearheaded by St. Louis-based Peabody Energy. The municipalities and co-ops signed 30-year contracts to obtain power from the plant on promises it would be a less-expensive, stable power source.

The Prairie State Energy Campus is “an unnecessary financial burden on ratepayers and local governments rather than the much-needed financial relief that was promised,” Sanzillo said.

At least one community, Hannibal, on the Mississippi River in central Missouri, this summer approved a 3 percent rate hike for customers to offset the added construction costs and delays.

“We’re in almost a million and a half bucks, and we don’t have a dime of revenue,” Bob Stevenson, director of the Hannibal Board of Public Works, said in a June St. Louis Post-Dispatch report. “All I can say is, I had other plans for that money.

The Illinois Municipal Electric Agency owns a 15 percent share in the project. Phillip “Doc” Mueller, vice president of government affairs at the agency, said the IEEFA report is flawed.

“The study seems to fundamentally misunderstand the place that Prairie State holds in our total energy portfolio,” Mueller said.

IMEA represents 32 Illinois communities that own and operate their own utilities. The agency’s main responsibility is to provide long-term electricity at wholesale prices through various means, such as owning portions of power plants in other states, contracting with Midwest energy company Ameren, buying off the market and investing in Prairie State.

Mueller said IMEA members are not going to see power costs that are at least 40 percent higher, as the report predicts.

“What (the report’s authors) have done is compare the current market price of power with Prairie State, and the only way the report makes any sense is if you buy all of your power off the market all the time. But if you do that, then you open yourself up to the higher market prices as they go up and down through the year and as they go up over time,” he said.

“Our job, and this little piece of Prairie State that we’ve got, is actually intended not to hurt our people. It’s intended to provide a cost hedge for the long term because inevitably the market prices we’re seeing out there now are not going to hang around. When natural gas goes up and the market goes back up, the market prices will follow.”

Sandy Buchanan, executive director of Ohio Citizen Action, the state’s largest consumer and environmental organization, said ratepayers there have not been given full and complete information about the Prairie State project, its operations, the financial risk and the cost.

“What today’s report shows is that the coal plant is turning out to be the financial nightmare many of us feared when the plant was proposed,” she said.

Peabody announced plans for the Prairie State Energy Campus in 2001, when the economy was better and the demand for electricity was higher. The company currently has a 5 percent stake in the project.

Peabody spokeswoman Meg Gallagher on Wednesday said the company still is reviewing the report but found its assertions biased and lacking important facts.

“Among other issues, the report makes a number assumptions on costs of competing fuels and uses this to make flawed estimates for a plant that will be in operation for decades. Even so, the cost of coal for Prairie State is less than half the cost of natural gas at a time when gas is at historically low levels this year,” she said in an email response.

“Ultimately, when the scorecard is complete, we firmly believe Prairie State will continue to provide reliable, clean low-cost electricity for the benefit of millions of customers in multiple states for decades to come.”

One of the plant’s two 800-megawatt generators went online in June, and the second one is expected to go online by the end of the year. The plant includes an associated underground coal mine at Lively Grove that will produce an estimated 6 million tons of high-sulfur coal each year.

IEEFA researches various energy and environment issues. The organization’s mission is “to accelerate the United States’ transition to a diverse, sustainable and profitable energy economy and to reduce the nation’s dependence on coal and other non-renewable energy resources.”

Sanzillo, finance director for the group, is a former deputy comptroller for the state of New York.

Aug. 27, 2012

By Jayette Bolinski

SPRINGFIELD – Gov. Pat Quinn and his staff may tell you about the sausage that is Illinois policy, but they aren’t quite as open about the sausage-making process, according to a review of public records requests by Illinois Watchdog.

Quinn’s office cited the “preliminary drafts” exemption to Illinois‘ open records law in one out of four Freedom of Information requests between April and July, enabling it to withhold documents that could shed light on a range of high-profile policy decisions.

Quinn’s office withheld records about prison and developmental-center closures, consolidation of state police communications centers and shutting down animal disease testing facilities – each of which has affected taxpayers and the economy all over the state.

The “preliminary drafts” exemption was designed to allow policymakers to communicate honestly and openly without the risk of embarrassment. It allows officials to withhold “preliminary drafts, notes, recommendations, memoranda and other records in which opinions are expressed, or policies or actions are formulated.”

Quinn’s office may be using the exemption as it was intended, said Springfield attorney Don Craven, who specializes in open government matters. The problem, however, is that the broad exemption leaves taxpayers in the dark about the decision-making process. Illinoisans have no clue what factors were or were not considered in any given policy decision.

“Why did they come to the conclusion to close Jacksonville (developmental center)? You can’t tell what policy considerations went into that decision. You can’t tell what policy considerations were rejected as part of that decision-making process,” he said.  “And all the administration gives you is, ‘We think Jacksonville should close; therefore, it closes.’ And it causes severe frustration.”

Quinn spokeswoman Brooke Anderson said the “preliminary drafts” exemption has been part of the state’s open-records law for decades and that it allows “free and frank discussion among policy and decision makers” and “a wider range of ideas that could lead to more effective public policy.”

Anderson noted that final decisions are available under the law.

“Under Gov. Quinn’s direction, we work to be as transparent as possible. The governor’s office receives a high volume of FOIA requests, with many containing complex issues,” she wrote in an email to Illinois Watchdog. “We carefully review, analyze and respond to each request in a transparent fashion and as quickly as possible.”

Quinn’s office received an average of 17 FOIA requests a month between January and July, according to records supplied by the office. Of 77 requests it processed between April and July, the office cited the “preliminary drafts” exemption 19 times. Between January and July, it cited the exemption 23 times.

In addition to withholding records about some of Quinn’s major closure decisions, since January his office cited “preliminary drafts” in withholding records about:

• A third airport in Chicago.
• A Department of Children and Family Services contract.
• Hospital tax exemptions in the state.
• A contracted review of hiring practices under the Rod Blagojevich administration.
• One of Quinn’s nominations to the state’s tollway board.
• A review by the Illinois State Police of its consent-search policies.

It also withheld communications among Quinn’s staff about the location of a southern Illinois news conference in July, at which state workers showed up to protest Quinn’s planned facility closures.

Quinn’s FOIA officer, Benno Weisberg, is based in Chicago. He has been an “associate general counsel” to Quinn since February. Anderson said he also is a legal liaison between the office and 10 state agencies. His salary is $72,000 a year.

In Illinois, individuals whose records requests are denied may ask the state attorney general’s public access counselor to review the denial. Since January, the public access counselor has received 16 requests to review FOIA denials by Quinn’s office, of which six were for denials citing the “preliminary drafts” exemption.

Craven said about once a week he hears from frustrated reporters new to Illinois who received a “preliminary drafts” denial from a public body for records they were able to review easily in other states.

“They say, ‘I can’t believe the way the laws work here,’ to which I respond, ‘Welcome to the Land of Lincoln,’” he said.

It’s unclear if there is a happy medium to the exemption that would satisfy both public officials and the public’s right to know.

“In order to get to a happy medium, you have to have a conversation. And I don’t know anybody on the other side of the table from where I am who wants to have a conversation about that exemption,” Craven said. “They like it just the way it is.”

Aug. 17, 2012

By Jayette Bolinski

SPRINGFIELD – Illinois House lawmakers on Friday kicked out indicted Rep. Derrick Smith, who faces a federal bribery charge for allegedly accepting a $7,000 bribe in connection with his job as legislator.

The vote – 100 in favor of expulsion and six against it – resulted in Smith immediately being removed from the House roll. He is a Chicago Democrat who was serving his first term as a state lawmaker.

Neither Smith nor his Chicago attorney, Victor Henderson, were present for the vote in Springfield. At a Chicago news conference after the vote, Smith said the ordeal allowed him to learn who his friends are, adding that friends “stick by you through thick and thin.”

The six representatives who voted against expulsion were all Democrats: Anthony DeLuca of Crete; Mary Flowers of Chicago; Rita Mayfield of Waukegan; Arthur Turner of Chicago; and Karen Yarbrough of Broadview.

Three Democratic representatives voted “present,” meaning they did not cast a vote either way: Charles Jefferson of Rockford; Andre Thapedi of Chicago; and LaShawn Ford of Chicago.

Three members of the chamber’s Black Caucus – Jefferson, Davis and Flowers – sided somewhat with Smith ,who also is black, questioning the timing and the process to kick him out. They also questioned whether the expulsion process respected Smith’s right to a due process.

Flowers said Smith’s not-guilty plea in federal court allows lawmakers to “infer” Smith is not guilty.

Other lawmakers said Smith and his attorney had opportunities to appear before the House discipline committees and say the lawmaker was not guilty, that he did not do the things he was accused of and that it was not his voice on federal wiretaps that recorded the alleged bribery transaction.

Rep. Jim Durkin, R-Western Springs, said Smith had more rights during the expulsion process than former Gov. Rod Blagojevich had during the impeachment proceedings in the General Assembly.

Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, D-Chicago, said the vote was one of the most difficult but important votes the House would ever take.

Smith remains on the Nov. 6 ballot in his home district, but he no longer has backing from the state’s Democratic machine. His bribery arrest came after the March primary election. He faces Lance Tyson, a Democrat who is running as a “Unity Party” candidate with Democratic backing.

Aug. 10, 2012

By Jayette Bolinski

SPRINGFIELD – Want to know what conditions are like inside Illinois’ prisons? You’ll have to take someone else’s word for it.

And for the most part, that someone has to be the state of Illinois or the union that represents correctional officers and other prison workers.

Gov. Pat Quinn, a Democrat, is steadfast in his opinion that media tours of the state’s taxpayer-funded prisons, even the minimum-security ones, are a security risk and not a good idea.

“Prisons aren’t country clubs. They’re not there to be visited and looked at. I think we have to make sure they’re secure, and I think the security of the public is paramount when it comes to prisons,” Quinn said during questioning by reporters after he cut the ribbon for the 2012 Illinois State Fair in Springfield.

The issue of prison tours gained traction this week after a report by Chicago public radio station WBEZ that one of its reporters was turned down when he asked for a tour of the minimum-security prison in Vienna to investigate conditions there for prisoners.

Other reporters’ prison tour requests have been turned down, as well.

“I think it’s important that we listen to those who are on the front line at the prison with respect to working there and understanding their decisions regarding the safety of the prison,” Quinn said Friday. “Our corrections officials who are running the prisons are wardens. They have expertise that we ought to pay attention to.”

But Alan Mills, legal director at the Uptown People’s Law Center in Chicago, which represents Illinois inmates in legal cases, said Quinn is off base.

“Clearly, not only is it in the public’s interest, I think it’s the public’s right to know what’s going on in the prisons. Government should never be able to force the public to rely on its own version of the events. That’s what journalists and outside watchdogs are for,” Mills said. “The argument about security is hogwash.”

Mills said state officials have allowed tours of the Stateville and Dwight prisons regularly, and they have run tours of Tamms “when it suits their interests.”

“So there is no reason why they can’t run a tour and allow access to a medium-security prison. Do they have to assign someone to walk you through? Yes, but so what?” he said. “I think the public is legitimately able to conclude from their refusal to let people in that they don’t want people to see what’s going on in there.”

The union that represents corrections officers, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, has publicized reports from the last month about violence in the state’s prisons. But it’s impossible to confirm the reports because the Illinois Department of Corrections will not release incident reports – even versions with sensitive information blacked out – that document the alleged occurrences.

On June 26, Illinois Watchdog (formerly Illinois Statehouse News) filed a Freedom of Information request with the department seeking records about security incidents and resulting injuries to inmates and staff at each Illinois correctional facility. Watchdog also asked for all documents that describe the cause and nature of the incidents and injuries, from May 2007 to present.

The request was an attempt to independently confirm if, indeed, violence was on the rise in the state’s prisons and to gauge the severity of the violence.

The department’s FOIA officer denied Watchdog’s request, citing an exemption in state law that allows them to withhold “records that relate to or affect the security of correctional institutions and detention facilities.”

“Each of these records is utilized by the department for increasing security at a facility after an incident has occurred,” the department’s FOIA officer replied in a letter.

The records additionally were denied citing an exemption that allows withholding documents that “disclose unique or specialized investigative techniques other than those generally used and known or disclosed internal documents of correctional agencies related to detection, observation or investigation of incidents of crime or misconduct, and disclosure would result in demonstrable harm to the agency….”

The department of corrections did provide a chart showing the number of violent incidents by month and by year, but there was no supporting data for the numbers.

Illinois Treasurer Dan Rutherford, a Republican and former state senator, for years led tours of the Pontiac and Dwight prisons for members of the General Assembly and the media. He said he understands first-hand that laying eyes on the inside of a prison is extremely valuable when forming or reporting on public policy and state funding.

He said he suggests the governor invite the media into the prisons “unless he’s trying to hide something.”

“I can appreciate the governor is concerned about public safety. I am too. Prisons are not tourist attractions, and for him to say they’re not country clubs, he’s absolutely right,” Rutherford said.

“But to preclude the public under very reasonable requests to have first-hand sighting of how their tax dollars have an effect on policy and how it’s conducted is inappropriate.”

Laurie Jo Reynolds, organizer of Tamms Year Ten, a grassroots campaign to educate people about the effects of long-term prison isolation, said she believes the corrections department under the Quinn administration is more transparent than it was under the administration of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, but that more transparency and accountability undoubtedly will improve the state’s prison system.

“It is important that legislators understand the consequences of all the increased sentencing, mandatory imprisonment, reduction of good time and other tough-on-crime policies that they use to get re-elected,” she said, noting also that limited knowledge comes from walking through a prison on one tour.

“For example, you can’t see the effects of long-term segregation and isolation. You can’t see how long people have been in solitary confinement or their mental-health histories,” she said. “This takes more in-depth reporting, and news media historically has not shown that commitment.”

Aug. 9, 2012

By Jayette Bolinski

SPRINGFIELD — Gov. Pat Quinn’s office continues to withhold emails that could shed light on whether his staff moved the location of a southern Illinois news conference to avoid protesters.

Even so, his spokeswoman says he remains committed to the issue of transparency in state government.

One document his office released Wednesday, apparently an exchange of emails, is completely censored — or “redacted.” Officials blacked out even the dates and times of the emails and the names of the senders and recipients.

“This is the most redacted email I’ve seen,” said Esther Seitz, a media law attorney in Springfield. “I’ve seen an email where at least the subject and the ‘from’ and ‘to’ lines were disclosed, but the content of this email was blocked in whole.

“Pretty much, (the governor’s office is) withholding the entire document. I don’t see why they’re giving you that email at all. There’s no point.”

Among other things it’s apparent officials redacted the location of the news conference even though the address was provided to reporters ahead of the event. They also redacted the location in a news story emailed by a staffer, saying it was personal information and therefore exempt under the state’s open-records law.

Quinn has long championed openness and transparency in state government.

“Since taking office, Gov. Quinn has improved ethics and increased government accountability and transparency in Illinois,” his spokeswoman, Brooke Anderson, said in an email Thursday night. She cited three websites he launched — data.Illinois.gov, appointments.Illinois.gov and accountability.Illinois.gov — that allow taxpayers to search a variety of information about state agencies, state commission memberships, state expenditures and payroll information.

Illinois Watchdog, formerly Illinois Statehouse News, in July sought access to communications among Quinn’s staff and others about his July 16 appearance at a Waltonville farm in southern Illinois.

Rumors abounded that the governor’s staff changed the location of the news conference to dodge state workers and families who intended to protest his plan to shutter state facilities. The governor’s spokeswoman denied the rumors.

Illinois Watchdog sought correspondence between July 12 and 17.

In a July 26 reply, Benno Weisberg, an attorney and the governor’s Freedom of Information Act officer, said 10 emails were found pertinent to the FOIA request but that they were being withheld in their entirety. He cited an exemption in state’s open-records law that allows officials to withhold “preliminary drafts, notes, recommendations, memoranda and other records in which opinions are expressed, or policies or actions are formulated.”

On Wednesday, Weisberg sent a follow-up response to Illinois Watchdog, saying five additional emails were found. Three of them contained the text of news articles about Quinn’s appearance that were emailed among his staffers. Nothing was redacted from those documents.

A fourth document is an invitation from the governor’s staff to a local public official to attend the event. The official sent a brief response, and there was apparently further correspondence, but that, too, is redacted. Also blacked out in the exchange was the address of the Laird family farm in Waltonville, where the news conference was to take place. The address of that farm, 6326 E. Elm St., was identified in the governor’s public schedule released the day before the event.

A fifth document, identified as “Bankers for Monday_Redacted,” is perhaps the most striking because it appears to be an email exchange that is almost completely redacted with black bars. Not blacked out is what appears to be an initial email that contains a news story about the event that was sent by a staffer to others. Again, the location of the Laird farm is blacked out.

Illinois Watchdog is appealing the governor’s decision to withhold any documents related to the request.

Seitz said the “preliminary drafts” exemption of Illinois’ FOIA law is overused because it is vague and there isn’t much case law to help public officials know when to cite the exemption.

“What really is preliminary or non-final, and what really concerns policy? You can construe that very broadly, and that’s why public bodies tend to overuse that exemption,” she said. “I think withholding, literally, an entire email and providing such a cursory reason why that exemption is being invoked here, you’re really left with no check on why the governor’s office used that exemption.”

Aug. 2, 2012

By Jayette Bolinski

SPRINGFIELD – Prison lockdowns and inmate assaults are nothing new in the Illinois prison system. What is new, three longtime observers say, is the public-relations battle that has heated up between the state and the union representing corrections workers.

A volley of news releases and leaked memos since mid-July stemming from Gov. Pat Quinn’s plan to close two state prisons has surprised experts, who the dust up distracts from major flaws in the state’s prison system, including overcrowding, understaffing and cuts to programs for inmates.

“There is increased tension, so there’s an increase in prisoner-on-prisoner fights, but that’s because it’s hot. And the prisons have been on lockdown and they’re overcrowded, and there are no programs left so everybody is sitting in their cells. So there’s a good story here, but it’s not the one being told,” said Alan Mills, legal director of the Chicago-based Uptown People’s Law Center, a nonprofit legal center that handles cases on behalf of inmates.

Recent inmate assaults on both guards and fellow inmates — brought to light by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the union representing prison employees — are tied to the impending closures because prisons already are overcrowded, the union contends. Consolidating inmates will make matters worse, it says.

At a July 19 rally in Springfield, prison employees described a spike in inmates punching, spitting on and biting guards, saying the incidents worsened in recent years because of overcrowding. And a July 24 report documented what a union representative described as “a riot,” fueled by understaffing and overcrowding, at a minimum-security prison in East Moline during a power outage.

Mills has monitored the state prison system for more than 20 years, and he questions why the assaults suddenly are being publicized, when they are the norm, for many reasons, in prisons.

“I’ve been disturbed by the lack of any sort of skepticism on behalf of the press. I don’t see how you can report that anytime there’s an assault it must be related to closing a correctional institution without asking for somebody to prove it. Anytime there’s an incident in any prison … the union puts out a press release,” he said. “Things are terrible, but it has nothing to do with prison closures.”

The Illinois Department of Corrections, meanwhile, ordered a pat-down search of employees as they left their shifts at more than a dozen prisons around the state in July. The union asserts the searches were retaliatory and meant to intimidate whistleblowers. A corrections spokeswoman denied the claim, saying employee searches can occur at any time.

In addition, there have been reports that corrections officials took fans away from inmates, who sit in stifling, un-air-conditioned cells. The heat was a factor in at least one inmate death, according to reports. Corrections officials said fans were removed because parts could be used to make weapons.

And a corrections official tried to stop a newspaper reporter from writing a story about transferring some inmates out of state, telling the reporter that naming them would endanger guards and inmates.

“If you proceed to disclose any information in your possession on this subject beyond yourself, the department will view your actions as attempting to promote disorder within the prison system,” the official wrote.

The tit-for-tat can be confusing for taxpayers, most of whom have little interaction with the prison system and are trying to make sense of Quinn’s plan and the union’s objections, experts say.

Laurie Jo Reynolds, who has taught at Columbia College in Chicago and is the organizer of Tamms Year Ten, a grassroots campaign to educate people about the effects of long-term prison isolation, said the incidents are being used to bolster the argument that no prisons should close.

“I think it deceives the public about what the true issues are. It confuses the public, and it makes it harder for the governor, the (Department of Corrections) and anyone else to pursue evidence-based public policy,” Reynolds said.

“They are creating an environment of scare tactics and fear mongering,” she said. “We all need to work together to reduce overcrowding, and everybody needs to buy into true evidence-based policies to reduce prison populations. But they’re creating such a polarized political environment, it’s not good for the dialogue and it’s also not good for the policies.”

The John Howard Association of Illinois advocates for humane conditions in the state’s prisons, as well as for addressing overcrowding and reducing recidivism. The organization does regular inspections of the state’s prisons, documenting conditions and interviewing staff and inmates.

Executive director John Maki said there is much at stake in the closure debate occurring this summer.

“It’s good for people to argue … but at the end of the day we still have to move forward. What I would hate to see is for these arguments and battles to poison the well, because we definitely need to go back to that well and find ways to reduce our prison population,” he said.

“What we’re seeing here is decades of asking the system to do more than it can possibly do with the amount of resources we’ve given it,” Maki said. “Everyone is feeling that — from the administration to the staff to the inmates. The answer isn’t to have more staff. The answer is to do what other states have done, which is to reduce the prison population.”

Maki, who said the association does not want to get caught in the middle a dispute between prison staff and the governor’s administration, admitted it may be difficult for Illinoisans to decipher what is going on right now.

The prison system really encapsulates the state, he said. Prisons are located throughout Illinois and are populated and staffed by people from throughout Illinois. And the state’s complicated cultural and economic relationships are playing out in the prison debate right now, he said.

“The average citizen should keep in mind that it’s in everyone’s interest to have the most effective prison system possible, but also because we spend more than a billion dollars a year on this system,” he said. “As all these battles are getting played out, citizens should be asking how does this help what we all care about – safer communities and a safer state.”