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Videotranskription
Before we begin the chair would like to announce the arrival of the treasurer. Michael Farren, Michael. Before we begin mister Governor, we like to introduce your wonderful wife MK. But also the lieutenant governor, former House member Juliana Stratton. Mister governor Speaker Madigan President Harmon Leader Durkin Leader Brady Lieutenant Governor Stratton my fellow constitutional officers, members of the General Assembly, distinguished guests and people of Illinois. I wanna begin by thanking the first Lady of Illinois. My wife MK. With with quiet strength and with little fanfare, you've worked hard over the last year to make this state more inclusive and welcoming to all from Duke coin to Springfield to Chicago, Caring about and advocating for some of the most vulnerable people in our state and I wanna thank you for making some important aspects of Illinois shine once again. To now, former Senate President John Cullerton, I want to express my heartfelt gratitude for your many years of service to our state. You have always fought for your constituents and for all of the people of Illinois with a clear devotion with a vision to advance the state as a National leader in health, care, education and civil rights, and with a willingness to listen and seek compromise at just the right moments. John you've brought. Kindness and humor and even the toughest days in the General Assembly and everyone on both sides of the aisle in this chamber will miss you as you embark on a new chapter in your life with your beloved wife Pam, who has made so many personal sacrifices over the last 40 - one years as many unsung heroines spouses do on behalf of a grateful state. We thank And in turn, I look forward to working with our new Senate President, a friend and ally for more than a quarter century and a longtime champion of the fair Tax Amendment. Don Harmon. My friends, it has been a little over a year since I was inaugurated Governor. I have a real abiding love for the work that I do every day and a deeper respect for how fundamentally humbling it is to serve in this office. Illinois is a state with a Grand history of profound impact on our nation and our world. We've sent four transformative presidents to the White House. We were the first. To ratify two of the most important amendments to the US Constitution, one abolishing slavery and another one granting women the right to vote. The first cellphone was invented here, so was the first television remote control and the first widely used Internet browser. What all these things have in common is that they were the product of the talented and forward-thinking people of our state. Illinois is great because our people are great. It's been important to me as governor to listen truly to hear people from across our state who come with passion and perspective that's different than my own. Keeping an open door policy means that I've been rewarded with a wealth of constructive feedback advice and help from Democrats and Republicans alike. an indication that perhaps here in Illinois, we are not as divided in our values and goals as some would have you believe our state. Challenges we inherited a mess that was years in the making, and it had bipartisan roots on day one. It was clear to me that we had a government infrastructure that had withered from neglect and a lack of public trust. At times. it seemed like even the most basic things like getting a government issued iPad to work were hard to do. But one thing I know in life is that if you wanna make profound change in a broken system, you have to do the next. Thing that needs to get done big problems become big problems when you let small problems sit let me share one small example the story of the Thompson Center flags sometime last summer. A watch falls Twitter citizen noticed that the flags flying outside of state government building in Chicago. The James R Thompson Center, were hanging a bit half Hazard Ly from their rods dangling by their last. I have to admit I didn't notice it and in fact, no one among the 2000 people working there seemed to notice it maybe because you could spend all day noticing things dangling by their last threads in the Thompson Center. If you tried. So we did a little research and we found that the flags used to be serviced by a small fourth generation Family-owned business in Chicago that has tended Illinois flags for a century's worth of parades and state visits and state championships. But during the last few years, you guessed it. the flag company stopped getting paid like so many other small businesses in Illinois that were caught up in the budget. Impass. This company did their best but the Thompson. Flags ended up falling into disrepair once the dangling flags were brought to my attention. We contacted the company and heard their story. We immediately paid them what they were owed and the next weekend. they came with a huge ladder truck and they fixed it so that our state's flags flew straight once again as it turned out fixing those flags made people really happy. In fact, it's the most pleased that Twitter has ever been with me. It's because the simple story about a flag at the Thompson Center is a metaphor for where state government has been and where it's going and it reminded me that we have a choice about how we tell our story. We could spend our time reliving every past failure every by gon insult and fight or we could fix things and be hardened voices on behalf of an agenda of opportunity in the years ahead. The last year has shown what we can do when we roll up our sleeves and work together to restore stability to our state. Those who would shout doom and gloom might be loud using social media bots and paid hacks to advance their false notions. But they are not many. you see. We're resting the public conversation in Illinois back from people concerned with one thing and one thing only predicting total disaster spending hundreds of millions of dollars promoting it and then doing everything in their power to make it happen. I'm. Tell the carnival barkers the doomsayers the paid professional critics. The state of our state is growing stronger each day. Don't believe me well consider these facts today. The Illinois economy support six point two million jobs. This is the most jobs on record for our state, and we now have the lowest unemployment rate in history last year for the first time in nearly 20 years, every major region in our state was growing simultaneously and even more remarkably communities in Southern Illinois like Carbondale have led that growth over the past year. Has reduced its unemployment rate more than all of the top 20 most populated States in the nation and more than our Midwestern peers. 230 - Seven Illinois businesses from all over the state made Inc magazine's list of fastest growing businesses in the nation, including companies in Columbia and Rock Island Saint Charles in O 'Fallon. Taylorville and Chicago student applications to Illinois Public Universities increased last fall for the first time in many years. Illinois is the second largest producer of computer science degrees in the nation, accounting for nearly 10 percent of all computer science degrees United States Our great state has an awful lot. that's going right and just look what a difference a year can make. Passed a bipartisan truly balanced budget on time with renewed investments in job creation, cradle to career education and physical and mental health care. Even the credit rating agencies and financial analysts described a distinct improvement in our fiscal stability and investors took notice and lowered our state's borrowing rate. A balanced budget is an important accomplishment, but it's more than just about fiscal discipline. It's a moral document that reflects our values as a state 13 years ago, Bonnie Brackett and her family opened the doors on a new family business Heartland Kids Early Learning Center in Marion Illinois. Over the years. Hundreds of Williamson County's babies and toddlers have gone through her program, which is one of the top. In our state, but as with hundreds of child care providers across Illinois and more than 10000 parents, the budget crisis became Bonnie's crisis and disrupted families across the area. At one point, Bonnie's staff dropped to a low of 14 teachers from a high of 20 -. One Bonnie, one of the only three child care centers in Marion almost had to close her doors but The increase in state funding for child care that we announced in December, Bonnie is not only able to stay in business, but has a plan for teacher training, rebuilding enrollment, classroom improvements and even beginning the process of hiring more staff now, thanks to our bipartisan investments, dozens more parents in Marion can go to work and Bonnie can get back to the business that matters most to her caring for the children of Southern Illinois. Bonnie Brackett is. Today and we wanna thank her for all that she does for our community for our kids and for our state. Thank you Bonnie. For the first time in a decade, we passed a bipartisan infrastructure bill Rebuild Illinois will create and support 500000 jobs in the state. as we fix our aging and crumbling roads and bridges bring broadband to parts of the state that our Internet desserts as well as modernize our hospitals, our community centers, our state police facilities, our universities and colleges all the things that keep us going and growing over the last several. I've had the pleasure of attending many local events celebrating the jobs and projects that rebuild Illinois is bringing to our communities. Most times. Those events are attended by legislators and mayors and local officials of both political parties. and it's clear that when we stand together in front of the public and talk about what we're doing together to literally rebuild bridges and roads and child care centers and schools, we restore a little bit of the public's trust that's been lost. Government institutions at all levels in the past few years, Rebuild Illinois is about more than just roads, bridges and universities. It's about jobs, Middle class careers with wages and benefits the kind of jobs that help you raise a family and together we did more to make these jobs more inclusive and diverse by investing in the Illinois Works program to recruit new construction print apprentices and set strong goals for our public works projects to include diverse. With me today is Reggie Mariz Junior a first year apprentice with laborers local 160 - five in Peoria, Reggie fell in love with Hands-on work early in his life, and it's his apprenticeship where he's learning all the skills to succeed, not just now. But for decades to come, Reggie intends to become a full-time journeyman and later to pursue his lifelong Dream opening a father son construction Dad Reggie Please stand so that we can cheer for your hard work and for your bright future. Over the past six years, in addition to our expansion of apprenticeships, rebuild, Illinois will transform our infrastructure even as we create a lot more opportunities for Reggie and thousands of young people just like him with steady work that will help make sure that our economy works for everyone. Last year. we made enormous strides toward equality and opportunity when Democrats and Republicans came together to legalize adult use cannabis with the most equity centric legislation in the nation, which will. Salt in 60, - 3000 new jobs and new opportunities for entrepreneurs, especially those from communities that have been left behind. It gives us a chance to collect tax revenue from the residents of Wisconsin and Missouri and Iowa And most importantly, we're giving a second chance to hundreds of thousands of people who had a low-level cannabis conviction or arrest on their record. The bipartisan licensed to work act that I signed two weeks ago ended the practice of revoking driver's licenses for unpaid parking tickets and fines, because often the only way that someone has to pay their parking ticket is if they can travel to work, we restored dry. Privileges to more than 50000 people. When public policy makes it a crime to be poor, it ends up costing us all the situation. You may be born into the struggles that you may be born with even the struggles that you've never expected to be your own should not be allowed to write your entire future. We've also begun the long work of tackling our pension problems. In addition to expanding our state pension buyout program in the fall veto session, we accomplished something that eluded governors and general assemblies for almost 70. By consolidating 650 down state and suburban first responder pension systems, which will alleviate local property tax burdens and strengthen the funds that offer a decent retirement to our police and our firefighters. More significantly, the bill that we passed was supported by both a leading Progressive representative Will Gaza City and an outspoken conservative Senator Dan McConkey. All I can say is anything is possible. Did big things to help people real people who live and work here every day we raised the minimum wage We advanced equal pay for women and minorities provided millions of Illinoisans relief from high interest on consumer debt and expanded health care to tens of thousands more people across our state. We are reaffirming that our most important commitments are to our children and their education Mark. My words, Illinois will be the best state in the nation to raise a young family. Today, 20000 more kids are getting child care and thousands more are going to preschool to address our state's shortage of teachers. We raised the minimum teacher salary so we can retain educators in Illinois and we made it more attractive for out-of-state teachers to move here. We made it easier for high school graduates to get a skilled wage by expanding vocational training and career and technical education for the first time in a decade and after. Of decline, we are turning around University student enrollment by making College more affordable expanding scholarships to an additional 10000 College bound students, and this fall more than half of the families in our state will be eligible for free tuition at the University of Illinois. We made health care more available and more affordable working with Senator Andy Manar. We kept out of pocket insulin costs set a hundred dollars for a 30 day supply, so that no one in Illinois has to decide between buying food and paying for the medicine they need to stay alive. We expanded insurance coverage for mammograms and reproductive health, and we protected people who need treatment for life-threatening allergic reactions. Overall the Of Opioid-related deaths are declining, We diminish dependence on opioids by reforming the medical cannabis program to cover chronic pain conditions, and we're focused on using evidence-based practices to reduce racial disparities as we continue to battle the opioid crisis in the face of the resurgence of measles and mumps and other diseases, we restored federal funding of our state immunization program, which was shut. Under the previous administration, we raise the age to buy cigarettes and vaping products to 20 - one so that we can reduce youth youth We stood up for human rights and civil rights when we put Donald Trump on notice that Illinois will not be complicit in his shameful and draconian immigration policies. Opted in to be welcoming refugees to Illinois, continuing a proud tradition in this state that stretches back to my great grandparents welcomed here a century ago after fleeing antisemitism in Europe. We invested in public safety by expanding the number of new Illinois state troopers and we're building a new state Police forensics lab so that we can solve crimes faster and address the backlog of DNA testing of rape evidence because crime victims shouldn't have to wait for Justice. And we stopped bad mouthing the state and started passing laws that make Illinois more attractive for businesses and jobs working across the aisle. We brought tax relief for 300000 small businesses through the phase out of the corporate franchise tax, and we laid the groundwork for new high-paying tech jobs by opening new business incubators by incentivizing the building of new data centers and by investing 100 million dollars in a University of Illinois and University of Chicago Partnership that will make Illinois. The quantum computing capital of the world. Jobs and businesses are coming to the state because we are investing in the things that have always made us great. a skilled workforce, modern infrastructure, great public schools, Top research universities, a robust agricultural sector and a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship literally built into the steel frames of our skyscrapers themselves, a symbol of Illinois ambition and belief in the future by almost every measure. In the past year, we've improved the financial well-being health, education and safety of the residents of Illinois and we did it together. And now we have to work together to confront a scourge that has been plaguing our political system. for far too long. We must root out the purveyors of greed and corruption in both parties whose presence infects the bloodstream of government. It's no longer enough to sit idle. while under the table, deals, extortion or bribery persist protecting that culture or tolerating it is no longer acceptable. We must take urgent action to restore the public's trust in our government. That's why we. To pass real lasting ethics reform this legislative session. Honest members of the General Assembly from both sides of the aisle have some good ideas and so do I it's time to end the practice of legislators serving as paid lobbyists in. Fact it's time to end the for-profit influence peddling among all elected officials at every level of government in Illinois. Disclosure of conflicts of interest and punishment for breaching them must be included in any ethics package for us to truly clean up government. Most States have a revolving door provision for legislators and it's time for Illinois to join them elected. officials shouldn't be allowed to retire and immediately start lobbying their former colleagues. It's wrong and it's got to stop. There are many more ethics reforms that must be addressed this spring and I expect the legislature's bipartisan Ethics Commission to issue its report in the next eight weeks. restoring the public's trust is of paramount importance. Let's not let the well-connected and the well-protected work the system. While the interests of ordinary citizens are forgotten, there is too much that needs to be accomplished to lift up all of the people of Illinois the overwhelming. Of people involved with government and public policy and politics here in Illinois truly just want what is best for the state from legislators to citizen activists to reporters, They chisel away at intractable problems and put their shoulders into making real lasting institutional change. They don't get distracted or dejected whether they're battling poverty fighting for increased education funding or fixing the unglamorous, but essential problems of our state's IT Infrastructure, Illinois is. People who love our state and are willing to work earnestly every day to fight for her, which is why we have to be committed to the hard work of changing another aspect of the political culture in this state that has too often rewarded a go along to get along attitude at the expense of truly ethical conduct. When I took office a year ago, I hired people who came from all walks of life all different backgrounds who were diverse in gender in. Ethnicity, sexual orientation, geography and life experience, and who's only loyalty is to good ideas and good results, and I took heat for it from some who had been here. a very long time. Many were incredulous that I wasn't just automatically hiring the same old faces that get jobs year in and year out a commitment to diversity and inclusion is not just a talking point for me and I hope that the past. Has proven that I have an administration that looks far more like the state that we represent than any that has come before it. I have elevated talented people who have been overlooked for far too long and our state is doing better because of it change needs to happen and much of this change needs to happen outside of the scope of legislation. It's about how we as public officials conduct ourselves in private that also matters common sense and basic decency need to prevail in the every day interactions that make government work people need to treat. Gusting suggestions with discussed the old patronage system needs to die, finally and completely the input of women and people of color need to be treated as essential to decision making not as some token show of diversity. Bit by bit inch By inch, I am working hard to reverse the harm that has been done to people and communities that have been left behind over many generations by government policies and elected officials who were content to simply ignore them. I remind myself every day that I have obligations not just to the current people of Illinois, but to the many people who preceded us who were discriminated against harmed treated as lesser and forgotten lasting damage that. Through too many communities today, we are obligated to make our future more equitable and fair. I came into this office with the message that I am committed to doing things differently in my administration. A lot of folks didn't believe me a year ago. Now, you can see how far we all can come in a year. even when the work still remains, it's time for us to recommit ourselves to the hard work of bringing prosperity and opportunity to all community. In Illinois through a fair tax system, job creation, education and job training programs, child care and preschool and a focus on building essential tools of success such as High-speed Internet in all corners of our state this spring working with legislators, we will begin the long path toward a fairer criminal Justice system that starts with phasing out cash bail and following many of the recommendations made by the. Is in Criminal Justice Reform Commission created by my predecessor, most of whose ideas were never adopted because of the ranker and dysfunction. Our spring agenda must also address the pressing issue of adopting new clean energy legislation that reduces carbon pollution promotes renewable energy and accelerates electrification of our transportation sector. We saw the effects of climate change right here in Illinois last year with the Polar vortex. Stating floods record Lake levels and emergency declarations in more than a third of Illinois counties urgent action is needed, but let me be clear. The old ways of negotiating energy legislation are over. It's time to put consumers and climate first. I am not going to sign an energy bill written by the utility companies. Property taxes in Illinois are simply too high, and that's why it's time to put the best ideas to work from both sides of the aisle. Local governments continue to match out their levies even when they don't need to there are perverse incentives in state law that encouraged that we can change the law to support local governments and lower property taxes, and with nearly 7000 units of government in Illinois, it's time to empower local taxpayers and voters to consolidate or eliminate them. These changes along with our landmark pension reform that consolidated police and firefighter pensions can make a serious dent in property taxes today in Illinois, we are governing with our heads and our hearts in a time when cynicism has too often become the rule rather than the exception. We're proving that we really can make progress. We're showing the rest of the nation that pragmatic Progressive leadership is good. And putting our state back on the side of working families is important a year ago. I shared a story at my inauguration. It was also about flags about how a couple in Barrington, Illinois had their pride flags stolen from their backyard and replaced with an American flag. Biggets wrapping themselves in a veil of patriotism are an increasingly familiar site these days, and it's a dangerous trend, but the Fought back a neighbor Kim Phillies upon hearing about the incident put a pride flag in her yard in solidarity and then suddenly lots of people were asking for them and she was giving out pride flags to everyone in Barrington. They were popping up in yards all over the neighborhood, Kim told the news at the time. Frankly, I've grown weary of this of all this hate and I gotta say it just seemed like there was one thing that I could do that I had control of. A lot about that story this past year, it reminds me of the fundamental goodness and decency of the people who live here in Illinois and about how hard they will fight for each other. It reminds me that we all ought to think a little like Kim Philly every day to remember the things that we have control of so this past June, I asked Secretary of State Jesse White to fly a pride flag over the Illinois State Capitol. For the first time in our history after all, we have a choice about how we tell our story and I want our Illinois story to be one of hope, inclusion opportunity and kindness. I wanted to be inspired every day by the fundamental goodness of the people who live and work here and who struggle so hard for a fair shot. Those are good ideals to live by those are good idea. To govern by let's all try to remember them in the year ahead. Thank you. The Committee of Escort Please come forward to escort the governor from the chamber. President of the Senate is recognized for emotional. Thank you Mister Speaker. I moved at the joint session to now arise. the President of the Senate has moved that the joint session do now arise. Those in favor say I those opposed say no. the ayes have it and the joint session will now arise. The regular session will come to water.
Governor JB PritzkerVideosIllinois has come a long way in a year. We're beginning the...