By Dave Dahl
SPRINGFIELD – Let lawmakers be part of the process. Convene the General Assembly. And open Illinois for business. Those are the demands of three Illinois House Republicans who held a virtual news conference Wednesday morning.
Lawmakers have not met since early March, and Illinois has no provision for a remote session.
“The General Assembly needs to come back and be part of the conversation,” said State Rep. C.D. Davidsmeyer (R-Jacksonville). “I am tired of the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate abdicating my responsibility to represent my district and my constituents by not calling us back in.”
State Rep. Norine Hammond (R-Macomb) says her constituents know better than Gov. JB Pritzker how to proceed, saying, “The people living in these counties understand what is going on. They are not approaching this from a podium in Chicago. They are the boots on the ground in these counties, and they have the ability to address it as they see fit.”
Davidsmeyer says in a border district, he is afraid of losing business to Missouri, which is reopening. And he and Davidsmeyer and Hammond say they find Pritzker to be quite unresponsive to them; the conference calls he holds simply rehash his daily briefings, and the lawmakers have no opportunity for question-and-answer.
State Rep. Dan Ugaste (R-Geneva) says governor and co-equal lawmakers need to prepare. “We should be creating a plan right now, so it is in place for when we are ready to start this process and reopen the state on a gradual basis.”
Dave Dahl can be reached at [email protected].
