SPRINGFIELD — When Illinois’ top public universities say they will gladly pay more of the pension costs for their employees, what they really is mean is that students are going to pay millions of dollars more in tuition and fees.

University of Illinois President James Easter and Southern Illinois University President Glenn Poshard told state lawmakers Thursday their schools would rather assume part of the pension costs than lose more state and federal funding.

“We’re willing to do whatever it takes,” Poshard told lawmakers. “This issue is the single greatest issue threatening our people over the long haul.”

Notice he said “our people”, not “our students.”

Poshard, and the U of I’s Easter, have made it clear — the universities will charge students for any new pension costs the schools inherit from the state.

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If I were a judge in Illinois, frankly I’d be embarrassed. In their sluggish search for a solution to the state’s pension mess, state legislators seem determined to leave the judges’ pension system untouched by reforms that will almost surely require financial sacrifice by hundreds of thousands of other active and retired public workers — including lawmakers themselves.

Why is the judicial pension system being left alone while the other four may be placed on a forced diet? Because ultimately, seven of the nearly 1,000 judges holding court in Illinois likely will be asked to decide whether desperately-needed pension reforms passed by lawmakers and signed by the governor are constitutional. Those seven are members of the Illinois Supreme Court.

Cynics suggest it’s an outright bribe: Leave judges’ benefits intact and they’ll approve fixes to the other troubled pension systems, helping the state out of a tight spot. House Speaker Mike Madigan says it’s not that at all; he just doesn’t want to put the justices in a conflict of interest. Either way, it’s an insult to our state judiciary, suggesting Illinois’ highest court is unable to put self-interest aside and properly weigh legal arguments presented by interested parties.

Am I naïve, caught in a junior high civics class time warp?

Then, there’s this: No state pays its judges more. A circuit court judge makes about $181,000 a year, associate judges somewhat less, appellate and Supreme Court judges somewhat more. There are about 1,000 retired judges getting annual pensions averaging $112,000 — not quite triple what a typical retired public pensioner gets. And I don’t have a problem with that.

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But this is Illinois. Laws don’t matter. Children don’t matter.

And taxpayers exist only so the politicians can suck the marrow from their bones.

Madigan says pension funding for downstate and suburban teachers must be moved to school districts because the current system is unfair to Chicago.

Chicago finances its teachers’ pension system, the argument goes, and Chicago taxpayers also contribute to the system for teachers outside the city.

What Madigan and the other Chicago politicians don’t say is that Illinois’ education funding system always has been rigged to shift more money to the city.

Continue reading at Southtown Star…

With his little sister’s Englewood school slated to close, Brian Stirgus had a personal reason to participate in a march Monday protesting Chicago Public Schools’ plan to shutter 53 elementary schools.

Stirgus said he fears his 12-year-old sister wouldn’t be safe if students at her school, Banneker Elementary, are shifted to Mays Elementary next year.

“It’s no secret that Englewood is one of the most notorious in the city for its violence,” said Stirgus, a senior at Robeson High School. “Something different lies on every block.

Stirgus, 17, was among about 40 CPS students who marched with Chicago Students Organizing to Save Our Schools. In a letter to Mayor Rahm Emanuel written on an oversized piece of paper, the group demanded a moratorium on school closings.

Continue reading at the Chicago Tribune…