Call Your Senator Now!
The Illinois House approved legislation this week that would impose Tax Caps on every non-home rule unit of local government and every school district in Illinois. The bill also permanently sets the Tax Cap at 0% above the previous year's levy. Unless approved by a prior voter referendum, this legislation would impose a permanent property tax freeze on every single school district and non-home rule local government.
ILA strongly opposes this legislation and urges all ILA members and library supporters to immediately contact their local State Senators and tell them to OPPOSE House Bill 696. This legislation takes away all local control for local library boards to manage their own local property tax levy. At a time when the State of Illinois can't manage its own budget, it is totally inappropriate for the state to micromanage local governments that always balance their own budgets!
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State Higher Education Funding
The Illinois General Assembly and Governor reached an agreement to approve a stopgap measure for higher education funding in the current 2016 fiscal year.
Senate Bill 2059 appropriates $600 million to support community colleges, state colleges and universities, and fund student MAP grants. However, this appropriation only provides approximately 30% of the recommended fiscal 2016 funding for higher education, and only about 40% for MAP grants. Even though this appropriation is not tied to any part of the Governor's Turnaround agenda, he has signed the legislation--Senate Bill 2059 (Public Act 99-0502).
Many legislators expressed their disappointment that this budget legislation falls far short of what should be appropriated for higher education, and does nothing to support struggling human service programs which remain unfunded. The General Assembly will return to Springfield on May 3 to work on passing the remainder of the 2016 budget, and then turn attention to the 2017 Budget. The Session is scheduled to adjourn by May 31.
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ILA Passes Resolution Regarding State Higher Education Funding
WHEREAS, the Illinois Library Association applauds the Illinois General Assembly and Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner for approving partial Fiscal Year 2016 higher education and Monetary Award Program (MAP) grant funding through enactment of Senate Bill 2059 (Public Act 99-0502); and
WHEREAS, this legislation only appropriates approximately 30% of the necessary funding for institutions of higher learning and only appropriates approximately 40% of the necessary funding for MAP grants; and
WHEREAS, further State failure to appropriate full Fiscal Year 2016 higher education funding will lead to review, sanctions, or loss of accreditation for institutions in Illinois, as stated by the Higher Learning Commission in its letter of February 4, 2016, which would raise further barriers to student success and economic development in Illinois; and
WHEREAS, further State failure to appropriate full Fiscal Year 2016 MAP grant funding will force Illinois students to withdraw from higher education;
Be it Resolved, that the Illinois Library Association urges the Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner and the Illinois General Assembly to immediately appropriate sufficient funding for Fiscal Year 2016 and future years that would prevent further damaging the viability, quality and excellence of all Illinois’s public colleges and universities; and
The Illinois Library Association urges the Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner and the Illinois General Assembly to immediately appropriate sufficient funding for Fiscal Year 2016 and future years for the Monetary Award Program (MAP) funding; and
The Illinois Library Association will alert Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner, the Illinois General Assembly, the Illinois library community, and the public to this Resolution Regarding State Funding of Higher Education.
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Moving Beyond Counts and Check Marks
 ILA Executive Board member Dennis Krieb is one of five presenters in this ACRL-sponsored webinar on May 11 from 1:00-2:30 pm (Central). The webcast discusses the benefits of participating in a campus-wide learning analytics program, sharing the challenges and opportunities inherent in these partnerships with three sample projects from DePaul University, University of Minnesota, and Lewis and Clark Community College. These different approaches illustrate the range of opportunities available on campuses to use data to maximize the library’s role in student retention and student academic success. Complete registration information is available here.
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In the News
Library-related stories appearing in local news media for alerting and inform the Illinois library community about issues and events that are considered significant by the general media.
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Benefits for ILA Institutional Members
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Libraries of Illinois Risk Agency (LIRA) is a group insurance pool for ILA institutional members that offers potential savings for property, casualty, and workers compensation coverage for libraries. Learn more »
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The Fund for Illinois Libraries was created in 1990 to help Illinois libraries in their fundraising efforts.
The purpose of the fund is to enable libraries to receive gifts from individuals or organizations that can only make donations to 501(c)(3) charitable organizations.
Learn more »
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If you use spam filters to protect your in-box, please take a moment right now to add doyle@ila.org and Illinois Library Association to your e-mail address book, spam software whitelist, or mail system whitelist. Adding the address will help ensure that you receive the ILA E-Newsletter and that your e-mail software displays HTML and images properly.
Disclaimer: Links to non-ILA sites have been provided because these sites may have information of interest. The Illinois Library Association does not necessarily endorse the views expressed or the facts presented on these sites; and furthermore, ILA does not endorse any commercial products that may be advertised or available on these sites.
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