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96 GA
Bills Submitted
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Category
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Lead Organization
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Comments
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HB
671
SB
1513
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Property
Tax Extension Limitation Law
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IAFPD
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Amend property tax code in regards to PTELL
exemptions for-tort liability, pension contributions, risk management programs,
and insurance. Split into three
bills.
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HB
665
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.60%
Levy Authority
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IAFPD
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To add authority for a maximum corporate tax
rate of .60%. Municipalities already
have this authority in 65 ILCS 5/11-7-3.
In PTELL counties, this would automatically bump up the maximum rate for the corporate
levy to .6% under the last amendment made to PTELL [a referendum would be
required, in all likelihood, to raise the limiting rate to take advantage of the .60% rate
authority]. In non-PTELL counties,
voters would have to approve going
to .60%.
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HB
673
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Remove
the requirement on fire
protections to publish its entire
budget
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IAFPD
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Amend Section 7 (70ILCS705/7) by striking the
phrase “or making any appropriation”, thereby removing the requirement on fire
protections to publish its entire budget.Each
FPD must currently publish its budget resulting in many $1000s that could
otherwise be spent on providing necessary services.
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Allow
the investment of proceeds of the sale of real estate or personal property owned
by a fire protection district that has dissolved to pay the contract for
services.
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IAFPD
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We propose that a fire protection district
that dissolves its fire department and contracts with a neighboring department shall be
able to sell its assets and invest the proceeds in the Illinois funds for
purpose of paying a portion of the contract for protection and such funds shall
not be considered excess accumulated funds such that they will reduce the
district’s tax levy below that
necessary to pay the contract.
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HB
667
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Allow
elected boards to increase from 3 to
5 members by passing an ordinance
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NIA
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Allow the same process for elected boards as
stated for appointed board of trustees when increasing the number size of the
board from 3 to 5 in that the change
may be done passing an ordinance rather than requiring a referendum.
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HB
668
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Amend
Section 35 of the Property Tax Code to include Cook County
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NIAFPD
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Fire protection districts in the notification
of property tax appeals that exceed $100,000 and deletes a provision exempting
counties with 3,000,000 or more inhabitants from certain notice requirements
concerning tax objections
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Natural
Gas/Utilities in HazMat/Spiller Pays
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IFCA
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Add natural gas, gas liquids, and liquefied
natural gas to the "hazardous material emergency response reimbursement act to
provide for cost recovery subsequent to natural gas leaks caused by improper
locating of the gas service lines or by careless actions of the contractor.
Include electrical transmission. Extra ordinary expenses can also be recovered.
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96 GA
Bills Submitted
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Category
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Lead Organization
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Comments
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HB
666
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Fire
District Non Resident Fee’s
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IFCA
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Amends the Fire Protection
District Act. Provides that, until January 1, 2009, the fee charged to persons
and entities that are not residents of the fire protection district for the cost
of providing services shall not exceed $250 per vehicle (now, $125) and shall
not exceed $70 per hour per firefighter (now, $35 per hour per firefighter).
Provides that those amounts shall be adjusted annually to reflect changes in the
Consumer Price Index during the previous 12-month period.
Deletes everything after the enacting clause. Reinserts the engrossed bill with
the following changes. Provides that the charge for fire protection services
provided to persons and entities who are not residents of the fire protection
district shall be increased or decreased by the percentage change (instead of
adjusted annually to reflect changes) in the Consumer Price Index-U during the
previous 12-month period. Effective immediately.
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HB
670
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Increase
Compensation Limits for Trustees
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NIA
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Amend section 6 to add an additional category
or increase per annum for Fire Protection Districts with more than 30 paid fire
fighters not to exceed $4,000.00
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SB
1353
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Fire
Training for Retired Fire Personnel
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MABAS, IFA
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Amends the Illinois Fire
Protection Training Act. Provides that certain persons who are retired from
active fire service duties may receive training certification regardless of the
fact that they are not employed or otherwise engaged by an organized Illinois
fire department. Effective immediately.
Final bill to be crafted and approved by all members.
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Public/Private
Partnerships for Mutual Aid
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MABAS
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Local government does not have the resources
including funding to handle all emergencies.
In some cases, private sector partnerships must be created in order for
the local emergency service agencies to mitigate the emergency without cause for
liability issues. Local emergency
responders who respond to all types of emergencies are covered under the Tort
Immunity Law. However, there are
some emergencies that demand a response of special equipment such as cranes,
drilling equipment, and the like which are owned and operated by private sector
companies who are willing to assist but are open for lawsuits. Further, in many rural areas of the
state, the response time of the private contractor would be more expedient given
the geographic proximity to the emergency scene versus mutual aid or a state
asset, thus resulting in a more efficient incident management.
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96 GA
Bills Submitted
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Category
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Lead Organization
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Comments
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SB1255
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Provide
a share of the Special Tax Allocation Funds from TIF Districts Enterprise Zones
for Fire Districts
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IFCA
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To include a budget formula that provides a
share of the Special Tax Allocation Funds, from a Tax Increment Financing
District, for fire districts. The
formula should be based on a calculation similar to the school or library
district calculations, found in 65 ILCS 5/11-74.4-3(q) 7.5 through 7.7, that
determine the projected impact on the fire district by the increased number of
housing units located within the fire district.
The formula should also consider other factors that may increase the
demand for services such as, increases in the working population, increase in
the hazards due to industrial or storage occupancy development, and increase is
traffic due to retail development.
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Mandatory
health, safety and general welfare inspections of rental properties that are
rented to College and university students.
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IFCA
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Home rule communities have the power to
require these life safety inspections of rental properties under the current
state statute, cities that have less than 25,000 in population, as non-home rule
communities, do not. The problem
here is not a home rule or non-home rule situation, the problem is life safety
for renters in communities that have higher than normal percentages of
residential rental units. In a
university town we are dealing with a high percentage of college student age
renters, who have less money, fewer options and are typically a less
knowledgeable and sophisticated group of renters. With college age renters, we
find a significant number of persons living in units that are substantially
below any minimum standards and they do not know it or just think they have no
other choice. Younger renters are
also less likely to understand their rights to have their dwelling unit meet
minimum standards and it is easier for unscrupulous property owners to convince
the students that they have to put up with unsafe conditions.
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SB
2180
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Novelty
cigarette lighters that resemble toys.
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IFIA, IFA
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This proposal is needed to curb the use of
novelty cigarette lighters by children.
Young children are not capable of differentiating between a toy and a
fire tool. Hundreds of novelty
lighters that resemble toys are sold at stores across America. These lighters
do
not
meet existing child-resistant cigarette lighter safety standards.
(16C.F.R., Part 1210). Visit the
EBay website for a firsthand look at lighters that resemble ordinary children’s
toys.
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96 GA
Bills Submitted
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Category
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Lead Organization
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Comments
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HB
1175
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Amend
Fire Sprinkler Licensing Act
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IFIA
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Amend the Fire Sprinkler Contractor Licensing
Act by deleting section 225 ILCS 317/15 (i) from the current Fire Sprinkler
Contracting Licensing Act: (i) No
license is required for a person or business that is engaged in the installation
of fire sprinkler systems only in single family or multiple family residential
dwellings up to and including 8 family units that do not exceed 2 ½ stories in
height from the lowest grade level.
AND replace with: “No license is required for a person or business
that is engaged in the installation of single sprinkler heads that are installed
in single family residential furnace rooms.”
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Exclude
volunteer firefighters from unemployment insurance
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IAFPD
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Exclude volunteer firefighters from
unemployment insurance contributions to be made by the fire district for
volunteers (Volunteers who receive no pay, reimbursement, or stipend as a member
of the Volunteer Fire Department).
Add language in regards to what constitutes a “lay off”.
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HB
38
HB
297
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Fire
Station Revolving Loan Fund
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Representative
Moffit
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Authorizes (now, requires) the fire station
revolving loan program. Provides that the revolving loan program may (now,
shall) provide zero-interest loans, and conditions the Authority's lending upon
the program receiving funding. Provides that the loan funds may (now, shall) be
paid out of the Fire Station Revolving Loan Fund and that the Fund may (now,
shall) consist of funds transferred or appropriated into it and loan repayments.
Makes the use of the Fund permissive and conditioned upon the program receiving
funding.
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HB
669
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Amend
the Fire Chief License Plate
Public Act
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IFCA
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Amendment is needed with the following
additions to Sec. 3-611.5. Subsection (b),The fee
for this plate for a vehicle owned by the fire chief shall be the same as
the fee prescribed for first division vehicles in Section 3-806 of this code. Permanent license plates shall be issued at the fee prescribed in
Section 3-808.1 (b) to fire chief vehicles owned by a municipal fire department or
fire protection district.
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96 GA
Bills Submitted
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Category
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Lead Organization
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Comments
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Increase
Revenue Streams that are
coming into the Fire Prevention Fund to be divided as by the formula currently
present in the Act and does not affect future fees.
Create Funding Source for MABAS
Establish a continuous funding source
to support of fire based EMS re: personnel structure, testing, training
and licensure |
IFSA |
The Fire Prevention Fund (FPF) as defined
in the Fire Investigation Act, is the sole source of State funding for
firefighter training for the statutory State Fire Academy (Illinois Fire Service
Institute) and for the City of Chicago Fire Department. Only that portion of the
FPF that is generated by the 1% fire insurance premium fee is allocated by
formula (12.5%) to IFSI and (10%) to Chicago FD. In recent years the demand for
training associated with basic firefighter skills, homeland security,
implementation of fire service mutual aid, creation of regional fire and
emergency training facilities and high rise response has exponentially increase
the demand for training courses and resources. In 2007, IFSI received less than
30% of the total funding required to support its operations through the FPF,
with the remainder provided through fees assessed on local fire departments and
from State and federal grants. Similarly, Chicago Fire Department (CFD) relies
significantly upon City funding and federal grants to fully fund its training
requirements. Much of the grant funding that is associated with new homeland
security tasks and DHS grants have been steadily decreasing annually. This
funding is thebasis for specialized HAZMAT, technical rescue and incident
command / NIMS training. Federal DHS grants are expected to decrease further in
the future. Local departments simply cannot replace the lost federal grant
funding for these teams. Therefore, there is a real and continuing need to
increase the annual State funding available to IFSI and CFD by providing
alternative sources of funding either through the FPF or directly to IFSI and
CFD to underwrite training costs for Illinois firefighters. Any new source of
FPF funding that is intended to be shared with IFSI and CFD by the 12.5% /10%
formula must be explicitly added to the Fire Investigation Act.
Establish
a Bill to generate the revenue needed to maintain MABAS so that the financial
burden does not rest on the individual departments especially for those smaller
departments/areas that may not have the same risk as others. Needed funding level 1.7M.
For
several years, the issue of EMS oversight personnel continuity, licensure,
testing, availability and costs have resulted in the IFCA fighting for these
elements to be reinstated, fixed, purchased and/or contracted in last minute
efforts to assure field service levels were not interrupted or delayed. Several
times these efforts fell short because of funding issues. The State budget
process and timely approval has also negatively affected the provider service
levels due to lack of testing ability. We need to identify the needs of the EMS
service providers and build a self sustaining structure to maintain these
programs with a funding source that is continuous and secured from annual budget
politics. A long term plan needs to
be in place to identify the needed and projected costs. Create
shell bill. |