ISBA Director of Legislative Affairs Jim Covington reviews bills in Springfield of interest to ISBA members. This week he covers House Bill 196 (New traffic fees), Senate Bill 1808 (Eavesdropping and cell phones) and Senate Bill 2840 (Medicaid eligibility rules). More information on each bill is available below the video.

New traffic fees. House Bill 196 (McAuliffe, R-Chicago; Munoz, D-Chicago) creates the State Police Merit Board Public Safety Fund that is to be used to provide training for law enforcement personnel. Requires that every person pay $15 to pay for this fund if he or she is convicted of any criminal or traffic violation or a similar provision of a local ordinance. This is on third reading in the Senate. This is going to be a trend in which Illinois state government is moving to funding specific state agencies by assessing fees wherever they are able to get legislation enacted to do so.

Eavesdropping and cell phones. Senate Bill 1808 (Nekritz, D-Northbrook; Noland, D-Elgin) creates an exemption from prosecution for eavesdropping. It allows a citizen to record a law enforcement officer performing public duties in a public place. If not a "public" place, the exemption doesn't apply. Senate Bill 1808 passed out of the House this week on a 71-45-1 vote. The Seventh Circuit is considering this issue now in ALCU v. Alvarez. The Fraternal Order of Police and other law enforcement organizations still oppose. On a concurrence vote in the Senate.

Medicaid eligibility rules. Senate Bill 2840 (Feigenholtz, D-Chicago; Steans, D-Chicago) is supposed to eliminate Illinois’ $2.7 billion Medicaid funding gap. Included in Senate Bill 2840 is a repeal of the compromise of the Medicaid eligibility rules negotiated last fall between the Department of Healthcare and Family Services and the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules.

Some of these changes include the following: (1) A home transferred into a trust after the bill becomes law may not be considered homestead property. If the home was transferred into a trust before the bill becomes law, it prevents a person from being eligible for long-term care if the person’s equity interest in this homestead exceeds the minimum home equity as allowed under federal law. (2) People over the age of 65 can no longer participate in a federally created OBRA Pooled Trust unless the beneficiary is a ward of the county public guardian or the State guardian. (3) A healthy spouse still living at home will receive only the minimum resource allowance ($22,000) instead of the maximum allowance ($110,000) as previously approved by JCAR. (4) Abolishes spousal refusal entirely so that HFS is not limited to how much it can seek when pursing a support order against a community spouse.

Senate Bill 2840 will be heard in House Executive Committee today. The bill has an immediate effective date and will therefore take effect when the Governor signs it.