GOP chief McKenna senses 'appetite for change'
Bernard Schoenburg
Bernard Schoenburg column for THursday's papers
SPRINGFIELD -- The leader of Illinois Republicans, whose party was shut out of statewide offices in the 2006 election, is hoping that the very public bickering among Democrats trying to fashion a state budget in an overtime legislative session will mean new strength for the GOP in coming elections.
"People are coming to the point that they don't feel they can trust the governor, and that's creating appetite for change," said Andy McKenna, chairman of the state GOP, in a telephone interview this week. "It's opening the door. Now we've got to be smart enough to get voters excited about our ideas."
McKenna, whose party has sustained the corruption convictions, now being appealed, of former GOP Gov. George Ryan; the embarrassment of out-of-stater Alan Keyes getting drubbed for U.S. Senate by Democrat Barack Obama in 2004 and the 2006 second-term win of Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich despite several ongoing investigations of his administration, is trying to get the GOP to put its best public face forward.
This week, with an evening forum at a hotel in the DuPage County city of Lisle, McKenna and the party began what it is calling its "reform Illinois tour" of regional meetings to develop and push an agenda. At least five more meetings are being planned, including one in Peoria Monday and possibly one in Springfield the week of July 12. And people might be able to participate in the Springfield gathering through a telephone conference call hookup.
The party's Web presence is also being revamped, as the old www.ilgop.org site has plenty of links to a newer location, www.weareillinois.org. And there, a 60-second Internet ad can already be watched, providing still photos and mockups of newspaper headlines critical of Blagojevich and pointing out investigations and problems, including mention of the governor's proposed gross-receipts tax. The last images are of workers and a teacher working with kids - apparently folks who would love GOP leadership.
"Can we really trust Governor Blagojevich and Democrats in Springfield to change Illinois?" words across the screen ask. "People are demanding change," it says later. "Illinois Republicans. We are Illinois."
So far, McKenna said, the ad isn't being broadcast anywhere - but is being used to draw attention to the Web site.
Even before a couple of GOP presidential candidates dropped out of an August straw poll in Ames, Iowa, the Illinois GOP had been toying with the idea of having a straw poll during Republican Day at the Illinois State Fair this year. McKenna said a decision on having that occur could be made by the end of this week.
As McKenna envisions it, the party could merely have voting booths open for several hours at the state fair director's lawn, and maybe at the GOP tent at the fair. A process would be developed to let Illinois registered voters cast one ballot each - and people could get registered on site.
GOP presidential candidates Rudy Giuliani and John McCain both earlier this month said they would not participate in the August straw poll in Ames.
The Ames poll, which can draw thousands, "is a big money investment" for campaigns, McKenna said, but the Illinois contest wouldn't be costly for the candidates.
And he's not sure if candidates themselves would come. But it would still be good for the party, he said.
"Presidential primaries can draw new volunteers, new people into the party, and this is one vehicle to do that," he said.
McKenna says that ideas, not just activity, are needed to build the party and energize a following.
"As we start this election cycle, our leadership really wanted us to work with them to really promote our ideas and try to talk about how they're different," he said. The state central committee has worked with congressional and state legislative leaders from Illinois, he said.
Examples of ideas being put forward are trying to change state law so any tax increase would need a supermajority, not just a simple majority; and calling for a referendum before the state can expand borrowing by more than $1 billion.
Factions remain within the GOP, as some conservatives think the state central committee and McKenna haven't adhered to party principles.
"We've formed an advisory council of conservative coalition groups to find ways that we can constructively help each other and work together," McKenna said. "I think that's been very well received."
McKenna also thinks Blagojevich's continued push to expand programs helps show Republicans to be the more fiscally responsible.
"It's reminding people that we're not about tax and spend," he said.
McKenna thinks that the 2006 elections were "heavily influenced by Iraq," and it remains to be seen what effect the war will have on 2008 contests.
"Today, the national environment is not favorable," McKenna said of the GOP, "but the state environment is quite favorable. And I think that gives us a basis to … rebuild on ideas, recruit candidates and revitalize local organizations."
The fact that Republican incumbent Brad Cole was able to defeat Democratic challenger Sheila Simon in the April race for mayor in Carbondale, showed that GOP ideas and grass-roots activism can defeat "Democratic star power," McKenna said. Simon is daughter of late Sen. Paul Simon, D-Ill.
Steve Brown, spokesman for House Speaker and Illinois Democratic Party Chairman Mike Madigan, D-Chicago, minimized efforts of the state GOP, saying he thinks more people will notice that a nationally prominent Republican - New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg - just left the GOP.
"So it looks like old Andy's got a lot of work to do," Brown said.
Not too long ago, Republicans seemed to have an iron grip on the governor's office. Blagojevich changed that, with lots of help from George Ryan, and Illinois has been becoming more Democratic in recent presidential elections. But things can change, and Blagojevich's second term is certainly giving the GOP hope that it can again find its footing in the state.
Telling the governor 'no'
Meanwhile, state Rep. Bob Pritchard, R-Hinckley, writes a weekly "Pritchard's Perspective," and in the June 18 edition, he compared Blagojevich to hotel heiress Paris Hilton.
"You see Paris has admitted that her lifestyle, self-centered attitude and behavior are the result of her hardly ever being told 'no,'" he wrote. "She was conditioned to believe that she could do whatever she wanted, get whatever she desired, and be accountable to no one.
"I couldn't help but think that our ongoing budget stalemate here in Illinois is caused by a similar situation: a governor who isn't accustomed to hearing 'no.'"
However, he continued, Democrats have joined Republicans in opposing "the largest tax increase in history," and have been cool to the governor's health-care program expansion and proposed sale of the state lottery.
"The overtime budget negotiations between the four legislative leaders and governor are making little progress because the governor continues to return the conversations to his ideas that have been rejected out of hand by lawmakers from both political parties," Pritchard continues. "The most important thing remains that the governor has finally been told 'no' and in the end, he, and our state will be better for it."
Fernando Grillo, former director of the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation, is now a lobbyist for some of the firms that his old department regulates.
However, while Grillo had been registered as a lobbyist before getting his directorship in mid-2003, he waited more than a year after leaving the government post to again register as a lobbyist, thus adhering to current revolving-door rules.
Grillo, 43, of Chicago, was paid $120,900 in the state job, which records show ended by Sept. 30, 2005. He registered as a lobbyist on Oct. 13, 2006.
Grillo & Associates, P.C., lists clients on state lobbyist records as Coverdell, Hispanic Housing Development Corp;, Americash Loans, LLC; and Affinity Credit Services Inc.
Grillo is elsewhere on the lobbyist list as representing Illinois Issues Management LLC and Samuel A. Ramirez & Co.
When he announced his retirement in the summer of 2005, Grillo said he was returning to Ramirez & Co., and would be managing director for the Midwest. He had earlier been senior vice president at the investment firm.
Shortly before Grillo became a lobbyist, one of the firms he now represents - Affinity Credit Services - was fined $273,000 by the professional regulation department because, a state news release said, it issued 273 loans from five stores it had recently purchased from Americash before getting the needed licenses under the Consumer Installment Loan Act. Those stores are in Freeport, Sterling, Ottawa, Lombard and Bridgeview.
Affinity has requested a hearing concerning the fines, but no hearing date had been set as of this week, said Susan Hofer, spokeswoman for the department.
Grillo may be lobbying alongside former Blagojevich chief of staff Alonzo "Lon" Monk. Monk's firm is AM3 Consulting, Ltd., in Park Ridge.
Grillo is listed as exclusive lobbyist for Illinois Issues Management, and that firm and AM3 are both listed as contract lobbyists for Public Issues Management LLC, with clients including Illinois State Medical Society Insurance Services Inc., ISMIE Mutual Insurance Co. and the Illinois State Medical Society.
Grillo and Monk didn't return phone calls.
Cindi Canary, executive director of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, said "there's always a concern when somebody comes from one of these senior administrative positions and then comes back and is lobbying on behalf of … hot-button issues such as payday lending." But she also noted that the one-year revolving-door law in Illinois is "a fact of life."
"In some places, they have a two-year revolving door. You can't necessarily build a firewall here. I think that it's something, though, (about which) legislators and the public should be aware."
Bernard Schoenburg is political columnist for The State Journal-Register. He can be reached at 217-788-1540 or bernard.schoenburg@sj-r.com.