Jim Dey: SAFE-T Act decision supposedly imminent

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Jul. 16—It's time once again to dive into another round of quick takes on the people, places and events that were being talked about over the past week:

SAFE OR UNSAFE?

Don't hold your breath, but the Illinois Supreme Court is scheduled to release its decision Tuesday in the case of the constitutional challenge to the SAFE-T social/criminal justice legislation.

The court's clerk Friday announced that "opinions will be filed" at 9 a.m. in two cases, one of which involves the SAFE-T challenge filed by a group of county state's attorneys.

The hugely controversial law, which includes the abolition of bail, was scheduled to take effect on Jan. 1, but the court put a hold on the start date while it considered the challenge.

If the law is affirmed, it will require huge changes in the state's criminal justice system. There will be much more on this story after the court issues its opinion, particularly if it affirms the law's constitutionality.

HARD TIMES

The U.S. poverty rate is on the rise, according to the U.S. Census Bureau's 2021 American Community Survey, and Illinois is part of that trend.

Numbers released by the federal government recently show that Danville has a poverty rate of 20.9 percent, the seventh highest of 286 U.S. metro areas that were surveyed.

The survey stated that Danville has a median household income rate at $49,091. Median means mid-point, 50 percent above and 50 percent below.

The national median household income is far higher — $69,717.

Danville's unemployment rate is 5 percent, a number that is not inordinately high but still at least 20 percent higher than the national unemployment rate of nearly 4 percent.

The number of Americans living in poverty increased from 38.4 million in 2020 to 41.4 million in 2021, a 7.9 percent increase.

After seven years in decline, poverty jumped by the largest number since the 2008-2009 recession. At the same time, the increase occurred during the coronavirus pandemic, during which many states, including Illinois, restricted or locked down their economies in an effort to slow the spread of the virus.

Danville was the only Illinois city on the top 22 list. The top five poorest cities are McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas, Valdosta, Ga., Monroe, La., Farmington, N.M., and Brownsville-Harlingen, Texas.

LONDON CALLING

University of Illinois President Timothy Killeen is among dozens of luminaries traveling with Gov. J.B. Pritzker on a trade mission to London.

Joining Killeen on the trip will be UI Vice President Jay Walsh. They are among many academics, business representatives, corporate honchos and political leaders who will be toughing it out in Londontown.

The governor's office said Pritzker will attend the July 13-16 Goodwood Festival of Speed to "discuss electric vehicle manufacturing with automobile, energy and supply chain leaders."

Those are top priorities for Illinois given that Rivian, located in McLean County, operates a large manufacturing facility and employs several thousand people.

Pritzker said he wants to let "the world know Illinois is the best place to live, work and do business."

That might be a tough sell for a state with a multitude of problems, including a reputation as unfriendly to business investment and expansion.

Other members of the delegation will "meet with their British counterparts to talk about manufacturing, clean energy and higher education," the governor's office reports.

Illinois did $5 billion in bilateral trade with Great Britain in 2022. The governor's office went out of its way to state that Pritzker's overseas trip has nothing to do with establishing foreign policy credentials for a presidential run. It stated Pritzker is a "firm backer" of President Biden.

SPEAKING OF RIVIAN

Recent investors in the stock of the electric vehicle manufacturer could have made a killing. Of course, early investors in Rivian could have gotten killed.

That's why timing is everything.

Even though Rivian had never made a dime, the company's stock price went straight up to about $180 a share after it went public in November 2021 at $87. Then reality and a slew of manufacturing problems hit and the share price fell back to as low as $11 a share.

In recent weeks, it's been hovering around $14 a share. But good corporate news caused the price to climb to about $25 a share.

It'll take guts to put money into this speculative venture.

Just think, investors would have doubled their money if they had bought at $12 and watched it climb to $25. Just think, investors lost their shirts when they bought at $180 and watched it fall to $25.

Where will it go next? Nobody knows, because the electric vehicle industry is the wild, wild west, where some will prosper and others already have failed.

NOTHING TO SEE HERE

The state's economy is hanging in there, not doing much in terms of growth or decline.

The University of Illinois' Fred Giertz reports in his June survey of the state's economy — the Flash Index — that it "remains in a holding pattern, where concern about a recession is balanced against reports of continuing strength, evidenced by higher-than-expected first-quarter GDP growth and surprisingly low unemployment rates."

The index fell slightly, to 103 from 103.2 in May. Any index value above 100 indicates expansion.

"The rate of inflation continues to decrease although not as fast as the Federal Reserve would like. This implies that the Fed may still raise interest rates to address inflation concerns which may slow the economy further," he said.

Illinois' unemployment rate fell slightly to 4.1, slightly above the national average. Giertz said that "at one point, the differential was nearly 2 percentage points."

He said June Illinois state tax revenues from individual, corporate and sales taxes (components of the Flash Index) were all down in inflation-adjusted terms compared to the same month last year.

The Flash Index is the weighted average of Illinois growth rates in corporate earnings, consumer spending and personal income as estimated from receipts for corporate income, individual income and retail sales taxes.

FEELIN' LUCKY?

Hey, St. Louis Cardinals fan looking to ease the pain of a tough season, would you like to make $2,500?

All they — or anyone else — has to do is bet $100 with DraftKings that the Cards will win their division. Of course, they're now in last place and way under .500. But those are just details.

Their disgraceful mid-season standing is a long way from the preseason optimism that had some betting outfits forecasting a division title.

Dan Caesar of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports a fan would have had to bet $130 to win $100 when the season started.

Other gambling businesses place the Cardinals even lower on the totem pole. A $100 bet on the Cards to win the division now would return $3,500 at Barstool, $7,000 at FanDuel and $12,000 at DraftKings.

YUCKING IT UP

Who says television is a vast wasteland? It can't be when there are shows like "Luann & Sonja: Welcome to Crappie Lake."

The two "Real Housewives" ladies are being parachuted into Benton in deep southern Illinois, where they will interact with the local yokels and talk about fishin', truckin' and all kinds of other 'ins.

The Chicago Tribune's Nina Metz reports that it's the latest incarnation of Bravo's "Real Housewives" franchise.

Metz characterizes the show as akin to "sucking on a pop culture sourball, as you become transfixed by the uncanny valley of dysfunction, plastic surgery and obsession with thin bodies. But something about it all finally turned too rancid — too cynical and ugly — even for me."

The show features Luann de Lesseps and Sonja Morgan, who will spend five weeks in Benton. She calls the show a "straight rip-off of 'The Simple Life,' which premiered 20 years ago with Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie scrunching their noses to spend time around people in (gah) Middle America."

She gave the show 1.5 stars out of four. Readers who are sufficiently miserable can tune in at 8 p.m. Sundays on Bravo (and streaming on Peacock).