State cash for capital projects

A range of groups set to get funds - bill not yet signed by Quinn

06/10/2009 10:00 PM

By MICAH MAIDENBERG
Editor

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Community centers, hospitals and social service providers are among the Near South and Near West side institutions that could benefit from a capital bill passed May 31 by members of the Illinois House and Senate.

The $29-billion dollar piece of legislation clocks in at more than 900 pages and includes money for thousands of projects in cities and towns across Illinois.

State Senator Kwame Raoul (D-13), whose district stretches from the South Loop to South Shore, said the capital bill will address the state’s crumbling infrastructure and spark job creation at a time of economic recession.

“We’re at record — maybe not the record — but this is a long-term low in employment,” Raoul said. “The economy is suffering and we need to put people to work.”

As of Chicago Journal’s deadline, legislators and Gov. Quinn had not agreed to an operating budget, and Quinn had yet to commit his signature to the capital bill.

Raoul said he was disappointed the General Assembly did not have “a more aggressive conversation about the operating budget and the need for people to face the reality that we need to raise some sort of revenue.”

The Senate passed an income tax increase to do just that, but the measure failed in the House. The capital bill, despite its limbo, offers a sense of which local organizations could ultimately get grants from the state.

Two of the largest local recipients of the bill are the University of Illinois-Chicago and the Illinois Medical District Commission.

The bill includes $57.6 million for planning, construction and equipping a new chemical sciences building for UIC. Mark Rosati, a spokesman for the school, said in a message that UIC is awaiting further action in Springfield.

The medical district, meanwhile, could get $17 million from the Capital Development Fund of the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity “for capital improvements, including previously incurred costs.” District executive director Sam Pruett could not be reached.

Another Near West Side medical organization, Rush University Medical Center, would get $10 million from the state. The hospital system would apply the fund toward its 10-year, $1 billion expansion project.

Sharon Butler, a Rush spokeswoman, said the hospital worked with the Illinois Hospital Association to secure funds in the capital bill.

Asked if Rush had any qualms about potentially taking the money at a time when so many other issues are unsettled on the state level, Butler said the hospital provides $172 million in charity care.

“Expanding our facilities will help our patients — many of our patients are patients in need. So of course we feel it’s going for a very good cause,” she said.

The grant for Rush wouldn’t be the first time the hospital received a public subsidy — in early 2008, the City of Chicago expanded the boundaries of the Central West tax increment financing district to give Rush $75 million for its expansion.

The Ruth M. Rothstein CORE Center, an AIDS and HIV treatment center that is part of the County Cook Bureau of Health Services, has $3.5 million earmarked in the bill. The money would be used to increase capacity at its facility at 2020 W. Harrison.

“We’re a public institution. We are talking about the health system of Cook County,” said spokesman Marcel Bright. “We service those who need it the most — people who are underinsured, people who have no health insurance. They depend on us.”

The capital bill lists $800,000 in two grants for the Haymarket Center, a drug treatment center at 932 W. Washington in the West Loop.

Anthony Cole, a vice president of the organization, said the capital bill was one of Haymarket’s few opportunities to find monies for building improvements, projects other funders generally won’t pay for. “We can’t operate in thin air. We have to have adequate facilities,” he said.

State Sen. Rickey Hendon (D-5), the assistant majority leader, worked with Haymarket to secure a line-item in the bill, Cole said. Hendon did not return phone calls.

The funds would allow the group, which services some 18,000 people annually, to upgrade its air conditioning and heating systems, fix roofs and tuckpoint their buildings.

Funds would also go toward improving Haymarket’s computer and phone systems.

The Chicago Lighthouse for the Blind, meanwhile, would use $250,000 listed in the capital bill to support its expansion project, said executive director Janet Slyzk.

“The building costs to do this are $5 million. We have not received any state or federal funding for the building project to date. This has all been done on philanthropic dollars,” Slyzk said, noting that those funds have become scarce as the economy dropped. The group wrote a proposal for the line-item and submitted it to State Sen. Art Turner (D-9), Slyzk explained.

Haymarket and the Lighthouse, however, could cut services, depending on the outcome of the negotiations over the operating budget.

Cole said if Haymarket lost half of the $10 million it gets from the state — Gov. Quinn’s so-called “doomsday” budget scenario calls for massive cuts across state departments — up to 5,000 patients would lose services.

“All rehab services would be cut for those with disabilities, and that scares me,” Slyzk said.

Other organizations slated for funds in the capital bill had few details about the money.

Johnny Harris, the executive director of the Major Adams Center, 125 N. Hoyne, said he didn’t have any information about the $100,000 for capital improvements listed in the bill for the Major Adams Community Committee.

“No one called me officially from the governor’s office. I don’t know where that proposal happened,” Harris said.

Kerry Dickson, senior vice president at L.R. Development, the firm in charge of Roosevelt Square, the development replacing the ABLA Homes as part of the Chicago Housing Authority’s Plan for Transformation, didn’t have specific information about the $250,000 slated to go to Roosevelt Square Partners for “housing development projects.”

“There are substantial financial challenges with Roosevelt Square being able to move forward,” he said, including an $8 million financing gap on Phase II of the project. “Hopefully it’s the state trying to move the project forward.”

The company would accept the funds, according to Dickson, if Quinn signs the capital bill into law: “We’d put it to good use.”

Other local line-items in the capital bill include $200,000 for renovations to classrooms at Roosevelt University; $75,000 for construction of Roosevelt’s new pharmacy school; $3,000,000 to Mercy Home for Boys and Girls in a capital grant; $100,000 to Mercy for “general infrastructure renovations”; and $175,000 for UIC’s Pediatric Dental Clinic.

A number of organizations that work in Pilsen — including the 18th Street Development Corp., the Pilsen Wellness Center, and Alivio Medical Center — could also get funds.

Another earmark that could have a local impact is $10 million “to provide loans and grants for capital-related projects for grocery stores statewide located in underserved communities.” Three grocers have expressed interest in building a store at Madison and Western avenues. The city calls the area a food desert.

Chicago Park District parks listed for funds include $100,000 for Sheridan Park and money for Cottontail Park and Dearborn Park.

State senators Mattie Hunter did not return calls for this story. State Rep. Ken Dunkin could not be reached.

Contact: mmaidenberg@chicagojournal.com


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