Issues revisited: AIDS, tax refunds, etc.

When lawmakers pass a bill or a package of bills, the issue seldom ends. Questions are revisited, refinements continue and tinkering goes on. Some changes are minor. Some seemingly minor changes are major. The big topic in the General Assembly in 1987 was AIDS. Lawmakers passed a collection of bills that Gov. James R. Thompson sifted through, approving some and rejecting others.

That was 1987. This year it was time to begin the refinements. The most controversial AIDS bills this year were H.B. 4005 (P.A. 85-1399), which Thompson signed, and H.B. 3695, which he vetoed. H.B. 4005 contains three major provisions:

• It deletes the requirement for written consent from the patient before the AIDS testing in cases where health care workers, firefighters or ambulance personnel are accidentally exposed to blood or bodily fluids that might transmit human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus linked to AIDS.
• It allows school principals to tell the school superintendent and other school administrators of children who test positive for the HIV infection or have AIDS or AIDS-related complex.
• Most controversially, it allows physicians to test persons for AIDS secretly, without the patients' written consent or their knowledge, if the doctor determines the test is needed to diagnose or treat a patient.

The final controversial provision was pushed by the Illinois Medical Society and added in a conference committee report on June 29. Dr. Bernard Turnock, Thompson's director of the Department of Public Health, urged its veto. The governor acknowledged the controversy and attached a message to the bill when he signed it. "H.B. 4005, like the bills I acted on last September, requires that the state exercise its responsibility to weigh individual rights against the public safety, protecting the health of the community at large," Thompson argued.

And Thompson stressed that the confidentiality provisions of last year's measures remain intact and protect patients. The flap produced some dissension in the medical community. Dr. Richard J. Sassetti resigned from chairmanship of the Illinois Medical Society's Ad Hoc Committee on AIDS because of the lack of input from the committee and the lateness of the hour.

The other bill would have allowed dentists to refuse to treat persons with infectious diseases and instead refer them to another dentist who could treat them within 10 working days. Thompson said the legislation violated the state's Human Rights Act, that dentists were taking precautions and that 10 days with a tooth ache was too long.

Less controversial than AIDS was fine-tuning done to the system that Illinois uses to pay refunds to taxpayers who have overpaid their income tax. Currently the General Assembly pays those refunds by appropriation. And if, as was the case earlier this year, too little money is appropriated, taxpayers can wait and wait for refunds.

A pair of identical bills — H.B. 2918 and S.B. 1562, both amendatorily vetoed by the governor to delay the effective date by one year until January 1, 1990 — would create an Income Tax Refund Fund and prevent the state from spending money that belongs to taxpayers. Initially 6 percent of individual income tax receipts and 18 percent of corporate receipts would be diverted to the refund fund. Later diversions would depend on balances and estimates of obligations. The money would be set aside and used to pay the refunds and would not be available for other use, as it is now. The legislation would eliminate, or at least make it harder, for the state to use money owed taxpayers for its own operations.

The year's delay was necessary, Thompson said, to protect cash flow. "Since the legislature was unable to pass a modest increase in the state income tax, I must take action to protect our fiscal flexibility," he wrote in both veto messages.

Other fine-tuning enacted by the General Assembly provides for:

• Requiring that a not-for-profit corporation obtain permission from the appropriate State Central Committee before using "Republican" or "Democrat" in its name. Previously a county party chairman had been able to give that permission. H.B. 3810 (P.A. 85-1396) was aimed at the United Republican Fund, which claims the measure was in retaliation for its opposition to Thompson's 1987 and 1988 tax increase proposals. Thompson countered: "The difficulty with the present law is that it allows a local party group to sanction the use of the party name in areas beyond that locality, a procedure subject to abuse."
• Extending the "lemon law," the New-Car Buyer Protection Act, to include pick-up trucks. Under S.B. 2102 (P.A. 85-1350) owners of the small trucks can, in the first year or 12,000 miles of use, get a refund or a new truck if theirs is in the shop for more than 30 days.
• Extending pilot recycling programs that have been underway at the State of Illinois Center in Chicago and the Willard Ice (Revenue) Building in Springfield to five state buildings to be chosen. Another section of H.B. 3389 (P.A. 85-1196) requires the Department of Central Management Services to revise purchasing procedures to encourage use of materials that can be recycled and to study recycling of used automobile tires and motor oil.
• Making March 4 Mayors' Day, a commemorative holiday in the Chicago Public Schools to honor the late Harold Washington and Richard Daley. Sorry kids, H.B. 2942 (P.A. 85-1313) doesn't get you a day off; time will instead be spent learning about the mayors.
• Prohibiting in H.B. 3455 (P.A. 85-1364) consumption of food or drink on buses operated by mass transit systems, and setting the fine for violation at $100.□

October 1988 | Illinois Issues | 24