Metro East Sun

State Rep. Avery Bourne (R-Litchifield) recently expressed her displeasure with the recently passed ethics bill.

In June, the House passed SB 539, a bill focused on ethics reform for state lawmakers, according to Illinois Policy.

At a news conference, Bourne said that she supports ethics reform for the state, but feels that the bill "falls short" of true ethics reform.

"I'm here to join my colleagues in calling for true meaningful ethics reform and strong anti-corruption safeguards to be put in place," Bourne said. "This bill that may be taken up in the legislature tomorrow, Senate Bill 539, falls extremely short and this isn't something new. We brought up many of our concerns with this bill in the debate on the House floor."

Bourne's biggest criticism of the bill was that it would limit the power of Illinois' legislative Inspector General to investigate wrongdoing.

"Most concerning to me and to our caucus is the lack of independence of the legislative inspector general," Bourne said. "If we are to have true and meaningful anti-corruption reforms in Illinois and true accountability for politicians, we need an independent legislative inspector general. The bill that they passed, Senate Bill 539, actually takes away some of the jurisdiction of the legislative inspector general. It limits the scope of the investigations that she can investigate."

Legislative Inspector General Carol Pope announced her resignation following the passage of the bill, saying that her office is essentially a "paper tiger."

Bourne continued, "To make matters worse, the governor had the opportunity to use his amendatory veto power to change this bill and take away some of those parts that limit the legislative inspector general, but instead the only change he made is a move to get rid of a federal hiring monitor for his agencies so he's actually trying to bring less oversight to his own agencies through his amendatory veto." 

Bourne said that she and fellow Republican legislators would be taking action to pass more stringent ethics reform.

"We need something that is true and meaningful," Bourne said. "I will join my colleagues in calling for Rep. Burke and others to re-engage negotiations with our caucus to pass something that will really turn the tide in Springfield and give people faith in state government again."