Peoria Standard

State Rep. Tim Butler (R-Springfield) recently congratulated Rochester High soccer coach Chad Kutscher on his 300th career win.

“Thanks for letting me crash your class this morning to present an Illinois House certificate honoring the big milestone,” Butler posted on Facebook. “Go Rockets.”

In other activity, Butler recently said voters are being kept in the dark over Democratic lawmakers' most recent map-making plans.

“I don’t see anyone here that isn’t from the media and looking at witness slips, we don’t have any,” Butler said during the Oct. 14 House Redistricting Committee hearing in Springfield. “Though, Chairman Aquino said they were looking at sub-circuits for counties with 150,000 or above, the two hearings we have today are counties that have 150,000 or above — Sangamon and Peoria. Is it the intention of the majority party to not only draw new sub-circuit maps for the circuits that have sub-circuits or is the majority also looking at counties that don’t have sub-circuits yet?”

Most of Butler’s questions about the public not having a fair say on issues like their counties becoming sub-circuited seem to have gone unanswered, with Democratic state Rep. Elizabeth Hernandez only responding, “I would have to check.”

Butler argues that response alone should be enough to tell residents everything they need to know about what’s happening.

“If it is the majority’s intention to sub-circuit counties that are currently not sub-circuited that is going to be a travesty," Butler said. "If this is the intention of the majority, this needs to have a much more intensive process – more engagement from the judiciary – from those counties. I’m really concerned when we go back into session, all of the sudden, out of the blue, we are going to see sub-circuit maps for counties that are not sub-circuited and you are going to continue to drive this change across the state that you would like to see and the governor would like to see, not only in the legislature but in the judiciary.”