On July 29th, 2010, Governor Quinn signed SB 2487, which transfers the management and control of the GYO program from the Illinois State Board of Education to the Illinois Board of Higher Education. The bill passed the legislature in May, through a House amendment to a Senate "shell bill".
In anticipation of the Governor's signature, IBHE outgoing director Judy Erwin and two of her key staff met with GYO constituents from across the state at the GYO Retreat in Chicago in late June, and began to lay out the process of transition. Shortly thereafter, IBHE issued guidelines for continuation grant proposals, accepted the proposals from all 16 current projects in late July, and prepared grant agreements. One significant change is that vouchers for the entire grant amount will be issued immediately, so that payment can be expedited.
At its August 10th Board Meeting, IBHE formally accepted responsibility for GYO, and approved these grant agreement.
Thanks to everyone at IBHE for the extraordinary work they put in to make sure that this major change was implemented both rapidly and smoothly! And thanks to the ISBE Board and staff for their support and hard work during our long relationship.
At the same IBHE Board Meeting, we received final confirmation that the the Governor had approved a GYO appropriation for FY 2011 at the same level as that for FY 2010, $3,150,000. This is an extraordinary achievement because many state-funded programs in the education field have received deep cuts. We thank the Governor and his staff, and our strong advocates in the legislator, including Speaker Madigan and Majority Leader Currie, Representative Golar and the members of the legislative Black Caucus, and Senators Martinez and Collins; but as usual, the credit is ultimately due to candidates, consortium partners, and community members across the state who put extraordinary effort into grassroots communication.
The current recession, coupled with structural problems in the state's overall finances, have led to exceptionally high budget deficits, a large number of unpaid bills, and very large projected budget cuts in education and other fields. In summer 2009, a group of more than 150 human services, education, and civic groups around the state formed the Responsible Budget Coalition to mobilize public opinion in favor of a state budget plan that would include enough new revenue to avoid devastating cuts to public services. Grow Your Own Illinois was one of the early member organizations.
Since then, GYO Illinois has participated in rallies, policy discussions, legislative meetings, and forums in Springfield and across the state. In April 2010, we helped organized an event on the campus of Northeastern Illinois Univeristy which drew more than 200 faculty, staff, and students; two of the featured speakers were Maureen Gillette, the Dean of Education at the University, and Mayra Bravo-Gonzales, a GYO candidate from the Chicago Lawn project:
