Shutterstock

Illinoisans soon will get a new weapon to fight political corruption. It’s not the machete that’s needed to hack away decades of endemic corruption sown by pay-for-play political contributions that have gone totally unchecked. State lawmakers couldn’t bring themselves to make it harder to get re-elected.

But they did approve Senate Bill 189, which compels public officials to respond to requests for public documents, imposes fines on those who deliberately flout disclosure and gives the state attorney general’s office the power to investigate complaints and render binding opinions when records releases are disputed.

SB 186 awaits Gov. Pat Quinn’s signature along with House Bill 7, a mild campaign finance “reform” bill. Both should be signed promptly.

The government “transparency” legislation is less sexy and less transformative than the bold reform of campaign financing laws that was needed. For that matter, the transparency legislation is not as strong as it should be. But some progress was made.

• The bill establishes a presumption of transparency, which means that public records should be available unless the public officials can make a convincing case that they need to be withheld.

• The existing office of public access counselor within the attorney general’s office would get broad new powers to resolve contested requests. The office would get subpoena power and the ability to pursue civil penalties ranging between $2,500 and $5,000 if courts eventually rule that the public officials acted in violation.

• All public bodies in Illinois must designate a public access officer to educate the public about how to make open-records requests and to teach public officials how to respond. The bill says officials must respond to records requests within five business days unless the public body seeks more time.

In 2006, Illinois citizen requests for public information were ignored 42 percent of the time and another 20 percent of the public bodies failed to comply fully with the release of documents, said Dave Lundy, president of the Better Government Association based in Chicago.

The new law should help because the public access counselor now has some clout. Right now, public officials face no sanctions for being uncooperative and belligerent with the public. Missouri could use a similar public advocate.

“Illinois has gone from one of the worst to one of the best” regarding open government laws, Mr. Lundy said. “Do we expect this to be the end all of the fight? No.”

Even as former Gov. George Ryan sits in a federal prison and former Gov. Rod Blagojevich awaits federal trial on public corruption charges, the legislature ducked a chance to fundamentally reform the state’s culture of corruption.

The legislature grudgingly adopted individual campaign contribution limits of $5,000 for candidates for state office and $10,000 for political action committees. They failed to close gaping loopholes that allow political committees and legislative leaders to sustain pay-to-play.

So while the open records law and contributions limit are a step in the right direction, Illinois still has a lot of work to do. Voters should not be misled when their legislators claim they’ve cracked down. Tell them they still have far to go.