News

Monday, February 2, 2026
The Battery Farm Proposal on Behan Road: It’s Really About Data Centers

This is the third installment of a series relating to a proposal to install a 600Mw Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) on 52 acres on Behan Road in Nunda Township….


Thursday, January 29, 2026
Pritzker Profile in Political Courage: Prevarication on Education Tax Credit

On July 4, 2025, the FY2025 Reconciliation Act was signed into federal law. Among its provisions, the law created a federally funded tax credit scholarship program for elementary and secondary…


Wednesday, January 28, 2026
Clean and Reliable Grid Affordability Act, Part 2: The Brave New World of Batteries

In my last Reick Report I discussed recent “energy” legislation passed in the October veto session. I put “energy” in parentheses because the bill wasn’t about energy so much as…


Monday, January 26, 2026
S.B. 25 – “Clean and Reliable Grid Affordability Act.” Affordable? Hardly

President Joe Biden’s signature climate law, the inaptly named 2022 “Inflation Reduction Act,” provided tax credits and other incentives to help accelerate the transition to alternative sources of energy like…


Friday, December 5, 2025
Perception? Reality?

We’re often warned against believing that “perception is reality,” but sometimes perception becomes the reality. In politics, it usually rises to the level of self-fulfilling prophesy. The November 4 election…


Friday, November 14, 2025
In the Land of Unlearned Lessons, Will an AI Bubble Burst?

I’ve been seeing a lot of talk recently, warning of a bubble in the development of artificial intelligence. For instance, the following quotes are from an article on The Motley…


Wednesday, November 5, 2025
Veto Session: Death and Taxes, Lots and Lots of Taxes

The fall veto session ended in the wee hours of Halloween morning, which was apt when you consider the horrors that were unleashed on the taxpayers of Illinois during those…


Monday, July 21, 2025
What We’re Paying for Public Transit and Why I Voted for a Pension Sweetener

On March 19, 1974, a referendum proposition “Shall a Regional Transportation Authority be created for Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry and Will Counties, Illinois?” was presented to the voters of…


Monday, July 7, 2025
McHenry County and the RTA: Should We Stay or Should We Go?

Having finished one of the weirdest sessions of the General Assembly that I’ve seen in my time there, it took some time to digest what we just endured. Now that…


Wednesday, May 21, 2025
The Reick Report: Mental Health Screening in Schools, How Far Will We Go?

It’s been a while since my last Reick Report, and I apologize. I suppose I could’ve handed the job of writing my Reick Reports to a Chatbot and hoped that…