From the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin
After two years under one umbrella, the Illinois House’s lawyer-heavy Judiciary Committee will split into two panels to review criminal and civil matters separately this year.
That’s similar to the setup that was in place for the better part of the last three decades — from 1985 until an overhaul of the state’s criminal code was completed in 2012.
But a renewed focus on criminal-law changes, the intricacies of many civil-law proposals and an attempt to increase efficiency have led lawmakers to, again, divvy up the work.
The criminal law committee will be chaired by Rep. Elgie R. Sims Jr., a Chicago Democrat, while the civil law committee chair is Rep. Elaine Nekritz, a Northbrook Democrat who led the singular Judiciary Committee.
Both panels this week will convene their first meetings of the year, with the House Judiciary-Criminal Committee scheduled to review bills this afternoon and the House Judiciary-Civil Committee slated to get together Thursday morning.
It was “members’ preference” to go back to the two-panel divide, said Steve Brown, spokesman for House Speaker Michael J. Madigan.
Additionally, there were time constraints when a bulk of legal-system proposals went through one committee of legislators.
“I don’t think any of them were saying they were being overworked. I think more of them were saying these matters require some additional time to review, and the schedule sometimes doesn’t lend itself to that,” Brown said.
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