In a special session Sep. 23, the Illinois Senate followed the lead of the House and passed a supplemental appropriations bill and a sweeps bill to prevent the unprecedented closing of 11 state parks and 13 historic sites scheduled for Nov. 30.

SB1103, the approps bill, and SB790, the sweeps bill, were the same bills passed by the House two weeks before and will restore $2.1 million in parks funding that unfortunately comes from designated funds for other Illinois Department of Natural Resources programs.

The park closings disaster was averted largely because of a grassroots revolution involving thousands of individuals and groups from around the state who took action to voice their disapproval -- staging protests, emailing and calling their legislators and organizing petition drives that gathered tens of thousands of signatures in support of keeping the parks open.

In particular, Partners for Parks and Wildlife, a coalition of environmental, recreational and sportsmen’s groups, held press conferences and aggressively lobbied legislators to restore the funding.

While the Illinois legislature’s action is an important step towards keeping the state parks open, it comes at the expense of several other programs impacting the environment that are being raided to cover the gap in the IDNR budget.

The top sweeps include: $5 million from the Illinois Clean Water Fund, $5 million from the Renewable Energy Resources Trust Fund, $5 million from the Wildlife and Fish Fund, $2 million from the Park and Conservation Fund and $2 million from the Illinois Habitat Endowment Trust Fund.

In addition, it’s not clear that Gov. Blagojevich will sign the two bills, and if he does, if he will actually spend the money. His administration has a history of not spending funds allotted for protection of the state’s natural resources.