McHenry Times

Senate Minority Leader Dan McConchie (R-Lake Zurich) recently criticized a judge's decision to award backpay to ex-lawmakers who claimed a pay freeze violated the state constitution.

The senator went on his Facebook page to criticize Judge Allen Price Walker's decision, who ruled that Illinois must pay two former Democratic lawmakers who sued to collect raises they voted to reject while in office.

"Unbelievable,"  McConchie said in the April 8 Facebook post. "Two former IL state legislators sued the state saying it was unconstitutional for them to vote to reject their own pay raises; today, a Cook County court agreed, setting the stage for a huge taxpayer-funded payout."

The lawsuit was filed by Michael Noland of Elgin, who is now a Kane County circuit court judge, and James Clayborne of Belleville, the Daily Herald reported in April.

The two claimed that laws freezing legislators' salaries from 2009 to 2016 were unconstitutional because lawmakers are prohibited from changing their pay during the current term. Typically, lawmakers receive annual inflation raises.

Government officials, including Comptroller Susana Mendoza, have also harshly criticized the ruling, the Daily Herald reported. Mendoza called the former Democratic lawmakers "shameless grifters" pursuing a "brazen money grab."

Mendoza's earlier arguments that Noland and Clayborne waited too long to sue were rejected by Walker, who said the two Democrats did not wait long to sue. According to Walker, the ruling applies only to Noland and Clayborne and not other lawmakers who were in office because they filed the lawsuit as individuals and not public officials, the Daily Herald reported.