Reis Introduces Cloning Ban, Good Government Bills

January 5, 2006

Springfield.….State Representative David Reis (R-Ste. Marie) recently announced that he is sponsoring new legislation that will seek to eliminate the use of state tax dollars to fund research on human cloning. House Bill 4156 provides that the State, units of local government, school districts, and community colleges, may not use or allow the uses of public funds, property, or credit for certain cloning.

"While the debate will continue on the embryonic stem cell research, we are confident that the majority of tax payers in Illinois do not want their hard earned money going to fund human cloning research," Reis said. "We are riding a very dangerous line here and hope that this legislation will draw a line in the sand so to speak as to what is allowable and what is not."

Also, Reis announced another proposal that is in direct response to the Governor's issuing of the $10 million dollars for stem cell research. "In issuing this Executive Order, the Governor deliberately skirted the legislative process. This legislation requires this Governor and all future governors to report to the General Assembly at the end of each fiscal year the fiscal impact of all executive orders issued or signed into law during the previous year." Reis said.

"The issuing of Executive orders has been widely used by our governors and while we don't discount their usefulness, we do feel that there needs to be transparency and disclosure protocols in place to see to it that tax payer dollars are being spent wisely," said Reis. HB 4157 will be known as the Good Government Transparency Disclosure Bill. Both HB 4156 and HB 4157 will be considered for action at the beginning of this spring's legislative session.