We’re hiring interns! 🔍 Our team is looking for curious, hard-working individuals for the following legislative session roles:
⚡️ Session Legislative Intern
🏛️ Lobby Day Intern
‼️ The deadlines to apply are 3/13 and 3/16
❇️ For more information and how to apply, visit 🔗: ilenviro.org/we-are-hirin...
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For #WomensHistoryMonth, we’re celebrating #ColorOfWater member Cate Caldwell, Senior Policy Manager at @ilenviro.bsky.social.
See Cate’s profile here: colorofwater.waterhub.org/experts/cate...
🌊 Find more water experts of color here: colorofwater.info
Tracking votes on the most important issues, @lcv.org gives each member of Congress a score from 0-100% based on how they are voting on the country's most pressing issues, like climate change, clean water, and voting rights.
✴️ Check here to see how Illinois’ members scored: lcv.org/2025-scorecard
🧾 Yeah, it’s an election year — and we have the receipts. Do you know how your U.S. Congress members voted on key environmental policy in the past year?
Throughout the session, we’ll be reaching out with opportunities for you to make your voice heard when it matters most. We’ll keep you informed every step of the way. Stay tuned 📻
💡 We encourage you to take a look—and to be ready to act: ilenviro.org/illinois-202...
🥤 And we’re closer than ever to phasing out antiquated, toxic polystyrene foam foodware containers, the worst of the worst single-use plastic.
💾 We’re also working to pass new legislation that will ensure Big Tech, which is rushing to rapidly build massive, energy- and water-intensive data centers in Illinois, pay their fair share, bring their own new clean energy capacity, & contribute more to their neighboring communities than they take.
🪷 In 2026, we’re fighting hard to get legal protections in place for Illinois’ historic wetlands—an ongoing battle since the US Supreme Court gutted the federal Clean Water Act, leaving most wetlands vulnerable to developer bulldozers.
✴️ After many months of research, convenings, public town hall meetings, priority-setting, and bill drafting, we have proposed policy solutions to many critical environmental issues in our 2026 legislative agenda.
Our top priorities?
New resource unlocked 🔓 Take a peek at our 2026 Environmental Legislative Agenda: ilenviro.org/illinois-202...
🎦: Illinois’ Looming Abandoned Oil Well Crisis
🗓️: Wednesday, March 4
⏰: 12:00 - 1:00 pm
📍: Zoom
🎟️ Register here: zoom.us/webinar/regi...
Understanding and addressing this environmental & financial issue is critical, so we invite you to join our Illinois’ Looming Abandoned Oil Well Crisis webinar. The discussion will focus on the report's key findings, steps Illinois can take to tackle this looming issue, and how you can get involved.
‼️ A new report from the Northwestern Environmental Advocacy Center and ClientEarth USA has identified a major, but little-known crisis plaguing Illinois: a potential $1 billion oil well cleanup problem.
Additional budget priorities include:
🔌 $803M appropriated for consumer utility bill credits through the Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA), administered by the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity
🚌 $508M to support downstate public transit, an increase of $20 million from FY26.
Two raccoons peek out from a hole in a tree.
Gov. Pritzker's proposal includes funding aimed at cutting climate pollution, expanding clean energy, and helping communities lower energy costs across the state. ⚡️🌿
🔎 Curious about what else is in the proposal?
Is Illinois funding the environment? Gov. Pritzker released his FY27 budget proposal. Our team took a close look at what it means for climate and conservation in Illinois.
Take a look at our analysis to find out which priorities made the cut: ilenviro.org/the-environm...
⚠️ Take action and tell your legislators to protect Illinois communities from dangerous pesticide exposure: act.ilenviro.org/a/strengthen...
📰 Kim Erndt-Pitcher (Prairie Rivers Network) coined chemical trespass for Illinois Times and Investigate Midwest article: www.illinoistimes.com/news/this-is...
✴️ New legislation seeks to change this by requiring advance notice before pesticide applications near schools and parks. HB1596 won’t ban pesticides or target small residential use, but it will give communities time to move kids indoors and reduce risk.
Agricultural groups are wanting newer and better ways to kill weeds, but it’s time we ensure that playgrounds, schools, and parks receive advanced notice of pesticide application for the health of our farmers, communities, and environment.
Children and families often have no warning before pesticides are applied near schools and parks, increasing the risk of exposure. In fact, some of the most volatile pesticides remain legal, despite their well-documented dangers.
Studies have linked dicamba exposure to increased cancer risk, and 2,4-D to hormone disruption affecting growth, fertility, and reproduction. These chemicals spread through air, across fence posts, and into communities.
🍂 Across Illinois, trees, flowers, and native plants are showing damage from herbicide drift — a well-documented phenomenon where weedkillers travel far beyond where they’re sprayed.
Big Tech’s development shouldn’t come at your expense. The POWER Act will:
✔ Make data centers bring their own new clean energy
✔ They pay for their own grid upgrades
✔ Communities get pollution protections
⚡ Learn more: ilenviro.org/data-centers...
@ilenviro.bsky.social
💐 Want to make your love for Illinois’ environment official? 💝
Become an IEC member today: give.ilenviro.org/a/2026member... ✨
📰 Jonathan Bullington for @chicagotribune.com: “At one time, Illinois was a top oil producer. Today, that legacy is a $160M problem.”
State lawmakers have recently doubled per-well bonding requirements and removed certain caps, but experts say the changes still fall short of actual plugging costs. Without structural fixes, Illinois risks perpetuating a system where abandoned wells will likely become public burdens.
✴️ Deeper reforms are needed: better tracking of production data, stronger bonding requirements to ensure companies can pay for cleanup, limits on wells sitting indefinitely in “temporary abandonment,” and potentially a tax on oil production to fund remediation.
For decades, Illinois has collected fees from oil operators intended to fund well plugging and land restoration, but public records and investigations suggest that much of that money has been diverted or insufficiently tracked, while the number of wells needing attention has barely budged.
Farmers describe crop losses from salt-damaged soil and worry about contaminants migrating into nearby creeks and aquifers that supply drinking water. Methane emissions also contribute to climate change, adding another layer of harm from infrastructure that is no longer in operation.
