Continuing to stand up for a lifestyle older than the State itself, Rep. Tony McCombie (71st– Savanna) went to bat for boaters and campers in the Stateline riverside communities she represents following Governor Pritzker’s unveiling of his Restore Illinois plan, which limits family boating to 2-persons (even if related) and keeps campgrounds shuttered for most of the prime summer camping season.
In her letter sent Thursday, McCombie, herself an active sportswoman, described, “the two-person rule fails to recognize best safety practices for boaters that have children or have taken their aging parents for a ride in the sloughs or our rivers.” McCombie went on to write, “those boating with a young child or an aging family member or friend must always be vigilant of possible emergencies and an exit plan for their excursion on the water…if a boater has a medical issue of any kind and requires CPR, a third boater can provide relief in administering CPR or drive the boat to a safe place for proper medical attention to reach the boater in distress…this outcome of a 2-person limit merits further review and correction based on safety concerns alone regardless of the common-sense arguments of a family who reside together in an enclosed environment not being able to boat together on open-water.”
McCombie made it clear in her letter, however, that these two issues are not her only concerns with the Governor’s Restore Illinois plan, which also mandates that no restaurants or bars may be opened prior to June 26 in the State and offers no date-certain for larger religious services, but McCombie wrote, “in this letter, I hope to address what I believe may be simple oversights on your part,” she wrote to the Democrat Governor, with whom she has sparred repeatedly over failures to involve the co-equal legislative branch in crisis decision-making related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
