Will County Gazette

Illinois state Rep. Mark Batinick (R-Plainfield) can think of at least 349 billion reasons why Gov. J.B. Pritzker should be motivated to restart at least parts of the state’s small business economy by May 1.

“We need to be trying to get ourselves safely open as soon as we can, that’s especially true now that all the first phase of Paycheck Protection Program money has run out,”   Batinick told the Will County Gazette. “And from what I’m hearing, a lot of the bigger companies were able to get to the money first anyway.”

Batinick reasons the state needs a return to normalcy much sooner than later if it’s to have any chance of saving many of the small businesses that have been ravaged ever since the governor imposed his stay-at-home order as a way of trying to mitigate the spread of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.

“Hopefully, by May 1 we’re able to put a plan in place that allows us to reopen some part of our economy while taking every safety precaution there is,” he said. “I recently wrote a letter to Gov. Pritzker reminding him about the need to recalibrate all the restrictions as the data related to the virus has changed.”

May 1 is the date President Donald Trump has established for states to restart their economies. While the governor’s stay-at-home order is set to expire on April 30, Pritzker hasn’t publicly indicated what his plans are going forward, though he recently announced that the state has entered into a partnership with Indiana, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Minnesota to restart the region’s economy in a phased alliance.

Meanwhile, Batinick is imploring the governor to consider every angle as the target date fast approaches.

“In all crises, strategy changes with new information,” Batinick said. “We now know much more about the virus, and conditions on the ground have changed significantly since we saw our first case here in Illinois. We are now entering a critical time in this fight, and it is important that we balance our restrictions in this next phase. With this new information, we should look to increase restrictions in some areas while decreasing them in others. The ultimate goal is that more lives will be saved with less total disruption.”