Until the Illinois General Assembly in a fit of reform abolished pretty much all legislative commissions because some (maybe most) were existed primarily to provide patronage employment, there was a commission to visit correctional institutions.
Barrington’s Senator John Graham Chairman of the Penal Subcommittee of the Commission to Visit Institutions.
The Graham Correctional Center is named after him.
That commission provided oversight of the Illinois Department of Corrections that does not exist today.
During the mid-1990’s, the Illinois House formed the Prison Review Committee, Co-Chaired by Republican Tom Johnson and Democrat Tom Dart (now Cook County Sheriff). I served as a replacement member for its hearings.
That committee held Corrections officials feet to the fire, so to speak.
.My question to every Warden related to how drugs got into the prison. I figured there were three main avenues:
- staff
- visitors
- vendors
Since then one Jacksonville inmate wrote me that drugs were put into soft drink cans, tossed over the fence and then retireved by a member of the prisoner clean-up crew.
Today, as a potential source, I would add drones.
The Department has also banned books not sent from Amazon, Bargain Books Wholesale, Book Depot, Books N Things, and Freebird Publishers, etc., because drugs were being infused into pages.
As of Sept. 30, 2025, all mail to prisoners was scanned or copied to keep drug-soaked paper out of inmate areas.
Visitors may no longer bring books or magazines.
I have recently learned that the problem still exists, which obviously means prison officials are still not keeping drugs out of prisons.
What the Johnson-Dart committee did was provide legislative oversight.
Now, there is a llinois Department of Corrections Advisory Board.
Its minutes go back to 2009. In its last posted minutes, December 15, 2025, a quorum was not present.
Members of the Advisory Board are
- Loyola University – Dr. Dave Olson
- Executive Director of John Howard Association – Jenny Vollen-Katz [Note this member is quoted in the press release below]
- Executive Director of Chicago Beyond – Dr. Nneka Jones-Tapia
- Heartland Alliance – Marlon Chamberlain
- North Lawndale Employment Network – Sadie Joseph
- Women’s Justice Institute – Alexis Mansfield
- Illinois Coalition for Higher Education in Prison – Lejia Johnson
- Impact for Equality – Loren Jones
- Illinois State University – Dr. Nathan Stephens
- Attorney in Private Practice – Reena Sikdar
If you, like I have never heard of this Advisory Commission, that’s an indication of its lack of importance.
Note that there is no connection to the General Assembly.
= = = = =
Now to what prompted what I wrote above:
From The Center Square:
Advocate calls for stronger IDOC oversight after payroll fraud guilty plea
- By Catrina Barker | The Center Square contributor
(The Center Square) – Calls for stronger oversight of the Illinois Department of Corrections are growing after a former department payroll employee pleaded guilty to stealing nearly $125,000 by falsifying her husband’s overtime and holiday pay records.
Jennifer Vollen-Katz, executive director of the John Howard Association, said the case highlights the need for broader transparency and accountability within the agency, extending beyond financial oversight.
The John Howard Association thinks legislators should be calling for far more transparency and accountability over the Illinois Department of Corrections in a lot of different ways, not just financial accounting,” Vollen-Katz told The Center Square.
The Illinois Department of Corrections received nearly $2.6 billion in taxpayer funds in the fiscal year 2027 operating budget.
Vollen-Katz said lawmakers should demand greater insight into how those taxpayer dollars are spent and strengthen measures that hold the agency accountable.
“This situation is deeply concerning,” she said, noting that recent inspector general audits identified other deficiencies in the department’s financial practices. “This isn’t the only situation that’s been identified where financial accounting practices haven’t been particularly effective in ensuring that tax dollars are not being wasted.”
Vollen-Katz said the payroll fraud represents more than an isolated theft because it diverted taxpayer money for personal gain.
“This person was stealing money from the Illinois taxpayers because it is our dollars that fund state agencies,” she said. “The problem here is the illegal skimming of funds, redirecting them to places they do not belong for individual financial gain.”
She argued lawmakers should expand their oversight beyond payroll practices, pointing to aging prison facilities, inmate treatment, ongoing litigation and prison healthcare.
Vollen-Katz criticized the state’s prison healthcare system, saying Illinois continues to spend significant taxpayer dollars while many medical positions remain vacant.
“We’re paying $500 million, and what are we getting?” she said, referring to the state’s contract with prison health care provider, Centurion. “I think legislators are well-positioned to ask those questions and get responses from the Illinois Department of Corrections.”
She said Illinois should establish an independent prison oversight body through state law to improve transparency and identify problems more quickly.
“I think Illinois needs to create stand-alone, independent prison oversight that is authorized, empowered by the state through statute and resource so that more of these issues will be caught more quickly and corrected in a more expedient manner,” Vollen-Katz said.
State Sen. Terri Bryant, R-Murphysboro, a 20-year veteran of the Illinois Department of Corrections and former IDOC auditor, said the case demonstrates that existing auditing procedures ultimately worked.
“It is unfortunate when people think they can game the system and never get caught,” Bryant said in a statement. “As a former auditor for IDOC, I’m glad to see the audit system worked. Justice is being served.”
