Senate Minority Whip Tim Bivins, R-Dixon, told right-wing website TheBlaze.com on Aug. 4 that he would like the state to audit how Center on Halsted (COH) spends money it receives from the government.
“I certainly think sunlight should be shed on it,” Bivins said in the interview. “An audit would let us know what they’re doing with the money. If you’re paying to keep the lights on, even if they are just renting the building out, there are objections to be made as to how the money is spent.”
Bivins pointed to events held by outside organizations that had rented space at the Center, such as International Mr. Rubber and the Grabbys Awards, and said that if the Center were holding “heterosexual sex events…every government body and citizen would be outraged and funding would cease immediately.”
He attributds his colleagues’ silence on the issue to fear “of being labeled,” adding, “The AIDS hotline, I have no problem with that. But if another nonprofit with state funds was throwing wild parties, there would be calls for investigations and resignations.”
Bivins, who was for 20 years the sheriff of Lee County, voted against both civil unions and the legalization of gay marriage in Illinois.
The interview is at: bit.ly/1v5yyTE.