Wheeling staff outlines several Illinois law changes taking effect Jan. 1, 2026 that affect municipal operations
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Summary
Village staff summarized amendments including the Lift Assist fee authority, rooftop safety survey requirements, expanded administrative adjudication remedies, new food handling training mandates, FOIA and Open Meetings Act changes, and anti-squatting clarifications; staff noted some changes increase local workload but do not preempt home-rule authority.
Village staff summarized a package of Illinois legislative changes that took effect Jan. 1, 2026 and that will affect municipal operations in Wheeling.
Mr. Ferullo reviewed several items: the so-called "Lift Assist" amendment to the Illinois Municipal Code, which permits municipalities to charge reasonable fees for assisted-living or nursing-facility lift-assist runs after the sixth lift in a calendar year; the Rooftop Safety for First Responders Act, which requires municipalities to survey buildings with low-slope roofs and share results with public safety agencies by Jan. 1, 2027; and amendments to administrative-adjudication provisions that authorize hearing officers to impose non-monetary remedies, including orders to remediate violations and municipal remediation with cost recovery.
He also described public-health and administrative changes: additional food-service sanitation training now must include gluten and celiac education; a change to the Illinois Municipal Code expands authority to use utility poles and rights-of-way for public-safety equipment; the Freedom of Information Act now excludes "junk mail" from public-records requests and relieves public bodies of any obligation to open attachments or embedded links in emailed FOIA requests (requesters must place their FOIA text in the email body); and the Open Meetings Act was amended to prohibit holding public meetings on any election day.
On a separate point, Mr. Ferullo said the Capital Development Board Act was amended to limit municipal enforcement of local permitting and ordinance requirements against state-owned construction projects, and an anti-squatting amendment clarifies that law enforcement may remove criminal trespassers under state trespass laws rather than relying solely on eviction lawsuits.
Mr. Ferullo noted Wheeling's local ordinance already allows lift-assist charges after three calls and said the state law did not preempt home-rule authority, so no immediate code change was required.