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In 2008 the Governor's Office paid Jansco Inc $5,625.34 to "Imprint -Pens."  According to their website, Jansco provides "creative, value-added promotional products at unparalleled prices."  A few examples of the pens that are available at Jansco are: The V2PSET which costs $32.25 per set of two, the I-Mark (R) - 1112 which costs $6.86 per pen, and the BrainChild Gift Club - PEN A252 which only costs $.76 per pen.

As you can see, Jansco provides a broad selection of pens at a wide array of prices.  Unfortunately, the Governor's Office did not provide us with more information about this purchase beyond the spending category "Imprint -Pens."  It would be helpful if the state could tell us if this spending was for purchasing pens or just imprinting them, in addition to how many pens they received for the $5,625.34 spent.  This information would help taxpayers make an informed decision on whether or not this type of purchase is a good use of our money.  

You can find this yourself by going to the "Checks to Businesses and People," selecting "Governor's Office" for the department and looking for "Imprint -Pens" in the spending category.

In 2008 and 2009, the Governor's Office spent a grand total of $30,026.35 on renting copiers.  They spent $6,408.43 on copiers up until the time of our FOIA requests in 2009 and an additional $23,617.92 on renting copiers in 2008.

To find these items on IllinoisOpenGov, click on Checks to Businesses & People and scroll down the Category of Spending Field to "Copier Rental, or Copier Rent."  To see the numbers listed in table, you can download the data by clicking on the Excel icon on the bottom left of your search screen.

YEAR	"Copier Rental"
2008	$23,617.92
2009	$6,408.43
Two Year Total	$30,026.35

 

 

 

 

In 2008 the Governor's Office spent $1,659.5 on newspaper subscriptions.  To get an idea of what this means, a subscription to The Chicago Tribune costs $4.75 for a week or $247 for a yearly subscription and The Chicago Sun-Times costs $1.40 for a week which works out to $72.80 a year.  Using the Tribune's cost of $247 per year it seems that the Governor's Office had at least 6 papers delivered daily in 2008.

In 2009, at the time of our FOIA request, the Governor's Office had already spent $6,942 on newspaper subscriptions.  Again taking the cost of the Tribune, $247 per year, as our estimate, the information provided to us by the state suggests that the Governor's Office was subscribed to 28 newspapers in 2009.  Which makes us wonder why did the Governor's Office more then quadruple their newspaper expenditures from 2008 to 2009?

You can find this information by going to the Checks to Businesses and Individuals section, sorting the Governors Office and searching for Subscription.