State Rep. Fine looking to Illinois Senate to make health care ‘champion’ connections

March 23--Laura Fine said she is giving up her seat in the state House because she wants to establish allies in the Senate who will help her advocate for those in Illinois who need affordable quality health care.

"My big issue has been insurance reform for the consumer," said Fine, D-Glenview.

While she has reliable colleagues to work with in the House, "I don't have a champion in the Senate," she said.

Fine ran unopposed Tuesday for the Democratic nomination to fill out-going state Sen. Daniel Biss' seat in the 9th District. Biss ran for governor and came in second place in the six-way race for the Democratic nomination, according to unofficial election results from the Cook County clerk's office.

Fine will face Republican Joan McCarthy Lasonde of Wilmette in the November general election. Lasonde also ran unopposed in the primary.

Fine first ran for office in 2012, she said, after her husband lost his arm in a head-on collision with a cement truck a couple years before. She was motivated to run after her family stared down $600,000 in medical debt and fought for coverage for multiple surgeries as he healed.

A Glenview native, "my parents are in the same house I grew up in," Fine said, which is about five minutes away from where she lives now with her husband. The couple has two sons in college.

Mark Kodiak Ukena/Pioneer Press

State Rep. Laura Fine, D-Glenview, pictured in this Sept. 2017 file photo, ran unopposed in the primary March 20, 2018 for the Democratic nomination in an effort to become state senator representing the 9th District.

State Rep. Laura Fine, D-Glenview, pictured in this Sept. 2017 file photo, ran unopposed in the primary March 20, 2018 for the Democratic nomination in an effort to become state senator representing the 9th District. (Mark Kodiak Ukena/Pioneer Press)

The 9th Senate District includes more than 218,000 residents in Evanston, Wilmette, Winnetka, Glenview, Deerfield, Glencoe, Golf, Kennilworth, Northbrook, Northfield, Morton Grove and Skokie.

gbookwalter@chicagotribune.com

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