Illinois Senate honors Bond Buyer's Yvette Shields for her work

The life and legacy of Bond Buyer reporter Yvette Shields was honored Tuesday with a proclamation introduced on the floor of the Illinois Senate.

Introduced by Sen. Rob Martwick, D-Chicago, the proclamation pays homage to Shields as a "celebrated and beloved financial reporter" who "left behind an indelible mark on the public finance industry in both the Midwest and the nation as a whole."

Shields died on July 19.

"I talk with lots of people in the media but I had a sort of special relationship and friendship with her – we spoke regularly even if nothing was going on," Martwick said, adding she was also his constituent and neighbor.

Martwick, who is the lead sponsor of several pension reform bills, said that Yvette, "more than any other journalist," understood the importance of the pension woes facing Illinois and Chicago. He first thought something might be wrong when she didn't phone him immediately after a pension group meeting last week, he said.

"She didn't just understand the numbers and the finances," he said. "She understood the interrelationship between the mismanagement of the pensions and the societal ills that that mismanagement brought about," he said.

"The solutions were never easy and she enjoyed that," he said. "Our relationship was built on this mutual love of this complicated and complex problem. Her reporting went deeper and was more insightful than most."

The proclamation reads, in part:

Whereas: Yvette Christine Shields, a celebrated and beloved financial reporter with a national reputation in the public finance industry, passed unexpectedly Wednesday, July 19, 2023; and

Whereas: In 1997, she joined the Bond Buyer where for 26 years she built up a body of exemplary work that reflected her ethics of hard work and thoughtful treatment of sources and subjects; and

Whereas: Known for her prolific output, she has left behind an indelible mark on the public finance industry in both the Midwest and the nation as a whole; and

Whereas: To those who knew her, she was a warm and engaging woman who was always willing to share her knowledge and experience; therefore, be it

Proclaimed: By the Senate of the One Hundred and Third General Assembly of the State of Illinois, we hereby honor the life and legacy of Yvette Shields.

The Senate will vote on the proclamation as a memorial resolution during the upcoming fall veto session, Martwick said.