Those who may have thought former Gov. Jim Edgar’s service to Illinois ended in 1999 may be surprised – some pleasantly so – by last week’s news from Champaign-Urbana.

Edgar announced his Edgar Fellows initiative in which 40 young leaders in government, business and nonprofit agencies (selected from more than 200 nominees) will attend a 4-day training session in August at the University of Illinois.

In recent years, Edgar served as a distinguished fellow with U of I’s Institute of Government and Public Affairs. He came to believe that Illinois’ current leaders lost the ability to forge compromises to solve the state’s difficult problems.