Do police in Illinois have to obey traffic laws?

I’ve had this asked more than once, so I felt it best to put the mat­ter to rest. I’ve seen many police vehi­cles going through red lights, speed­ing, mak­ing u-turns.… and not dis­play­ing flash­ing lights or a siren. What is the “statu­tory” require­ment for “emer­gency vehi­cles” when it comes to obey­ing traf­fic laws? Well.….

(625 ILCS 5/11–205) (from Ch. 95 1/2, par. 11–205)
Sec. 11–205. Pub­lic offi­cers and employ­ees to obey Act-Exceptions.
(a) The pro­vi­sions of this Chap­ter applic­a­ble to the dri­vers of vehi­cles upon the high­ways shall apply to the dri­vers of all vehi­cles owned or oper­ated by the United States, this State or any county, city, town, dis­trict or any other polit­i­cal sub­di­vi­sion of the State, except as pro­vided in this Sec­tion and sub­ject to such spe­cific excep­tions as set forth in this Chap­ter with ref­er­ence to autho­rized emer­gency vehi­cles.
(b) The dri­ver of an autho­rized emer­gency vehi­cle, when respond­ing to an emer­gency call or when in the pur­suit of an actual or sus­pected vio­la­tor of the law or when respond­ing to but not upon return­ing from a fire alarm, may exer­cise the priv­i­leges set forth in this Sec­tion, but sub­ject to the con­di­tions herein stated.
© The dri­ver of an autho­rized emer­gency vehi­cle may:
1. Park or stand, irre­spec­tive of the pro­vi­sions of this Chap­ter;
2. Pro­ceed past a red or stop sig­nal or stop sign, but only after slow­ing down as may be required and nec­es­sary for safe oper­a­tion;
3. Exceed the max­i­mum speed lim­its so long as he does not endan­ger life or prop­erty;
4. Dis­re­gard reg­u­la­tions gov­ern­ing direc­tion of move­ment or turn­ing in spec­i­fied direc­tions.
(d) The excep­tions herein granted to an autho­rized emer­gency vehi­cle, other than a police vehi­cle, shall apply only when the vehi­cle is mak­ing use of either an audi­ble sig­nal when in motion or visual sig­nals meet­ing the require­ments of Sec­tion 12–215 of this Act.
(e) The fore­go­ing pro­vi­sions do not relieve the dri­ver of an autho­rized emer­gency vehi­cle from the duty of dri­ving with due regard for the safety of all per­sons, nor do such pro­vi­sions pro­tect the dri­ver from the con­se­quences of his reck­less dis­re­gard for the safety of oth­ers.
(f) Unless specif­i­cally made applic­a­ble, the pro­vi­sions of this Chap­ter, except those con­tained in Sec­tion 11–204 and Arti­cles IV and V of this Chap­ter, shall not apply to per­sons, motor vehi­cles and equip­ment while actu­ally engaged in work upon a high­way but shall apply to such per­sons and vehi­cles when trav­el­ing to or from such work.
(Source: P.A. 89–710, eff. 2–14-97; 90–257, eff. 7–30-97.)

http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/ilcs5.asp?ActID=1815&ChapterID=49

So, what is an “autho­rized emer­gency vehicle”?

(625 ILCS 5/1–105) (from Ch. 95 1/2, par. 1–105)
Sec. 1–105. Autho­rized emer­gency vehi­cle. Emer­gency vehi­cles of munic­i­pal depart­ments or pub­lic ser­vice cor­po­ra­tions as are des­ig­nated or autho­rized by proper local author­i­ties; police vehi­cles; vehi­cles of the fire depart­ment; vehi­cles of a Haz­Mat or tech­ni­cal res­cue team autho­rized by a county board under Sec­tion 5–1127 of the Coun­ties Code; ambu­lances; vehi­cles of the Illi­nois Emer­gency Man­age­ment Agency; vehi­cles of the Office of the Illi­nois State Fire Mar­shal; mine res­cue and explo­sives emer­gency response vehi­cles of the Depart­ment of Nat­ural Resources; vehi­cles of the Illi­nois Depart­ment of Pub­lic Health; and vehi­cles of a munic­i­pal or county emer­gency ser­vices and dis­as­ter agency, as defined by the Illi­nois Emer­gency Man­age­ment Agency Act.
(Source: P.A. 96–214, eff. 8–10-09; 96–986, eff. 1–1-11; 96–1190, eff. 7–22-10; 97–149, eff. 7–14-11; 97–333, eff. 7–12-11.)

http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/ilcs5.asp?ActID=1815&ChapterID=49