-- Connecting the dots between our economy, government and business --
Top Illinois Stories
Legal challenges would likely argue Illinois Democrats can't use the state constitution to sidestep the U.S. Constitution's prohibition on so-called racial gerrymandering. Essentially, Illinois and others have so far been allowed to use the race of voters to draw districts, so long as race was just one of the factors used, and not the predominant factor guiding the making of the map.
"Here’s the reality increasingly emerging from CEJA’s ill-conceived targeting of gas-fired peakers: Carbon-emitting plants the law slates for near-term mothballing instead are remaining open for nearly two more decades. Meanwhile, Chicago-area power-delivery customers of Commonwealth Edison by and large soon won’t be benefiting any longer from the juice they generate. Instead, that electricity will support growing needs outside of Chicagoland, perhaps even from new data centers."
More Highlighted Illinois Stories
Through designated state licensing agencies, Illinois and other states recruit, train, license and support blind vendors, generating program revenue that funds those very functions. In December, the U.S. Secretary of Education gave the U.S. Army a broad, Army-wide exemption from the law, stripping away the opportunity for blind vendors to be prioritized in contracting to operate dining facilities, based on claims of cost concerns and isolated performance issues.
Nico Tsatsoulis the Libertarian candidate for Cook County Assessor: "The solution is clear: Illinois must adopt a model based on California’s Proposition 13. This policy caps property taxes on residential and commercial properties at 1% of the purchase price and limits reassessments until a property is sold. Since its adoption in 1978, it has provided the stability that families and businesses need to thrive."
The U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency proposed a rule protecting federally chartered banks from the controversial swipe fee law set for implementation in Illinois this summer.
"This is what the legislation says. You have to have those tickets in hand before you can sell them," state Sen. Steve Stadelman said. The House bill would also set up a complaint system for customers through the state attorney general's office. It also aims to scare potential scammers.
Romeoville Mayor John Noak told the committee that taking away local control does not do enough to address the drivers of Illinois housing costs. “Preemption certainly will not do enough to address those costs. A simple shift in homeowners insurance in one given year can wipe out any potential costs from these preemption approaches,” Noak said.
Two interim filings posted last week by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, an independent subsection of the U.S. Treasury Department, represent the latest twist in a two-year legislative fight. One of the filings specifically preempts the state’s first-of-its-kind Interchange Fee Prohibition Act, throwing the policy into further uncertainty by creating a second legal front and added pressure on state lawmakers amid an ongoing appellate court case.
In Illinois, the total number of firefighters decreased by 13 percent, more than 2,200 firefighters, between 2019 and 2023. House Bill 2136, also known as the Future Firefighters Act, would decrease the state’s age requirement for firefighters from 21 to 18.
Every year, Illinois prisons incarcerate about 30,000 people at a total estimated cost of $1.5 billion. Nearly half of those people have a history of mental illness. By diverting people from prison through mental health courts and other interventions, one Illinois program estimates it has saved the state nearly half a billion by avoiding incarceration costs over the past 15 years, with $85 million expected to be saved this fiscal year.
"Fears that the (federal scholarship) program could fund schools promoting discriminatory, racist, anti-American, or anti-Semitic views also fall flat. Nothing prevents the state from establishing clear guidelines to guard against such outcomes. As for Pritzker’s skepticism about whether the program fully benefits students — what exactly is complicated about a scholarship that places hundreds of millions of dollars directly into the hands of parents, including those who choose to homeschool?"
The widening rift between the state’s largest public landowner and its top wildlife conservation agency shows how state-funded transportation projects may have overridden Illinois’ Endangered Species Protection Act in 11 cases in the past year.
Sheila Weinberg, founder and CEO of Truth in Accounting, said the situation points to a larger pattern of deferred maintenance. “This is indicative of the short-term planning that our elected officials do,” she said. “They’re notorious for not doing maintenance on a regular basis and they just keep on putting that off. ... They don’t even figure out how much deferred maintenance they have. Some people say it’s in the hundreds of billions of dollars throughout the country.”
Ahead of an estimated 150,000 Illinois households losing access to federal food assistance May 1, Illinois launched two websites aimed at providing work, training and volunteer hours to those households. Job Ready IL collects training programs and employment opportunities, while Serve Illinois shares volunteer opportunities.
The inventory crunch is worse in Illinois than in most of the country. The state has just 32 percent of the active housing listings it had before the pandemic, less than half the national average of 79 percent.
"In some communities, homeowners see double-digit percentage increases, with no warning. We have an opportunity to set a reasonable limit on total annual property tax increases."
"Anyone who’s watched a Three Stooges short gets a laugh when Moe, Larry and Curly run for a doorway only to get stuck — but, minus the sound effects, it’s a lot less entertaining when the players are the people we’ve entrusted to run this state. Sure, democracy is messy."
A policy drafted by the Illinois Department of Innovation and Technology, which applies broadly across most state agencies, largely permits AI use. If an agency allows the public to interact with an AI system or uses AI to assist in decision-making, that use must be publicly disclosed, the policy states.
In its current form, the HB 910 mega-project bill allows developers to pay a small “special payment” in exchange for lucrative 45-year property tax breaks and allows local governments to shift every dollar of lost tax revenue onto unsuspecting taxpayers.
"Bottom line: To reduce property taxes in any meaningful way, the state needs enough new tax revenue to allow it to assume the primary role in funding education."
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, as part of a coalition of 23 states, said the order "unlawfully restricts voter eligibility and who can receive mail ballots, while trampling on states' constitutional authority to administer elections."
State Rep. Harry Benton returned to Springfield this week after being stripped of all committee assignments and ousted from the Democratic caucus.
"And then there was another problem. The House bill would impose a 9 percent entertainment tax on the area surrounding the future stadium. Everything from pickleball to pinball to zip line courses and music venues would be taxed."
According to Loyola researcher David Olson, McLean County detainees outnumber those who are released awaiting trial. “In the rest of the state, it’s the opposite pattern,” he said. “In the rest of the state, we see about two people on pretrial supervision for every one person that’s in jail pretrial."
Proponents of BUILD argued that the primary driver of the current housing affordability crisis is a lack of supply caused by regulatory hurdles and inconsistencies across municipalities. Opponents of the package — primarily municipal leaders — argued that BUILD infringes on local home rule authority and imposes a “one-size-fits-all” approach to residential zoning. Some also complained that it would impose unfunded mandates on municipalities.
When asked by a reporter if speed might come at the expense of taxpayers, Gov. JB Pritzker said the Bears have been talking to lawmakers for two years. “We’re not talking about speed here, or it shouldn’t be a discussion about speed. I think now you’ve got a bill that probably has too many items associated with it or at least some of them that need amending,” he said.
AFSCME Council 31, which represents roughly 350 employees, says the move violates the state’s Employment of Strikebreakers Act, which classifies such conduct as a Class A misdemeanor. According to the complaint, the striking members involved work as building services, grounds, and dietary employees responsible for maintaining student dormitories and preparing meals in campus dining halls.
It could be a few years before lawmakers revisit the concept. The next deadline for approving constitutional amendments is early May 2028, six months ahead of the presidential election.
Top Chicago Stories
“At one occasion, there was a half-dozen private security and a couple of law enforcement people at a major station at 9 a.m. in the morning. That’s not when the danger is for the average rider,” a spokesman for the Active Transportation Alliance said. “It’s at 2 a.m coming back from a concert, and you’re boarding the L at Harrison station, where the lighting is poor, and there are very few people around.”
At the same time, officials say they’re working through a backlog of roughly 91,000 tax refunds totaling some $200 million in overpayments that still need to be returned.
More Highlighted Chicago Area Stories
"(Mayor Brandon) Johnson is right that young people need support. But support without structure isn’t compassion; it’s abdication. The question isn’t whether to punish or support. It’s whether we’re willing to do the harder work of both."
"For Chicago, the shocking crimes are noteworthy contributors to its tattered national reputation — fair or not — for being unsafe and for criminal-justice policies perceived as being concerned more with the rights of those accused than the interests of those victimized."
“Officer Bartholomew would be alive today if this massively repeat offender of violent crime after violent crime were behind bars where he belonged,” said Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza. “No reasonable person breathing should think it’s okay to put an armed robber, carjacker on an electronic monitor and send them on their merry way.”
The program is funded by the American Rescue Plan Act through COVID-era federal recovery funds, which must be spent by the end of this year.
“Why are we paying these commissioners a large sum of money if they can’t identify efficiencies within their own department?” Ald. Anthony Beale asked.
After interviewing 60 witnesses and reviewing 100 hours of federal agent camera footage, the Illinois Accountability Commission accuses the Trump administration of militarizing streets, suppressing free speech and acting with a sense of impunity in the federal government’s monthslong immigration crackdown in the Chicago area.
David Glockner, who most recently served as Executive Vice President for Compliance, Audit, and Risk at Exelon, the parent company of ComEd, also previously spent more than 24 years as a federal prosecutor in Chicago. He has also been the s chief compliance officer at Citadel LLC, the hedge fund founded by billionaire Ken Griffin.
Alphanso Talley, 26, is the fifth person accused of killing or trying to kill someone in Chicago this year while on felony pretrial release. Since CWB Chicago began tracking such data in 2020, people on pretrial release have been charged with murdering two Chicago police officers, one Chicago firefighter, and trying to murder 30 Chicago cops.
The ages of the victims range from 16 to 57. Among those shot were two Chicago police officers, one of whom died.
Dolton officials submitted a plan to the court with three options to pay off a $33.5 million judgment it owes as a result of a fatal 2016 police chase that killed one man and left another severely and permanently injured. The judgment was awarded in 2022, and has accumulated interest in the four years since, bringing the total owed to families of John Kyles and Duane Dunlap to $40.6 million as of February 2026.
The mayor's Peacebook Executive Order invests $900,000 toward youth antiviolence programs, in which 50 peacekeepers between the ages of 16 and 24 will be hired part-time to teach their peers how to resolve conflicts and de-escalate violence.
Over the years, Chicago-area companies have become more reliant on foreign-born workers, according to federal data. In the Chicago-Naperville-Elgin market, 83,522 construction workers identified as foreign-born, 32.5 percent of the area’s workforce, according to the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures.
"The petty political dramas that play out in mapmaking create problems for neighborhoods like Englewood, which is sliced up across five wards. ... All of this happens because under Chicago’s current mapmaking system, politicians pick their voters."
Brandon Johnson has not formally announced a reelection bid for the 2027 race, though his team has expressed confidence he will win a second term. But that confidence may be put to a test as potential challengers included in the survey posted stronger favorability scores than Johnson — though the city residents surveyed displayed significant levels of unfamiliarity with those possible rivals.
Following the shooting, the suspect, completely naked and EKG stickers still adhered to his chest, ran into the nearby neighborhood carrying a firearm. Some residents reported he tried to break into their homes as officers scoured the area, eventually locating him shortly after noon, according to preliminary information.
"They don't want to admit that we have a problem with billing in the city of Chicago," Ald. Ray Lopez said. The alderman said the city's comptroller agreed last October to eliminate the debt, yet it hasn't happened yet. "We were giving them the benefit of the doubt, since everyone agreed with us. And now here we are six months later, and multiple sources say to me, privately, that there's only one entity holding us back, and he resides on the 5th floor."
"Chicago’s media outlets are amplifying a dangerous narrative that paints the Chicago Police Department (CPD) as racist and unreformable, eroding public trust and hamstringing officers who protect our streets. This isn’t journalism—its activism disguised as reporting."
Illinois Policy Institute policy researcher Ravi Mishra said the cost per mile is more than double the price of similar projects in other cities, and questioned the allocation of almost $1 billion in tax increment financing dollars for the project when Illinois has the highest property taxes in the country.
“I think the attraction to these kids are the sports cars,” a Valparaiso mother said. “They think it’s fun when police show up, so they take off and get chased. ... My son is 19, so there’s nothing I can do, honestly. If I say don’t go, he’s going to anyway. If I kick him out of my house over it, I’d be a mess worrying if he’s OK, where he’s staying, and would he ever forgive me.”
Leo Fiascone, high school junior and founder of Chicago Rising: "In 1970, half of Chicago was middle-income; today, just 16 percent remain ... In the last decade, Chicago lost approximately 85,000 Black middle-class residents. A shrinking middle class also hurts remaining low-income residents by reducing local jobs and tax revenue for essential services. Shockingly, no comprehensive city-sponsored plan addresses this mass exodus.
Chicago households were also operating in a state with heavy fiscal strain. Truth in Accounting’s 2025 Financial State of the States report gave Illinois an “F” grade and said the state’s taxpayer burden was $38,800 based on fiscal year 2023 data. More recent Truth in Accounting reporting on Chicago put the city’s taxpayer burden at $42,600, while Chicago Public Schools said its initial FY2026 budget gap was $734 million. Those figures did not determine WalletHub’s ranking, but they added context to the broader financial pressure facing many Chicago residents.
"In Chicago, the 'period for schooling' is now being shortened in favor of 'solidarity and community resistance.' While the students may not be able to actually read, they will learn the three R's of modern education: resisting, raging, and rebelling."
"Recent developments deepen the concerns. A federal judge has ordered (former Cook County State's Attorney Kim) Foxx to testify about meetings with lawyers who allegedly operated an exoneration nonprofit while also suing the city. If that’s true, it raises questions about the intersection of public authority and private financial incentives."
In 2025, new affordable units in Chicago will cost *at least* $679K a pop to build. 
The teachers union in a letter to its members Thursday said it has 800 students and staff registered to attend a May Day training at the Operation Push headquarters, and expects thousands more students and educators participating in this year’s May Day events compared to last year. “We are building momentum for a pro-Democracy movement that can win the transformation we need,” the letter reads.
For teachers and students not participating in May Day rallies, CTU and Mayor Brandon Johnson are calling for civic engagement activities in school. CPS CEO Macquline King said no students will be required to participate in civic engagement activities.
Wirepoints Research and Commentary
Summary and audio linked here.
Audio and summary 
If this bill passes, say goodbye to local control over all Illinois parks and expect to see open drug and alcohol use, needles, no sanitation and fire hazards, but no ordinary park users.
Chicago’s political leadership is floating a pension buyout program as evidence it is seriously addressing the city’s thirty-six-billion-dollar unfunded pension liability, but Mark Glennon, founder of the Illinois policy research organization Wirepoints, said that the proposal moves debt from one column to another rather than reducing it, and that the broader fiscal picture facing the city continues to deteriorate across every measurable dimension. Audio here.
SIGN UP HERE FOR FREE WIREPOINTS DAILY NEWSLETTER
FOLLOW US
WE’RE A NONPROFIT AND YOUR CONTRIBUTIONS ARE DEDUCTIBLE.
MORE WIREPOINTS ORIGINAL STORIES
Expect no retraction or apology. This what they do. 
The state's existing buyout program for its own pensions is the precedent for Chicago, which should be a warning: Look out for similar exaggerated claims and shoddy analysis. 
Illinois lost another 54,000 tax filers and dependents, net, according to the IRS. Since 2000, fleeing taxpayers have taken $94 billion of annual adjusted gross income with them. 
Borrowing for current and past operating expenses, blanks for use of funds and more make Chicago's bond sale planned for next week smell mighty bad. Mark Glennon's interview is in the first ten minutes starting here.
Recent Comments