According to a survey by Chicago’s Neighborhood Building Owners Alliance, 71% of landlords surveyed in September said they had tenants behind on rent. That number rose to 79% just three months later. “Many of them are struggling, many of them will face foreclosure, even property tax sales over the coming years,” said attorney Michael Zink.
The Countywide Equity Institute featured 10 speakers alleging ‘institutional racism,’ as well as ‘implicit bias’ and ‘white privilege.’ Illinois has just mandated this kind of instruction in all public schools.
“We are literally losing our youth. We can get our young scholars back in the building, how many are willing to go back,” said Dar’tavous Dorsey, UChicago Crime Lab & Education Lab.
“To the extent Walgreens is having trouble with with their website, I know that my team is always encouraging them to make it easier, faster, but the truth is that there are technical difficulties that arise. Walgreens doesn’t want them either,” Pritzker said. “I don’t know when that will be overcome by Walgreens, but I know that they’re trying very hard to make sure that happens.”
CPS parent Sheila Mong: “Reopening schools to accommodate a small group of students for whom remote learning was not working is our responsibility…We need to provide a pathway back to student engagement in a classroom setting for those who need it. We still need to figure out how to do this so that it’s less disruptive to the majority of students who remain remote. I applaud the principals, teachers and staff who will no doubt be working tirelessly to tackle this issue.”
“Hard to believe, but a great man’s life doesn’t fit neatly on some virtue signaling tweet. It’s complicated. It’s called ‘history.'”
The bill’s chief sponsor, state Rep. Maurice West, said it’s important teachers convey the long-term consequences of sharing sexually explicit materials. “It was very important before the pandemic, but I’ve been hearing reports of how important this legislation is, even during and more so after the pandemic, because now sexting has been part of Zoom meetings or video conferencing meetings that our students are having for school.”
Rep. Deanne Mazzochi raised concerns about the possible impact the bill could have on child care providers in the state. “It seems like we’re really putting the day care providers in a lurch because they’re not getting the copay, but there’s no guaranteed funding source from the state once the CARES Act money goes away, and that money is set to expire.”
The governor’s Feb. 30 COVID-19 proclamation expires Sunday. He filed a new 30-day emergency order Friday evening that expires April 4. But there are also emergency rules in place requiring businesses in Illinois to follow mask and distancing guidelines or face fines.
The ability to impose a gas tax came in 2019 when Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and state lawmakers doubled the statewide fuel tax. The new law also granted certain counties the power to increase or start a local gas tax “not less than 4 cents per gallon and not more than 8 cents per gallon.” Will County was the first to add a 4-cent tax under the new law, and was followed by DuPage County doubling from 4 to 8 cents in November and the city of Chicago going from 5 to 8 cents on Jan. 1.
Advocates for corporate diversity and inclusion are hailing a first-ever report on the demographic composition of boards of directors for some companies headquartered in Illinois as a “gold mine” of data and a “game changer.”
“We need to come up with our own solutions. We need to do it with the community. We need to win back the trust that all of Chicago government has lost over many decades,” Ald. Maria Hadden said. “Working through a legislative process — this is not leaving the accountability or the value or the perception of a policy change up to one person.”
“A common observation is that there are two Chicagos — one prosperous and reasonably secure, the other poor and violent. What was novel about the year just past was the periodic irruption of the violent Chicago into the peaceful one.”
As of Tuesday, there are only 196 active COVID-19 cases among the inmate population and 92 staff cases at Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) facilities across the state. So far, 18 correctional facilities have received the first dose of the vaccine.
Adam Schuster, of the Illinois Policy Institute: “Pritzker is quick to look for ways to tap businesses, but his budget doesn’t include real cuts to state spending. (It does, however, freeze spending on education and most programs at the prior year’s levels.)…Pritzker’s budget proposal doesn’t match his rhetoric.”
On July 3, police arrested Jesus Moro after CPD surveillance cameras recorded him firing a handgun outside John Spry Elementary School in Little Village, according to court records. Judge David Navarro ordered Moro held in lieu of $100,000 the next day, but Judge LeRoy Martin Jr cut that in half a few days later, and Moro went home by posting a $5,000 deposit bond, records show.
Governor JB Pritzker proposed a 10% cut to state income tax that gets sent out to local governments. While it would take a chunk out of the state’s deficit, it would put Winnebago County at a $580,000 deficit with only two options: cut staff members or raise property taxes.
Asked if he had any plans to end his mask mandate, which has been in effect since last May, before it expires in early June, the governor replied, “I plan to keep the mask mandate in effect as long as it will be helpful in us keeping people safe across the state of Illinois.”
Mark Konkol: “‘It shows that J.B. Pritzker has continued to make enemies in the party, and that’s no good for the governor or his agenda,’ state Rep. La Shawn Ford said. ‘He goes in with knives, and people don’t forget feeling the cut. … That’s going to hurt his ability to get things done and keep people [in the party] from wanting him to be successful.'”
Records connected to the Caldero and Acevedo indictments list the same grand jury number that appears in records related to the indictment last November of members of former House Speaker Michael Madigan’s inner-circle, as well as on a federal subpoena delivered last summer to Madigan’s offices. It can also be seen in records related to the racketeering case against Ald. Edward M. Burke.
The 60611 ZIP code that takes in the Magnificent Mile shopping district of North Michigan Avenue and Navy Pier accounted for the state’s most dramatic plunge in sales tax collections – about one-quarter of the city’s $290 million portion of those sales tax losses. Also hard hit, though on a smaller scale, were other places that rely on retail sales and tourism to fund municipal services: mall-dependent towns like Schaumburg, Rosemont and Skokie.
“We sincerely believe that they are going to waste this money just like the last $5 billion state income tax increase just like in 2017,” said Taxpayer Education Foundation Executive Director Matthew Schultz. “[Michael] Madigan, for example, will be receiving $85,000 a year compounded 3%, subsided by taxpayers.”
“The change is being driven by generational, ideological and demographic shifts, with federal law enforcement and organized labor providing major assists. The result is a move away from iron-fist bossism toward a more diffuse leadership structure that’s increasingly diverse and practices an increasingly progressive style of politics centered on economic and racial equity.”
Official reporting of pension debt by the state of Illinois puts the debt at less than half of Moody’s estimate, $144.4 billion at the end of fiscal year 2020. State estimates use much more optimistic, and less realistic, assumptions about investment returns.
“The real story of Illinois governor’s office is that the administrations have been held captive to a political faction whose primary objective is a war on the police. Pritzker’s signing the recent legislation is merely the latest chapter in this grand political sellout, justified confirmation of this chilling truth, already revealed time and again in Pritzker’s predecessors. “
Ted was on Bishop in the Morning on WMAY to talk about Moody’s $317 billion pension numbers and to respond to State Senator Robert Martwick’s (D-Chicago) willingness to talk about pension reform. He also discussed why the legislature should strip the governor of his COVID executive order powers.
As the owner of Water Tower Place plots a comeback for the Mag Mile mall, a bunch of tenants have decided not to wait around to see how the plan turns out. At least 10 retailers have left Water Tower in recent months, departures overshadowed by the recent decision of Macy’s, the mall’s biggest tenant, to close its department store there.
The vice president is promoting the federal government’s role in setting up the United Center mass vaccination site and the administration’s desire to confront vaccine hesitancy among people of color.
Citing numbers from the state’s tourism office, Mendoza said COVID-19-related shutdowns and event cancellations cost the state nearly a $500 million in tax revenue over the past year, and state hotel revenue fell from $300 million in fiscal year 2019 to $250 million in fiscal year 2020. In the first six months of the current fiscal year, the state has only brought in $42.5 million in hotel tax revenue, she said.
This is just one of several demonstrations by multiple groups opposing the relocation. Hunger strikers have also gone without food for 30 days denouncing the move.
Marilynn Gardner, the President & CEO of Navy Pier, which has been closed since September, says the largest tourist attraction in the Midwest is at risk of closing permanently. “We’re able to provide for the distancing within our vast spaces, she said. “[If we] shift to the 50% and the show may go on.” But, Gardner says, the facility needs assurances there will be a tourist and convention season in the city to begin preparation.
“Revenue loss was was large, but it wasn’t as large as we thought,” said Kenneth A. Kriz, Director, of the Institute for Illinois Public Finance. “One of the interesting kind of patterns is that overall consumption is back to about where it was. It’s down maybe 5% a little bit less than that.”
More than 19,000 CPS employees have had an opportunity for a COVID-19 shot through either partnerships between the district and health care providers or the four CPS-run vaccination site across the city. Potentially thousands more have had access through appointments with private health care providers or pharmacies they sought out on their own.
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