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A panel ironically titled “Tough times for local journalism” became a shameful episode for Eric Zorn, DePaul University and journalism.
“Overall TIF revenues from south and west suburbs shot up 28% this year, Cook County Clerk Karen Yarbrough said Thursday. Yarbrough said a homeowner asked her about TIF revenue during an outreach event last weekend in the south suburbs. ‘I was asked that question, ‘How do we hold our municipalities accountable?’’ Yarbrough said. ‘They’re kind of bewildered.'”
September’s showing (106.0) is tied with June for the best showing since the start of the pandemic. Before that, the last time the index was at 106 or higher was in 2015.
The program combines the efforts of City departments, community organizations, corporations and philanthropic organizations and will direct $250 million in public funding to 10 communities over three years in addition to $500 million in already planned programs and infrastructure improvements in order to revitalize commercial corridors, improve transportation and build affordable housing.
“I don’t want to repeat the mistakes of the past of just closing schools to close schools,” he said when asked about former Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s massive 2013 school closures. “And that might mean some hard decisions about what we do with some of our schools buildings.”
The commissioner of the Department of Water Management told members of the Chicago City Council on Friday that city crews had replaced 10 of the approximately 400,000 lead service lines responsible for contaminating Chicagoans’ tap water in 13 months. In September 2020, Mayor Lori Lightfoot unveiled a plan to remove 650 pipes in 2021.
FOP President John Catanzara Jr. said the unions are committed to “exhausting all options to protect our members rights.” But the mayor said, “It is foolish, foolish to be trying to take a victory lap when so much is at stake. Unfortunately, that is in keeping with the leadership of the Fraternal Order of Police. They will be vaccinated.”
“Last Saturday night, my wife and I went out to eat, downtown Chicago with another couple – several couples – and we were driving home on Lake Shore Drive…I heard a popping sound,” said Durbin. “It turned out to be the car next to us. The driver was leaning out the window and shooting into the air. He could have just as easily been shooting the gun at us.”
“As business has expanded, the population base has not kept up,” Mayor Mike Troup said. “We want to make sure that businesses remain strong and focused on Quincy for all their future development. We have to find the workers that they need.”
While acknowledging cases are going down, Hillsboro Superintendent David Powell said there have been other consequences. Among them, some other schools aren’t willing to participate in extracurricular indoor activities with Hillsboro.
“Kiplinger (a financial magazine) recently named Illinois the least tax-friendly state for middle-class families. The report names the state’s income, sales and property taxes as drivers of its status as a hostile state for middle-class families. Perhaps the only silver lining for Illinois is that neighboring Iowa, Wisconsin and Michigan all made the top 10 list as well.”
It fails to solve the city’s long-term problems of runaway pension debt, inadequate public service quality, and out of control tax burdens.
Despite the significant subsidies, experts say residents remain hesitant to buy electric vehicles due to concerns over the cars’ charging speeds and battery “range anxiety.” In addition, many communities in the state are considered “charging deserts” with limited access to stations.
The NAE Cities Index uses 59 separate metrics to assess how immigrants compare to their native-born counterparts economically, civically, socially, and politically. In light of the important role cities are playing in the COVID-19 response and recovery effort, this year’s Index also includes a new section on Inclusive Emergency Management.
The provision drew scrutiny following the indictment last month of Pritzker ally Jenny Thornley, formerly the top financial officer of the Illinois State Police Merit Board. Thornley is accused of stealing between $10,000 and $100,000 by reporting overtime she did not work and forging documents purportedly signed by Jack Garcia, then the merit’s board’s executive director.
As Illinois’ senior U.S. senator revealed how dangerously close he came to a drive-by shooting in Chicago, former White House advisor David Axelrod urged Mayor Lori Lightfoot to declare a “public safety emergency.”
Retired Chicago Newsman Jay Levine: “And it goes beyond the issue of personal safety. It threatens the financial health of the city. That hits us all too. We’re at risk of losing both tourism dollars and tax revenues. Potential visitors staying away because they fear for their safety. Michigan Avenue lined with vacant storefronts…”
Aldermen raised concerns about whether the open positions, and the possibility of underfunding, was slowing down the agency’s investigations. COPA’s Interim Chief Administrator Andrea Kersten explained, “We’ve always had vacancies in investigations, our agency has never had the full benefit of the additional resources that we were afforded back in our inception, we’ve never run at capacity for any significant length of time.”
The Expanding Abortion Services or TEXAS Act, filed Sept. 14 in the Illinois House, would allow anyone to sue those that cause unwanted pregnancies, or perpetuate domestic violence or sexual assault. The Protecting Heartbeats Act, filed Sept. 28 also in the Illinois House, would allow any Illinoisan to sue gun manufacturers, importers, and dealers over death or injury caused by their firearms.
Judge Brett Olmstead, who rules on all of the eviction cases in Champaign County, described his caseload for first appearances Monday morning (Oct. 4) as large: 57 eviction cases on his docket. “Still, largely the evictions we’re seeing filed right now are cases where the tenant-landlord relationship just isn’t working anymore. The landlord isn’t interested in being paid, they just want the tenant to move out.”
The ongoing interest accrual is one of two time-sensitive factors in addressing the deficit in the trust fund, which is the pool of money that is paid into by employers to fund unemployment benefits. The second is that Illinois law has “speed bumps” written into it that would increase employer tax burdens and decrease claimant benefits beginning next year.
Thomas Bertrand, executive director of the Illinois Association of School Boards, said. “We have a very diverse, very large state. Conditions vary from one end of the state to the other. That is why we are such an advocate of local control because one size often does not fit all.”
Todd Maisch, president and CEO of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce, said, “Policymakers – both in Illinois and nationally – have not evolved enough in their thinking to really address these emerging issues in recognizing the fact that they’re likely to be with us for years.” Ultimately, it’s the difference between confronting the economic realities of a pandemic versus an endemic.
Among the homeowners whose property taxes are entirely wiped off the books because they are disabled veterans are U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth and former Ald. James Balcer. “What we have done is to create all special sorts of categories — veterans, disabled people, senior citizens,” says Laurence Msall, president of the Civic Federation. “And all of those exemptions administered by the county basically undermine the integrity of the property tax system.
Commissioner Mark Kelly explained, “We’re the birthplace of jazz, gospel, blues and house — this incredible music scene across genres…But that being said, Chicago has historically never fully embraced that idea and understood how important our cultural vitality is. A lot of that has to do with race and systemic racism. So much of the creativity in the city has come from the South and West sides, and the city has historically failed to recognize it.”
Dr. Allison Arwady said the city is still negotiating with the various labor unions representing city employees on the details of the vaccine mandate, but she said the city is sticking to the Oct. 15 deadline.
“To be able to get something done, you’re probably going to have to find some common ground with the people you’re working with,” former Gov. Jim Edgar said. “(That’s) even if you are Governor and you have your party controlling the legislature — which I did for two years out of my eight.”
“We don’t have to balance our checkbook. We are like the banker in Monopoly. We create the money…” This, from a politician in charge of the national budget.
Retiring Cultural Affairs and Special Events Commissioner Mark Kelly cited 15 television productions in the city right now — a record. “We estimate the economic value of that for this year will be about $750 million. It’s now over 20,000 jobs. … And because Illinois’ tax credit is the only tax credit that has a minority hiring clause with additional benefits, over 50% of crews” in Illinois are either minority or female.
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