“It’s now time for municipalities across the state to get our due. All of us have done all of the things that the rating agencies and others have told us to do. We have made government work more efficiently. In Chicago, we haven’t cut services, but other municipalities have been forced to cut services, have been forced to lay people off. And yet, they’re still suffering,” the mayor said. “Springfield and the governor’s office have to take notice and start the

In a statement, Chicago police and the city’s Office of Emergency Management and Communications said, “there is no actionable intelligence in Chicago at this time and resources will be adjusted as necessary as this situation develops.” Mayor Lori Lightfoot echoed calls by Nichols’ family to protest peacefully.

“The bigger challenge is that Chicago needs a credible plan for more effective policing — a complex blend of recruiting, training, deployment, supervision, mental health support and accountability. Absent more effective policing, more police will not make Chicago safer. As it is, we have more police per capita than almost every other big city, yet no one feels safe.”

Chicago’s point in time count from 2020 to 2022, the count of people experiencing homelessness in the city, dropped 28% percent from 5,390 to 3,875. Statewide, that count dropped 12%. But while overall point in time counts indicate a drop, the percentage of people experiencing homelessness who are unsheltered – living outside – increased.

“Our tax policies limit our ability to recruit and develop more investors and businesses and grow our tax base to relieve pressure from the city’s taxpayers,” said Amy Masters of Chicago’s chapter for the commercial landlord group Building Owners and Managers Association.

“In some ways, the Yale-trained pediatrician is beginning the year the way she ended the last one: leading the city through an ongoing pandemic. But she’s also capitalizing on the audience she’s built during her regular COVID-19 messages to try and tackle the city’s persistent mental health crisis, which is at the root of so many other issues, from homelessness to violence.”

It is at once an opaque insider’s game and a spirited debate over Democratic messaging and symbolism, shaped by regional rivalries, whispered disparagement of competitors and high-powered public jockeying. “There’s sort of a baseline of stuff that matters,” said Gov. Phil Murphy of New Jersey, a former Democratic National Committee finance chair, pointing to issues such as security and hotel capacity.

The city and county have jointly launched a new, free resource for individuals who need health or social services support.

Brain Costin, of Americans for Prosperity, said the Bears are trying to use their power to protect billionaires and big businesses and not hardworking Illinois taxpayers. “The [payment in lieu of taxes] proposal will result in higher property taxes for the small business owners and residents who don’t have access to the special program. All businesses in Illinois should be treated equally before the law.”

More than 35 firms in the Chicago region have teamed up with the city and P33, a nonprofit organization founded by former Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker, to bolster Chicago’s ambition of becoming a technology hub and fill the more than 400,000 vacancies open in Illinois.

ExxonMobil Joliet, on the Des Plaines River southwest of the city, exceeded its permitted levels of pollution 40 times between 2019 and 2021, federal records show. Neither

Hundreds of Chicago and Cook County public employees are suspected of getting PPP checks after claiming to have phony side jobs. Clusters of people with addresses in homeless shelters and transitional housing received checks to cover at least $100,000 in annual income for pandemic losses claimed for seemingly fictitious businesses. And Chicago gang members got checks to buy guns, believed to have been a contributing factor in the city’s explosion of violence during the pandemic.

“The policies that really destroyed State Street and honestly, Michigan Avenue, the Magnificent Mile was the one-two punch of the lockdowns, the looting, but also the policies that continue to this day,” reporter William Kelly said. “Believe it or not, if someone shoplifting up to $1,000, there are no consequences…(H)ow long can you stay in business if somebody is stealing $1,000 from you every single day?”