‘Hoax threats,’ ‘swattings’ continue to rise, joining real threats as disturbing trend for Chicago-area students – Chicago Tribune/MSN

The FBI’s Chicago office received about 84 reports of “incidents,” meaning reports of some type of school-centric threat, whether founded or unfounded, between October 2021 and September 2022, said FBI spokesperson Siobhan Johnson. Between January 2023 and March 3, they have received approximately 10 incident reports per month, Johnson said. For students, parents, and school staff the situations generate a “high degree of anxiety and ambiguity to what already exists” said one school security expert, referring to the already-looming awareness of mass school shootings.

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Chicago Needs Liberty, But Order Too – American Greatness

“Chicago shows the utter meltdown of a multicultural society. Even one-party rule cannot bring its disparate factions together. Lori Lightfoot, the would-be reformer who checked every diversity box, did not have the backbone, skill, and courage to redirect the energies of the city’s mutually hostile constituencies. Perhaps no one can in today’s Chicago.”

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Illinois comptroller ‘cautiously optimistic’ about revenues, but fully optimistic about Decatur – Southern Illinoisan (Carbondale)

“Estimates do not equal actual dollars,” Susana Mendoza said. “I think it’s great news, but we can’t spend money we don’t have yet… If those revenue estimates do turn out to be correct, then I would suggest that the first thing we do, rather than to look to spend new revenue dollars, is to pay down existing debts, specifically our unfunded pension obligations.”
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Governor’s FY2024 Proposed Budget Includes Increased Spending for State Agencies, Moderate Revenue Projections – Civic Federation

While total proposed FY2024 expenditures are nearly flat from the prior year, agency expenditures are actually proposed to increase from FY2023 by $2.7 billion, or 8.3%. With fairly conservative revenue projections for FY2024 anticipating a potential mild recession, a question going forward will be how sustainable these the proposals for increased agency spending are for future years.

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Bill proposes changes to online car buying in Illinois – WAND (Decatur)

“This bill is designed to modernize Illinois law regulating the home-delivery of purchased vehicles, to ensure customers don’t have to go to a physical facility just to sign some paperwork,” Will Munsil, Senior Corporate Counsel for Carvana said. He said the bill would clarify what has become common practice across the state, but is not explicitly allowed in Illinois.

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Traffic Stops by Chicago Police Disproportionately Impact Black, Latino Drivers: Report – WTTW (Chicago)

A report by BPI and the Free2Move Coalition found that from 2015 to 2021, the average Black Chicago driver was six times more likely to be stopped than the average White driver. Latino drivers were twice as likely to be stopped than White drivers. The report also found that CPD has increasingly been doing more traffic stops over the past few years, jumping from nearly 85,965 traffic stops in 2015 to 598,515 traffic stops in 2019.

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