The judge acknowledged that Cook County Clerk Karen Yarbrough’s office had not been a poster child for reformed hiring practices, but he noted that an appeals court ruling last summer lowered the bar for proving politics had been eliminated from a government agency’s personnel practices. By those new standards, Yarbrough’s office was due to be released from the mandates of the so-called Shakman Decree.

From March 2019 to Feb. 28, 2021, two years before the 6-10 mph ticketing, there were nearly 1,800 incapacitating injury or fatal crashes within 250 meters of a speed camera. From March 2021 to Feb. 28, 2023, the two years after the 6-10 mph rule went into effect, there were about 1,900 incapacitating injury or fatal crashes within 250 meters of a camera. Revenue from tickets during those same time period grew from $77 million to $185,200,000.

Illinois consumer and environmental groups are arguing in filings before the state commerce commission that there is racial disparity and “environmental racism” in Peoples Gas’ record of disconnection and reconnection in Chicago, as the utility seeks approval for a record $402 million rate increase. In the rate case for Peoples Gas, they are urging the commission to pursue “restorative justice” to address these disparities.

Crump and his supporters – including Father Michael Pfleger, members of the Rainbow PUSH coalition, and leaders from the Chicago Principals and Administrators Association – said CPS used substandard investigative tactics with false statements to oust at least seven Black principals.

Johnson’s transition co-chair Barbara Ransby opened up Thursday’s program by highlighting a philosophy of “Black feminist framework of intersectionality” that guided the team.

Affordable apartments in two- and four-flat buildings, considered the “backbone of Chicago’s unsubsidized affordable housing, were about 38 percent of the city’s overall housing stock in 2012. But in 2021, the share of those units fell to 32 percent, the lowest level in a decade, according to the report from the DePaul Institute for Housing Studies.

“For far too many decades, Chicago and Illinois politics have been defined by an ‘I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine’ mindset. Patronage hirings play a key role. They keep perfectly qualified job candidates from getting government posts solely because they lack connections to the pols wielding the levers of power.”

“Our new migrants are under assault, because they’re not familiar with what gang life means. They don’t know how to respond, and yet they’re still being preyed upon by these gang members,” he said.

“Exactly how screwed up are Chicago pension? I’m glad you asked.”

“In addition to advocating policies that hurt kids and taxpayers, the union has pushed statewide policies – including on vaccinations, crime, forced health care and pension investments – that are irrelevant to education or the core purpose of the union and potentially polarizing to wide swaths of Illinoisans.”

The amount the city owes to its four pensions that pay benefits to retired firefighters, police officers, municipal workers and laborers increased “due to the short-term impact of the global market volatility on recognized investment income,” the report said. Mayor Brandon Johnson, who took office in May, has set up a pension working group that is charged with finding sustainable solutions to the long-term challenge.