“As I’ve said repeatedly, I’m interested in working with anyone and everyone who is committed to preventing and ending homelessness. Anything short of that, then I don’t know what purpose they may have,” Mayor Brandon Johnson said.

Said Gov. JB Pritzker, “With $625 million in public and private investments, and representation from over 50 public and private entities across Chicago and the Midwest region, it’s clear that The Bloch is ready to lead cross-sector collaboration — and develop the future of quantum.”

Bears president Kevin Warren stated the team would commit over $2 billion to transform the Museum Campus and revamp the surrounding infrastructure — all of which Warren hopes could begin as soon as this year. But Friends of the Parks is playing defense as the building would seem to violate the lakefront protection ordinance.

“Maybe I’ll introduce a resolution in council in April to suspend everybody’s Twitter account,” Ald. Maria Hadden said. “Can people please think before they tweet, speak? Can you think about your own actions? Can you think before you file a resolution for a special meeting. Can you think before you call a press conference. Can you think before you call someone anti-American, or Marxist, or socialist, or whatever the latest bad word? … fascist? Can we think before we call names?”

“Any decisions to remove any violence funding, including ShotSpotter from any ward, should notify this City Council in advance and hold a meeting of the Public Safety Committee prior to the removal and hold a full vote by the City Council,” Ald. David Moore said.

A mass shooting on Chicago’s West Side Sunday morning left a 19-year-old woman dead and four others injured, police said. The victim was inside Poppy’s Chat Room café when an unknown suspect opened fire on a group of people. The other victims included two teen girls, aged 16 and 17, another 19-year-old woman and a 20-year-old woman.

Most 911 calls Chicago residents made in 2022 focused on car accidents, mental or physical health issues or noise complaints — not shots fired or other violence, a report that looked at more than 1 million calls to the city’s emergency number found.

The largest group of employees in each year worked an average of 30 to 40 hours per week. But that group has shrunk significantly from 2015, when 51.6 percent of operators fell into that category, to 34.8 percent of operators last year. At the same time, the cohort of employees working an average of 40 hours per week or more rose from 8.7 percent in 2015 to a peak of 21.2 percent in 2022.

“Americans rely on local governments to provide basic public services, on voters to hold local officials accountable, and on newspapers to help the public remain informed. Yet even many surviving newspapers are shells of what they were, as private-equity firms purchase such storied properties as the New York Daily News, Chicago Tribune, Denver Post, Baltimore Sun, and Buffalo News, only to sell off their downtown offices and printing plants and lay off reporters in droves. Doing so doesn’t make these firms evil…”

Mayor Brandon Johnson’s office says it will redirect a total 730 asylum seekers over the next few weeks from five park facilities to other nearby shelters. That’ll open up Brands Park, Gage Park, the Leone Beach Boathouse and Piotrowski Park, in addition to Broadway Armory Park. The move comes after nearly a year of protests from nearby residents upset with the lack of park district programming, who staged a demonstration as Johnson’s eviction plan started nearly two weeks ago.

State law currently does not allow school board members to be paid, though they can be reimbursed for expenses related to the job. But a bill filed in the state senate last fall would allow Chicago Board of Education members to be paid. Corrina Demma, an organizer with Educators for Excellence, noted that because state law prohibits employees of Chicago Public Schools from sitting on the elected school board, teachers could run for a seat but would have to quit their job in order to serve.

The proposal from state Rep. Kam Buckner comes as City Hall continues to seek new revenue streams to help stabilize its nearly $17 billion budget and pay for Mayor Brandon Johnson’s progressive policy proposals. What’s more, a larger goal, Buckner said, is to address racial disparities within the state’s video gambling industry, which generated more than $2.8 billion post-payout income last year, with nearly $960 million in tax revenue flowing to state and local governments.