“I’m a little surprised that we have four attorneys in here who think it’s okay to silence freedom of speech,” Ald. Nick Sposato said. “Little unclear to me why we are singling out abortion clinics instead of other places.”

“What is the impact of taking attention and resources away from the Park District and local parks? … Where are the details? There’s a lot of, ‘Just trust me’ going on,” said Gin Kilgore, of Friends of the Parks.

The report also rips state officials for not prioritizing intercity bus travel. Illinois’ bus network lags more than any other Midwestern state “due to a lack of planning, branding, and marketing of state-supported bus services,” the authors write. Five of 10 most heavily traveled routes in Illinois lack direct bus service, according to the report.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson pushed back on the idea that this summer will resemble 1968. “I’m not the mayor of the city of Chicago if a generation ago, and a generation before that, did not protest,” said Johnson. “I want to assure people that it’s not 1968. I am not the mayor of 1968.”

“It’s amazing to me that the city has known about this for years and they’ve done nothing,” said one frustrated neighbor. “Why?”

Beaming in a new video, Tom McKone waves his arm and proudly states that the CTA has established “a pilot program with a couple of outreach agencies” across a few lines to provide “outreach services for individuals experiencing homelessness.” Because of CTA’s status as a makeshift shelter since the pandemic, McKone decided that the CTA should formalize this designation.

U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin said, “I’m proud of this city and I’m honored to represent it. And I want to make sure that at the end of the week for the Democratic National Convention, people have a positive feeling about this great city. ” He said police should step in as soon as there are threats of violence, vandalism or looting.

Paul Alivisatos is president of the University of Chicago: Students demanded that we side against Israel, violating the core principle of institutional neutrality.

Johnson has been under fire for months now from Democrats and Republicans alike over his disastrous handling of the Windy City’s illegal immigrant crisis, with a citizen-led effort to put an initiative on the November ballot that would allow Chicago residents to recall their mayor currently in the works, a measure which now has the support of a powerful local police union.

“You know, we can’t just simply put forward policies that detract from our ability to make sure that young people are seen and felt and heard,” Mayor Brandon Johnson said. “As far as this particular policy is concerned, it’s not in line … with my vision for the future of Chicago.”

“Protest is a strongly protected form of speech in the UChicago culture, and the demonstrators had multiple opportunities to express their views,” university President Paul Alivisatos said. “But many aspects of the protests also interfered with the free expression, learning, and work of others. Safety concerns have mounted over the last few days, and the risks were increasing too rapidly for the status quo to hold.”

“Of cities carrying more than $5 billion of outstanding CMBS office debt, Chicago took the cake with a distress rate of 75 percent — meaning 75 percent of the city’s CMBS balance collateralized by office debt is distressed.”

“It’s what we see in virtually all the Democrat-run big cities. Businesses are leaving. Residents are leaving. The migrant flood never stops. City finances are in a shambles. Schools are overwhelmed. But in Chicago, there is no sign of any policy reversal. Same old, same old. Not sustainable.”

A disproportionate number of Black- and Latino-owned properties are targeted for tax sales, but to say that is because of race is “too big an inferential leap,” U.S. District Judge Matthew Kennelly of the Northern District of Illinois ruled.

The Cook County Bureau of Economic Development has created a Manufacturing Apprenticeship Accelerator, funded with $810,000 from federal American Rescue Plan Act taxpayer funds. Wirepoints reports that manufacturing employment in Illinois has dropped nearly 5 percent over the last five years.

“We’ve already seen the results of CTU’s activism. Math and reading scores are plummeting. Just one in four students can read at grade level within Chicago Public Schools. It’s even worse in math. It’s even worse for low-income students,” Illinois Policy Institute Director Mailee Smith said. “Chronic absenteeism is rising. Enrollment is dropping as people are leaving CPS, and this has all been while a radical slate of CTU leaders have been at the helm.”

Student protesters linked arms in a standoff with U of C police dressed in riot gear around 5 a.m. outside the encampment, which was installed over a week ago. Cook County Sheriff’s officers were also seen at the encampment.

Johnson said there’s a lot more work to do over the next three years but expressed hope that leaders will be able to build off a foundation laid in his first year in office. That foundation, he said, was about “creating real economic stability within our communities while also addressing root causes of trauma in this city.”

A spokesperson for the city of Milwaukee confirmed that they will be sending about 75 officers in support of the DNC in Chicago. Gov. JB Pritzker said the convention will have an “extensive security apparatus” that also includes the Secret Service, the FBI and the Illinois State Police.

“Over the last several days, the presidents of Northwestern and Rutgers have made shocking concessions to the unlawful antisemitic encampments on their campuses,” committee chairwoman Virginia Foxx, of North Carolina, said in a statement. “They have surrendered to antisemitic radicals in despicable displays of cowardice.”

President Manuel emphasized the “need for a timely resolution” and that he requested a meeting with the Divestment Coalition tomorrow, May 7, through the engagement team formed in response to the encampment. In the introduction, Manuel said that the administration hopes the DePaul community recognizes the “deliberation, thought, and care invested” in responding to the Divestment Coalition’s demands.