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“(Gov. JB) Pritzker and his power-hungry Democrats could have waited to change the law until after the current election cycle. Instead, they decided to do it midstream, a slimy move that bolsters Democrats’ hold on power in the Land of Lincoln.”
During Mayor Brandon Johnson’s closed-door meetings, the Illinois Senate Executive Committee quietly cleared an education measure that Johnson and the Chicago Teachers Union had opposed. It included a moratorium on all Chicago school closings until 2027 — and it would also stop the Chicago Board of Education from changing standards of admission for selective enrollment schools.
A plan moving in the House would require the Illinois Board of Higher Education to distribute a stipend of up to $10,000 per semester for student teachers. Advocates estimate the new stipend program could cost between $54-$60 million.
According to Chicago Police Department data, there were 302 hate crimes recorded in the city in 2023. That marked a 48 percent spike over the previous year’s total and represented the most hate crimes recorded in any single year in Chicago since at least 2012. Already there have been 90 hate crimes in Chicago reported in 2024.
Chicago already has a congestion tax of sorts that went into effect in January 2020 that applies to rideshare vehicles. It adds upwards of $3.00 to fares in a zone bounded by North Avenue, Roosevelt Road, Des Plaines Avenue, Ashland Avenue and the North Branch Canal. The program also helped close an $838 million budget deficit.
When Ald. Scott Waguespack questioned Rev. Ira Acree about what he thinks the RTA needs to do to address a looming $730 million shortfall once federal COVID-19 relief funds run out after 2025, Acree couldn’t provide an answer. “This is my first time hearing about a $735 million shortfall. So I wouldn’t want to respond to that today without doing the research,” he said.
The organization that put together Wednesday’s protest is the same group that plans to march during the DNC this summer.
State Rep. Maurice West, chair of the House Ethics and Elections Committee, said that was just a matter of scheduling and there was nothing untoward about how the measure passed by gutting and replacing a bill about child welfare. “Get their petitions like everyone else and run in the primary and/or try their hardest to … be a write-in candidate, there’s nothing more accessible than that to me,” he said.
“If you want transformation in the state of Illinois you have to pay for it. It’s just that simple,” said Mayor Brandon Johnson. “As far as the specifics of how we generate revenue to ensure that, that’s an ongoing conversation.”
Starting this summer, the program backed by federal taxpayers is set to issue grocery cards of $120 to families of school-aged children for each child, regardless of citizenship.
“If people want EVs, they will buy them. If they don’t want the EV, they won’t buy them,” said state Rep. Brad Halbrook. “No amount of taxpayer-funded subsidies will ever change that.” Halbrook added the massive tax incentive package given to EV manufacturer Rivian Automotive equates to a $1.5 million for every job created.
Equality Illinois board member and former sex worker Reyna Ortiz said, “Like anyone else going to work, it’s important to be safe and feel protected under the law. The decriminalization of sex work is providing safety for adults who engage in consensual sex.”
The state’s newly appointed insurance director, meanwhile, indicated her willingness to help regulate the industry, citing the consolidation of ownership as detrimental to patients. Ann Gillespie, a former CVS Caremark employee, was elevated to insurance director from the Illinois Senate by Gov. JB Pritzker last month.
“By design, these committees are doomed to fail. While valuable in a campus environment to include a variety of identities and perspectives, Jewish voices are too often minimized as non-Jewish ideas about the experience of antisemitism are given equal weight.”
“Democrats can say what they want, but this isn’t about updating processes or cleaning up rules,” Senate Republican Leader John Curran said last week during debate on the measure. “It’s about putting their thumb on the scales of democracy to change the outcome of our elections.”
The proposed sites, the former U.S. Steel plant on the South Side and the former Texaco refinery in Lockport, are both under final review, with a decision expected soon. The initiative would initially create about 1,000 construction jobs and up to 500 direct jobs, including positions for hardware and software engineers. The project is designed to be accessible, with many positions requiring only associate’s degrees and specialized training.
The proposed ban comes after years of issues with rowdiness, public partying and in some cases, shootings and other crime near or directly related to late-night bars on commercial strips in Wicker Park and Logan Square.
“It’s going to come up in the next 6-8 years, that they’ll be unable to fully pay the pensions that has been promised in this city to the police and fire.,” said Savage a nationally syndicated financial columnist and author.
As of Monday, the number of robbery reports filed citywide is flat compared to the same time last year. However, the police districts where last night’s crimes occurred are experiencing significant increases, according to CPD’s latest statistics.
Data provided by the chief judge’s office shows that since bail reform, judges have granted detention petitions from prosecutors about 60 percent of the time. People who are released have continued to show up for hearings, with an arrest warrant being issued in only about 10 percent of cases when someone fails to show up. And 88 percent of people released have not been charged with a new crime. Of those who did, 4 percent picked up a case for a crime involving violence.
School of the Art Institute officials asked police to disperse the encampment following five hours of talks with protesters, requesting they move to another location on campus. Protesters at the encampment blocked emergency exits at the museum campus, shoved a security officer and escalated protest actions on Michigan Avenue, school officials said.
In Illinois, the cities of Champaign, Quad Cities, and Peoria are also expected to lose their sites and will have their mail processed in bigger cities.
Only three nonbinding proposals are allowed on one ballot, meaning voters won’t see any other advisory questions Nov. 5. The Parents Matter Coalition was collecting signatures to get advisory questions on the ballot regarding parental rights concrning “any non-emergency medical procedure, medication, pharmaceutical or any gender modification procedure, gender identification counseling or gender therapy.”
“How dare you think you can come into someone’s town and do work,” Henyard said, saying trustees who voted to hire Lightfoot an an April 8 meeting overstepped their authority.
An analysis of state data shows that 17 percent of all police officers hired by the Robbins Police Department since 2000 came on board directly after they were fired from previous law enforcement jobs, the most of any department in Illinois. Robbins Mayor Darren Bryant said that “sometimes we take what we can get” when it comes to the difficult task of hiring part-time, low-paid police officers.
“Our ‘not in my backyard’ rules place strict limitations on density. They say that buildings can’t be too tall, individual lots can’t be too small and you can’t have multi-unit residential structures in most places. Imagine if we wrote a set of ‘yes in my backyard’ rules.”
Details emerging about Chicago Teachers Union’s upcoming contract show just how divorced its demands, both extreme and expensive, are from the reality at Chicago schools. It’s not just about massive salary increases, but also about money for migrant students, climate initiatives, abortions and gender-affirming care. About blocking parental notification. Count on CTU’s demands to veer further from reality until the public finally says no.
Ted joined Dan and Amy to talk about a new law passed by the Democratic supermajority and signed by Gov. J.B. Pritzker that results in brazen election interference, keeping Republicans off ballots; about a referendum that tests the waters for a renewed progressive income tax hike; about how the Parental Notification referendum question was knocked off the ballot; and why laws like that pass so easily.
A longtime Democratic lawmaker said of CTU that “clearly they lack credibility, but they don’t need it because they use intimidation. … Nobody’s telling them to stop it.” The lawmaker asked not to be identified so they could speak candidly about the union’s tactics without retribution.
“We’re underfunded for pensions,” Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez said. “We don’t have a dedicated funding for capital. So we’re not a fully funded district. So therefore, we don’t have fully funded schools.”
“People don’t trust it,” said state Rep. Kam Buckner. “Listen, if you want a system to work, if you want a transit system to work in a city like Chicago, you have to make the system irresistible.”
The new processing facility has been established at the company’s existing manufacturing site in Bloomington. The same site is also set to house its new $214m Kinder Bueno production facility, currently under construction. Last year, Ferrero opened an Innovation Center and R&D Labs in Chicago.
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