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Two board members in particular— Aaron “Jitu” Brown, an elected member who represents the West Side, and Debby Pope, an appointed member from the North Side — are echoing the demands of the Chicago Teachers Union. So far, neither Gov. JB Pritzker, nor legislative leaders, are jumping to heed the call.
More than 290 city employees earned more than $100,000 in overtime alone, on top of their salaries; Of those city employees, nearly 69 percent are members of the Chicago Police Department. The Chicago Police Department spent more than two and a half times the $100 million earmarked for police overtime by the Chicago City Council as part of the city’s 2024 budget.
“One thing to consider is the finances of the city of Chicago; how will they pay for it? Another thing to consider is these are our policemen, these are our first responders, and we want to make sure that they’re well taken care of,” Pritzker said.
Gov. JB Pritzker said there has been a similar drop in crime statewide: “Shootings and homicides on our highways are down 60, 70, 80% depending on where you look — but certainly in the Chicago area — and that’s a result of more officers, investment in technology, making sure that we have summer jobs for kids, and making sure that we’re investing in areas that have high poverty rates.”
A Senate measure to fund transit with a $1.50 retail delivery tax and real-estate transfer taxes failed to clear the legislature during the regular spring session.
“We’re not going to be intimidated or buckle under some threat that’s coming from an individual that can hardly tie his shoes and bend over,” Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said. “Not going to do it.”
Julie Bosma, president and CEO of the United Way of Rock River Valley, said she wasn’t aware that state funds had been allotted to her organization this year. In fact, the fiscal year 2026 Illinois state budget includes two line items totaling $1 million for her organization.
The order directs city departments to partner with the CTA to “explore possible areas of collaboration,” including deploying the Chicago Department of Public Health Crisis Assistance Response and Engagement teams and the Department of Family and Support Services Homeless Outreach and Prevention teams to curtail smoking on trains.
Prosecutors say Anosh Ahmed and Sameer Suhail worked together to embezzle $15 million from Loretto, a taxpayer-funded hospital, and steered another $19 million worth of hospital contracts to Suhail through “corrupt” means, including bribery. Ahmed is also charged in a separate COVID-19 testing scheme that defrauded the government of about $300 million.
State Representative Brad Halbrook is sponsoring a resolution calling on Governor J.B. Pritzker to participate. “The money needs to follow the student, not the system, not the bureaucracy,” Halbrook said. “And this is a great opportunity to give students that are in schools that are failing, gives them an opportunity to excel.”
Some township leaders said the DMV has outgrown the 1100 sq. ft. site, which uses the township office building. They also cited security concerns and parking issues. “You haven’t seen sad until you see an elderly man or woman using a walker to cross (the street) to get to this building because there’s no parking for them here in this building in the township where they pay taxes to not only maintain the building but the parking lot they can’t park in,” Orland Township Trustee Frank Williams said.
In a 35-count ethics complaint, Americans for Prosperity-Illinois is calling for a formal investigation into the Rochester Public Library, alleging staff and board members used public resources to campaign for a 169% property tax increase.
Illinois, meanwhile, broadly eliminated all cash bail in 2023 with a provision included in law known as the SAFE-T Act. The provision, dubbed the Pretrial Fairness Act, was endorsed by Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, who argued at the time that “cash bail does not make communities safer” and “has simply exacerbated existing inequities and disparities in the criminal legal system.”
In years past at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, search committees received weekly updates on the demographic makeup of applicant pools, along with specific diversity goals for each department. If semifinalist or finalist pools were deficient in diversity, administrators could delay or block the search, records show. Redacted emails among UIUC administrators discuss solutions to inadequate diversity, including adding previously rejected minority candidates back into the shortlist or finalist pools.
During his remarks Monday night, Pritzker conceded these federal changes have put state and national climate goals at risk. Yet he maintained that Illinois has retained its ability to lead the Midwest in climate policy, emphasizing the importance of
PsiQuantum announced last year that it would spend a minimum of $1.09 billion to build the supercomputer and become the anchor tenant at the Chicago quantum and microelectronics park, a 128-acre project shepherded by Pritzker on the site of a shuttered US Steel plant.
His alleged crimes were heinous. Abuse of a corpse. Concealing a death and obstruction of justice. Class 4 felonies. It’s an infuriating example of how criminals in Illinois are prioritized over victims and their families. And how two laws – Illinois’ sanctuary status and the SAFE-T Act – can combine to wreak havoc on Illinoisans.
“It appears to be just another manifestation of the general practice in which OBM is actually closely holding their hand on the checker in order to find nickels, dimes, dollars for costs,” Joe Ferguson, president of the Civic Federation, said. “It’s beyond my imagination to even come up with something (that) looks like … from the perspective of liability and responsibility, a practice that takes this budgetary control mentality to a new extreme.”
The suit, announced Monday, seeks to stop a series of orders from federal agencies that would block people from the early childhood education program Head Start, Title X family planning, adult education, mental health care and community health centers based
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