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The City Council’s Progressive Caucus has demanded any new franchise agreement with ComEd include both a progressive rate structure and an end to shut-offs — not just for those unable to pay, but also for those who refuse to pay.
Lightfoot has already ended water shut-offs, which has cost the city $20 million in water bill revenues. The mayor plans to ask ComEd to get on board.
“All the utilities — whether it’s ComEd, whether it’s Peoples Gas” should end shut-offs, she said. “People are suffering and they’re struggling. And we can tell from the data where those … problems are,” Lightfoot added.
Summary and audio linked here.
Chicago’s political leadership is floating a pension buyout program as evidence it is seriously addressing the city’s thirty-six-billion-dollar unfunded pension liability, but Mark Glennon, founder of the Illinois policy research organization Wirepoints, said that the proposal moves debt from one column to another rather than reducing it, and that the broader fiscal picture facing the city continues to deteriorate across every measurable dimension. Audio here.
Expect no retraction or apology. This what they do.
The state’s existing buyout program for its own pensions is the precedent for Chicago, which should be a warning: Look out for similar exaggerated claims and shoddy analysis.
Full interview and summary linked here.
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In our Post-Modernist world, it’s racist to suggest that resources are not unlimited. After all, each person’s reality is defined by that person’s identity. People whose identity involves never having had a job, their parents never having had a job and them having zero intention to ever hold a job have a reality that says water, electricity, food, medical services, everything they want or need that must be produced by some other human being….all of that is an ENTITLEMENT resting entirely on their “reality.”
Wow no more shutoffs! That will be good for businesses, no more electric bills. Steel companies especially.
Ah, that’s where you are mistaken. Businesses in Illinois are treated with a vastly different standard. It is businesses who are not only expected to comply with the strictest rules, but also are there to pay for those that don’t. Shutoffs will most definitely continue for businesses, because that will be carved out as an exception. Businesses will also continue to pay the bevy of “commercial” taxes that our esteemed politicians have placed upon them. I would bet, in fact, that shutoffs for small businesses will now occur faster than before, because they will have more time on their hands… Read more »
Pondering on this I was thinking that Pritzker should be letting the homeless stay at his hotels for free. Housing is a right and what better way to exercise that right would be for the head Democrat to open his assets to the poor and neglected.
I just don’t understand. How does a business model work if customers are provided free services? Doesn’t that also make fools of those who do pay?
Lighfoot says–“People are suffering and they’re struggling. And we can tell from the data where those … problems are,” Whats shes saying is the cities already decided who can and cant pay, what next? Progressive nut job tribunals deciding who is suffering and whos guilty, who pays and who gets a free ride–REPERATIONS!!! The few of us middle class bungalow belt bozo’s left aint in the equation
Yes all based on zip code as a proxy for color of one’s skin. Poor people with certain color skin just can’t be held accountable to pay their electric bills, or any bills for that matter, on time or keep them current. I get that being poor is a burden, I too once was poor. But I did not compound my problems by making even poorer decisions. On the one hand, I don’t want to reward people for not paying their bills with free electricity (because they can’t ever be shut off) but on the other hand, if you can’t… Read more »
People of a certain skin color also can’t be expected to not shoplift, hence why Crook County’s States Attorney made it legal to grab-and-go up to almost a thousand dollars. What would you think if you watched a couple “urban youth” sit down in your restaurant or walk into your cell phone store? If the former dine-and-dash, trying to stop them will result in your business being labeled “racist.” Why don’t business owners just return to the quaint notion of a “sidewalk sale,” where people of a certain skin color are simply given free merchandise? My friend, your suggestion of… Read more »
The first step toward nationalizing the utilities …and charging progressive rates…