-- Connecting the dots between our economy, government and business --
There was optimism in the air two years ago when then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced full-throated city backing for 250 new single-family homes priced for working-class buyers and built on city-owned vacant lots in North Lawndale. Today, only 18 are in various stages of construction. Richard Townsell, of the Lawndale Christian Development Corp., said the hold up is from all types of municipal red tape over the properties. “This is really about a city that has no urgency when it comes to working families."
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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Far left activists have now idea how to build anything