For the first time since a damning 2019 audit was released by the city’s watchdog, police officials defended their continuing use of records that list approximately 135,000 Chicagoans as members of gangs, citing their need for the data to prevent “retaliatory violence.”
Maria Hadden
The third time did not prove to be the charm for a proposal to build hundreds of apartments near Higgins Road and Cumberland Avenue. Instead, the City Council’s Zoning Committee voted 11-2 Tuesday to table the plan from GlenStar.
The 42-8 vote was a victory for Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who promised during the campaign to overhaul the city’s laws to reduce the affordable housing gap of nearly 120,000 homes in Chicago.
Aldermen on Tuesday advanced a plan designed to boost the number of affordable homes across Chicago by requiring developers that get special permission from the city or a subsidy to build more units and pay higher fees.
As Chicago reeled — again — from the police killing of a teenager recorded on video, Inspector General Joseph Ferguson offered aldermen a way to reverse what he called the city’s “long history” of covering up police misconduct. “We are out of runway with respect to the public’s patience and beliefs that we care to reform,” he said.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot said the revised ordinance was “better” than her administration originally proposed and will “put our city on the right track to full ensuring that our residents have clean air, no matter what ZIP code in which they reside.”
Aldermen are sharply divided on the issue after a proposal from Mayor Lori Lightfoot was significantly revised. Alds. Jason Ervin, Maria Hadden, Byron Sigcho-Lopez and George Cardenas weigh in.
The revised measure is designed to tighten regulations on recycling centers and industrial operations in an effort to reduce air pollution on the South and West sides. A final vote is scheduled for the full City Council meeting on March 24.
Several aldermen on Thursday called on Mayor Lori Lightfoot to use approximately $50 million from the city’s share of the latest COVID-19 relief package to fund cash assistance payments to Chicagoans struggling to stay afloat. Lightfoot declined to support cash assistance payments to Chicagoans in a statement to WTTW News.
Dozens of aldermen peppered school and health officials with questions Monday about the effort underway to reopen Chicago Public Schools for in-person learning after a 300-day closure prompted by the coronavirus pandemic.
Aldermen on Tuesday advanced a scaled-back effort to test whether Chicago’s affordable housing crisis could be eased by permitting basement, attic and coach house dwellings in five areas of the city.
Juneteenth, which commemorates the end of slavery in the United States, is poised to become the first official “day of observance” in Chicago as part of the agreement that will approve a $12.8 billion spending plan for 2021.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s plan to close a projected $1.2 billion budget gap in 2021 would hike sales and property taxes by $76.4 million, eliminate 1,921 city jobs and dip into the city’s rainy-day fund.
After nearly 100 days at the helm of the Chicago Police Department, the superintendent’s tenure has been anything but average, as he faces an ongoing pandemic, protests and a surge in gun violence.
President Donald Trump will send “more than 100” federal agents to crack down on surging crime in Chicago — but will not order a Portland-style paramilitary strike force to patrol the city.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot has repeatedly said 30 days’ notice is not nearly enough time for a single person, let alone a family, to find a new place to live and move. Now, long-term renters will get more notice of an eviction without cause.
