From left: former Chicago alderman Bob Fioretti, former Cook County commissioner Tony Peraica and fired former Cook County Board of Review staffer Todd Thielmann are looking to run as Republicans for top countywide posts.

Attorney and former Chicago alderman Bob Fioretti is turning to Cook County Republicans to stamp his ticket for his sixth political campaign in seven years as he tops a full slate of familiar faces hoping to work their way back into elected office.

An increasingly thin presence in solidly Democratic Cook County, Republicans are regrouping and hoping to seize on a favorable political environment this year to win back some of the territory they’ve lost over the decades. The effort includes fielding a full roster of candidates running in citywide and district-level positions across the county.

Ald. Leslie Hairston (5), left, and Chicago Department of Housing Asst. Comm. Will Edwards speak during a meeting of the City Council Committee on Housing and Real Estate Tuesday.

A $15 million loan fund pilot to help longtime South Shore condo owners stay in their homes won’t insulate most of the neighborhood from displacement pressure, but it will salve a nagging problem that has been festering for decades, city housing officials and the area’s local alderman said Tuesday.

A vocal group of local organizers is calling for more, saying the fund is well-intentioned but shows misplaced priorities by the city as South Shore faces a crush of real estate interest rippling from the coming Obama Presidential Center.

Residents of condo buildings including the Lake Terrace complex at 7337 S. Lake Shore Drive would be able to apply for grants or loans to renovate their homes under the South Shore Condo Preservation Pilot Program. [Eric Allix Rogers on Flickr]

South Shore condo associations will be allowed to apply for city-backed grants for maintenance and repairs under an ordinance under consideration Tuesday that aims to protect longtime homeowners from displacement in the South Side neighborhood.

The proposal (O2022-2004) by Mayor Lori Lightfoot on behalf of the Chicago Department of Housing is one of more than a dozen ordinances set for consideration by the City Council Committee on Housing and Real Estate during its 10 a.m. meeting on Tuesday, including city financing for a new woman-centered supportive housing development in Uptown.

Cook County leaders laid the groundwork Monday for annual spending talks and late tax collections in an unusual budget year. And Chicago transportation officials unveiled plans to give away 5,000 bikes through 2026.

Cook County Assessor Fritz Kaegi’s office sent out reassessment notices this month to property owners in Norwood Park Township, which includes the villages of Norridge and Harwood Heights. [City of Chicago]

The first round of new assessments for the 2022 tax year hit mailboxes in Norridge and Harwood Heights last week, and they offer an early signal that landlords may be spared of the sticker shock that has confronted them the last three years.

But the timing of the new valuations — five months after they’re typically sent out — has set off warning bells that the delay could cascade into next year’s collections, extending a headache for suburban municipalities and school districts with no clear end in sight. Kaegi's office is downplaying the threat of a future delay, saying the same technology update that contributed to this year's pile-up will speed up assessments now that it's been implemented.

Second-installment property tax bills will be mailed out by Dec. 1 this year instead of in July per the usual schedule, officials said Thursday.

Cook County will launch a competitive fund offering loans of at least $20,000 each to suburban municipalities, school districts and other taxing bodies that are bracing for revenue shortfalls from an expected four-month delay in property tax bills this year, county President Toni Preckwinkle’s administration announced Thursday.

The county’s Local Government Bridge Funding Program, set for official launch by the county Board of Commissioners later this month, will make up to $300 million in “one-time…short-term operational cash flow” loans to taxing bodies most hurt by the late bills, officials said.

Dan Pogorzelski, left, was leading Elizabeth Joyce Thursday in the race for a two-year term on the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago. [provided/Facebook]

Nine days after the June 28 primary, just one Chicago-area race remained too close to call on Thursday, but a late batch of mail-in votes tilted the result toward a clean sweep for the Cook County Democratic Party’s candidates for the $1.2 billion agency responsible for wastewater treatment and flood mitigation all over Cook County.

If Daniel Pogorzelski clings to his nearly 2,000-vote lead over Elizabeth Joyce through the end of ballot-counting next week, party-backed candidates will have successfully beaten back an insurgent slate led by an ousted former commissioner who argued he and his allies are more diverse and qualified than the party picks.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought on unprecedented hardships for restaurant owners and employees, resulting in shuttered restaurants, job losses, and shattered dreams for countless owners and industry employees. I am lucky that Yolk, the restaurant I work for, did not suffer a similar fate.

This is certainly not to say we didn’t face our own set of challenges or were able to get through these difficult years unscathed. Like so many others, when the pandemic began and we were forced to shut our doors to indoor dining, we had to make the devastating decision to lay off hundreds of employees across our locations and even permanently closed two of our locations altogether here in Chicago.

Brian Urbaszewski, center, of the Respiratory Health Association joined ComEd leaders including Michelle Blaise, right, to unveil a new charging station in Bronzeville Wednesday. [Alex Nitkin/The Daily Line]

The mega-utility firm ComEd will dedicate $100 million annually for the next three years to a host of efforts designed to speed Illinois through its transition to electric cars, leaders of the company announced Wednesday.

The spending commitment was the topline goal of the “Beneficial Electrification” plan that ComEd submitted to the Illinois Commerce Commission under a new state law and unveiled during a ribbon-cutting for new charging stations in Bronzeville on Wednesday. The rollout comes as state leaders push toward a goal of seeing one million electric vehicles on Illinois roads by 2030 and as ComEd faces pressure to get a handle on price hikes.

A disgraced former Chicago alderman was sentenced to four months in federal prison on Wednesday as a judge denied his request for probation. And a Chicago police oversight agency launched an investigation into a Park Ridge incident allegedly involving a Chicago Police officer who pinned a 14-year-old boy to the ground.

Ald. James Cappleman (46) at a City Council meeting in February 2020. [Colin Boyle/Block Club Chicago]

Ald. James Cappleman (46) will not run for a fourth term in the City Council next year after more than a decade at the helm of Uptown’s radical transformation, he announced in a note to constituents on Tuesday.

The news comes as three contenders have already lined up to succeed him — including one challenger who came within a hair’s breadth of unseating him in 2019.

Ald. Brendan Reilly (42), right, talks to Ald. Nicholas Sposato (38) during an April 2022 City Council meeting.

A new proposal backed by a cluster of powerful Chicago aldermen aims to crack down on Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration’s semi-regular habit of introducing new legislation for an immediate vote with little or no notice.

Real estate appraiser Samantha Steele, left, appears to have unseated Cook County Board of Review Comm. Michael Cabonargi in one of Tuesday’s biggest upsets.

Updated July 1, 9:45 a.m. For the first time in decades, voters have simultaneously ousted two sitting members of the Cook County Board of Review — an earth-shaking blow to the county’s tax assessment orthodoxy that could have far-reaching consequences for property owners from Barrington to Calumet City.

But one of the incoming commissioners has little time to celebrate as she works to fend off an explosive lawsuit from a fired campaign strategist that has already cast a cloud over her victory.

Ald. George Cardenas (12) speaks during the Cook County Democratic Party slating event in December 2021.

More than a half-dozen Chicago elected officials asked voters last night for promotions that would have lifted them out of city government and given Mayor Lori Lightfoot the power to heavily reshape the composition of the City Council and its committees.

The candidates went one-for-seven. Few of the races were close.

From left: Metropolitan Water Reclamation District candidate Patricia Theresa Flynn, judicial candidate Tom Nowinski, judicial candidate Diana Lopez, Cook County Assessor Fritz Kaegi, judicial candidate Rena Van Tine, judicial candidate Tracie Porter and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle speak at a Cook County Democratic Party news conference and voting event in Kenwood on Tuesday. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line]

Fritz Kaegi declared victory Tuesday night in his bid for a second term as Cook County Assessor, calling his modest but decisive win against challenger Kari Steele a sign that voters want him to stay on his mission to recalibrate the county’s property tax burden from homeowners onto downtown businesses.

Meanwhile, Cook County Board of Review Comm. Tammy Wendt (D-1) and Comm. Michael Cabonargi (D-2) both appeared on paths to defeat, heralding a shake-up on the appeals board charged with checking Kaegi’s math.

Anthony Quezada gives a victory speech at a watch party in Portage Park after winning a five-way race for Cook County Board of Commissioners 8th District. [Erin Hegarty/The Daily Line]

The Cook County Board of Commissioners’ left flank is set to be shored up next year as Anthony Quezada, a Northwest Side political organizer and longtime right hand to Chicago Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa (35), jumped ahead of a crowded field to unseat two-term Comm. Luis Arroyo, Jr.

At the same time, a dyed-in-the-wool conservative took his place as the Republican Party’s nominee to succeed the retiring moderate Comm. Pete Silvestri (R-9), setting the stage for deeper polarization on the Democrat-dominated board responsible for setting the county’s $8 billion budget.

Clockwise from top-left: Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle and her challenger Richard Boykin; Assessor Fritz Kaegi and his challenger Kari Steele; Board of Review Comm. Tammy Wendt and her challenger Chicago Ald. George Cardenas (12) [Facebook]

Midterm elections can be low-profile affairs in Chicago, especially without a competitive gubernatorial primary at the top of Democratic ballots. But Tuesday’s election will mark a critical juncture for Cook County, offering a referendum on its controversial public safety strategy and its messy tax assessment regime.

Some powerful county executives, like county Clerk Karen Yarbrough, Treasurer Maria Pappas and Board of Review Comm. Larry Rogers (D-3), will face no competition in the polls this week. Neither will 10 of the 14 incumbent Cook County commissioners who are running for reelection.

Still, the range of competitive races could set the stage of a potential Republican resurgence on the Cook County Board of Commissioners. And the results will offer the latest indication of the Cook County Democratic Party’s power to swing races up and down the ballot.

From left: Chicago Police Department Supt. David Brown, Department of Public Health Comm. Allison Arwady and Ald. Jeanette Taylor speak during Friday’s committee hearing.

The leaders of Chicago’s police department, parks system and public school district have plenty of ideas in place to quell an expected wave of summer violence, and no shortage of funding to turn them into reality, they told aldermen Friday. But the City Council was skeptical on Friday that the institutions have the staffing power and the communication prowess to execute.

The council convened a joint hearing of its committees on public safety, education, health and special events to probe senior officials from the Chicago Police Department, Chicago Park District and Chicago Public Schools about their plans to keep young residents safe this summer. The special Friday afternoon meeting lasted more than three hours.

Clockwise from top-left: Luis Arroyo Jr., Anthony Quezada, Natalie Toro, Rory McHale and Edwin Reyes are vying to represent the 8th District on the Cook County Board of Commissioners.

Cook County Board of Commissioners’ races often nab little public attention from voters. The 17 members on the county board don’t administer services or approve new real estate developments like aldermen do, and they don’t get to negotiate torrents of capital spending and navigate landmark legislation like state legislators.

But in an especially low-profile year, when just three Democrats and one Republican on the board are facing challengers from their own parties, Comm. Luis Arroyo, Jr. has attracted four primary challengers — more than all his colleagues combined. The challengers vary widely, but they agree Arroyo has failed in his role on the board responsible for setting the $8 billion budget that funds the county’s courts, jail, two public hospitals, tax collection offices and more.

Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6) spoke during a pair of back-to-back news conferences introducing new public safety proposals Wednesday morning. [Colin Boyle/Block Club Chicago]

Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6) and a handful of his City Council allies are pushing to reshuffle tens of millions of dollars into a new regime of public safety programs that emphasize non-police community outreach, saying existing structures have failed to tamp down violence.

The proposals were among more than a dozen new citywide ordinances and resolutions introduced to the City Council on Wednesday, including Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s long-awaited “Connecting Communities Ordinance” to boost development near transit. They come as the city braces for a surge of summer violence, and less than a month after Sawyer announced a run for mayor.