Ald. Silvana Tabares (23) speaks during a news conference Wednesday morning. [Erin Hegarty/The Daily Line]

Aldermen on Wednesday sent to the City Council’s rules committee nearly half of the proposals their colleagues introduced as a package billed as a strategy to bolster police officers’ mental health and head off other challenges officers face.

Prior to Wednesday’s City Council meeting, a group of aldermen led by Ald. Silvana Tabares (23), Ald. Raymond Lopez (15), Ald. Anthony Napolitano (41) and Ald. Matt O’Shea (19) held a news conference announcing the legislative package with proposals that range from a hearing on officer mental health to eliminating the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, which investigates allegations of police misconduct.

A rendering of the two-building “Thrive Englewood” apartment complex being proposed by DL3 Realty for 914 W. 63rd St. [Department of Planning and Development]

The latest proposal to build up a high-profile intersection in Englewood and a plan for a new 22-story senior housing building in Uptown are the largest of a half-dozen proposals up for consideration by the Chicago Plan Commission during its regular meeting on Thursday.

Juan Sebastian Arias, deputy policy director for Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, presents details on the “Connected Communities Ordinance” to the City Council on Tuesday.

A years-in-the-making policy push to lay the groundwork for denser housing construction near the city’s transit nodes cleared a key committee hurdle after a marathon meeting on Tuesday, setting it up for final passage by the City Council during its meeting on Wednesday.

A handful of aldermen lit into the sweeping 38-page ordinance as an attack on aldermanic power and private property rights, and more were skeptical that the rule changes would accomplish their goals without added funding to back it. But the proposal ultimately cleared the committee in a lopsided 15-4 vote, portending easy passage in the City Council barring parliamentary roadblocks that could still slow it down.

Ald. Anthony Beale (9) and Mayor Lori Lightfoot during the June City Council meeting. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line]

A more than year-long push to ease back the city’s ticketing policy for drivers who speed near some schools and parks is scheduled to come to a head during Wednesday’s 10 a.m. City Council meeting as Mayor Lori Lightfoot has already signaled she would veto the measure if it is approved by City Council.

The City Council is also set to give its stamp to dozens of other items that passed out of committee in the past month, including Lightfoot’s proposed “Connected Communities Ordinance” designed to lay the groundwork for more housing construction near transit.

Related: Lightfoot promises to push forward on ‘essential’ housing density ordinance facing uneasy City Council

Ald. Jason Ervin (28) speaks during an October 2021 City Council meeting.

While aldermen on Monday gave a first OK to nearly $100 million in bonds for affordable housing developments throughout the city, they also pushed city leaders to ensure minority-owned companies are working on the development projects.

An ordinance approved on Monday will empower city workers to tow abandoned cars on privately owned vacant lots. [Colin Boyle/Block Club Chicago]

A City Council committee advanced a proposal on Monday to let city workers tow abandoned cars and trucks that are left to rust on privately owned vacant lots, but at least one South Side alderman wants the crackdown to hit even harder.

The City Council Committee on Budget and Government Operations also voted to push forward a near-total ban on water shutoffs, a measure empowering aldermen to help protect against flooding and an infusion of more than $14 million in new grant funds into the city’s budget. However, aldermen punted on a proposal to establish a long-awaited legal office for the City Council as two key aldermen said they had nearly converged on a compromise plan.

From left: Mayor Lori Lightfoot, Chicago Department of Housing Comm. Marisa Novara and Bickerdike Development CEO Joy Aruguete speak at the grand opening of the Lucy Gonzalez Parsons apartments in Logan Square in May. [Twitter/Chicago Department of Housing]

An ordinance representing the culmination of Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s legislative efforts to disrupt Chicago’s racial segregation and blunt aldermen’s powers to block affordable proposals in their own wards is finally set for a vote on Tuesday. But negotiations between the mayor’s administration and powerful aldermen have defanged the plan of some of its sharpest provisions.

The tent city at Belmont Avenue and the Kennedy Expressway in November 2019. [Mina Bloom/Block Club Chicago]

Chicago leaders are seizing on tens of millions of dollars in federal cash to expand the city’s homeless shelter network, but they acknowledged the endeavor will still only reach a fraction of Chicago’s population experiencing homelessness.

The city’s Department of Family and Support Services Comm. Brandie Knazze detailed the expansion of the city’s shelter system through the conversion of hotels and motels during Monday’s meeting of the City Council’s Subcommittee on the Chicago Recovery Plan. The meeting was the fourth of six meetings being held by aldermen to check in on the city’s spending of Chicago’s federal stimulus dollars as a part of the Chicago Recovery Plan.

Chicago Park District leaders also used the meeting to describe how they are using federal funds to expand the system’s infrastructure, and cycling advocates seized on the meeting to demand safer streets.

A City Council committee on Monday approved a proposal that would crack down on people who are caught drag racing and drifting in the city. The rules committee is set to meet Tuesday to consider a portion of a proposed ethics code overhaul.

Chicago Board of Ethics executive director Steve Berlin gives a presentation on the ethics ordinance that passed committee on Friday.

An effort to crack down on nepotism, widen conflict-of-interest restrictions and hike fines for ethics violations by city officials glided through a unanimous committee vote late Friday, bringing the proposal to the verge of implementation after months of debate and confusion.

Ald. Chris Taliaferro (29) speaks during a committee meeting Friday.

Aldermen on Friday shifted a general conversation about police oversight to focus on how the city is responding to officers’ mental health needs, giving a glimpse into possible hot-button issues in the upcoming budget season.

Creola Hampton, president and founder of the Black Leadership Advocacy Coalition for Healthcare Equity, left, and Chicago Department of Public Health Comm. Allison Arwady speak during a committee meeting on Friday.

A group of Black nonprofit health group leaders and some aldermen put Chicago Department of Public Health Comm. Allison Arwady on the defensive on Friday over what they called a trickle of money flowing to Black-led community groups, a condition they blamed for widening racial disparities in diagnoses of HIV and other health crises.

The accusations flew during a more than two-hour meeting of the City Council Committee on Health and Human Relations on Friday, when committee chair Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6) called a subject matter hearing to discuss the city’s response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the Black community. The committee on Friday also passed resolutions urging city leaders to release more information surrounding a botched 2020 demolition and to support international efforts at nuclear disarmament.

[Pexels]

Portions a proposal by Mayor Lori Lightfoot that would water shutoffs will get a second chance on Monday after a vote on the proposal was delayed earlier this year.

The “Evergreen Imagine” affordable housing complex in Auburn Gresham is in line for a city-backed loan. [Department of Planning and Development]

The City Council Committee on Finance is scheduled during its 10 a.m. meeting on Monday to pave the way for $82 million in new bonding authority for a handful of affordable housing developments around the city, including new apartment complexes in Invest South/West corridors in Englewood and Austin.

Also lined up for approval will be nearly $130 million in tax-increment financing disbursements, including $2 million for the renovation of the Ramova Theater in Bridgeport, $37.5 million for a gym annex at Dett Elementary School on the Near West Side and $12.4 million for a roof replacement at Whitney Young Magnet High School.

Finally, the committee is set to green-light more than $12 million in legal settlements, including a $6.75 million payout for a man who served 15 years in prison based on evidence he alleges was forged by Chicago police officers.

Ald. Harry Osterman (48) during an April City Council meeting. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line] 

Ald. Harry Osterman (48) will not seek a fourth term as alderman of the North Side ward that includes Edgewater, Andersonville and parts of Uptown, he announced in an email to constituents on Friday. 

“As someone who deeply loves this community this was not an easy decision. However, I feel that the time is right to make this transition,” wrote in his letter announcing his retirement. “I will continue to serve and work on behalf of our community as Alderman for the remainder of my term, which will end next May.”