Amber Ritter of the Chicago Department of Aviation shows plans for the demolition of a telecommunications building that will be replaced with a new passenger concourse.

A key step in the $8.5 billion O’Hare 21 airport expansion plan was passed through a City Council committee on Wednesday. 

The City Council Committee on Aviation convened virtually to take up an ordinance that would advance one part of the airport redevelopment initiative. The ordinance (O2022-1703), proposed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot, would grant a limited ground lease to AT&T so the company can replace the airport's copper wiring with fiber while gradually moving their office site out of the airport.

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle is set to roll out a gush of new federally backed funding for anti-violence and other programming.

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle is set to roll out about $20.8 million in new federally backed funding for anti-violence intervention programs among a host of new American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) initiatives as the county faces mounting threats to public safety and economic stability.

Commissioners are scheduled to fast-track the approval of five separate new spending initiatives during Thursday’s 10 a.m. meeting of the Cook County Board of Commissioners. The board is also scheduled during the meeting to approve dozens of other measures, including the adoption of the county’s new flag design, the appointment of a new public health director and a half-dozen new commercial property tax breaks.

Spouses of first responders who die by suicide or drug overdose will be eligible for city death benefits under an ordinance set for a vote on Thursday.

A proposal to repeal a controversial speed camera crackdown is finally set to meet its fate on Thursday, potentially burying the protest ordinance for good after months of delays.

Ald. Anthony Beale’s (9) ordinance (O2021-1227) to repeal the city’s 2021 rule allowing speed cameras to fine drivers who exceed the speed limit by 6 mph near schools and parks is one of more than a dozen items set to come before a 10 a.m. meeting of the City Council Committee on Finance on Thursday. The committee is also scheduled to take up an alderman’s proposal to expand death benefits for the spouses of fallen police officers, create the city’s first new tax-increment financing (TIF) district of the Mayor Lori Lightfoot era, approve nearly $40 million in new TIF funding for CTA infrastructure projects and more.

The Chicago Plan Commission is set to consider plans for the old Laramie Bank building.

The Chicago Plan Commission is set to hear plans for the restoration of the Austin Laramie Bank building and construction of an adjacent 78-unit apartment building as part of Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s Invest South/West program.

Ald. Brian Hopkins (2), left, and Department of Planning and Development Deputy Comm. Tim Jeffries speak during a committee meeting on Tuesday.

Aldermen unanimously and without much hesitation approved a proposed property tax incentive for the owner of a Bucktown building near Lincoln Yards despite word from a city department official that Mayor Lori Lightfoot opposed the incentive.

Ald. Derrick Curtis (18) advertised a campaign kickoff event he hosted for Mayor Lori Lightfoot in his June 2 ward newsletter. [18th Ward]

Ald. Derrick Curtis (18) could be on the hook for at least a $5,000 fine over an apparent violation of city ethics rules surrounding a campaign kickoff event he hosted for Mayor Lori Lightfoot last week, the Chicago Board of Ethics ruled on Monday.

The ethics board also opted to give Ald. Nicholas Sposato (38) a chance to escape a similar fine for mixing political and government messaging. And board leaders called on the mayor and City Council to put the gas on a proposed amendment to the city’s ethics ordinance that has been stuck in legislative purgatory since April.

Activist Ja’Mal Green became the seventh person to officially announce a run for mayor in 2023. A key City Council committee is set on Wednesday to consider a $5 million grant transfer and hold a hearing on American Rescue Plan spending. Another council committee will take up a ground lease agreement designed to smooth the path for telecommunications upgrades at O’Hare Airport. And Cook County leaders revealed their long-awaited redesign of the county’s flag.

Aldermen gave an initial OK to measures that will allow former 24th Ward Ald. Michael Scott, Jr. and his wife Natashee Scott to pay $8,000 for two vacant city-owned parcels next to their home in North Lawndale. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line; Byrnes & Walsh LLC]

Members of a key City Council committee unanimously approved proposals that will allow former 24th Ward Ald. Michael Scott and his wife Natashee Scott to use a city-backed land deal to buy two vacant lots adjoining their North Lawndale home.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot speaks during a news conference on Monday.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot and other city officials on Monday announced a $3.1 million expansion of city-funded mental health services through the city's network of Trauma-Informed Centers of Care.

Ald. Brian Hopkins (2) has urged his colleagues to support a tax break for the lab building at 2017 N. Mendell St. over the objections of city planning officials. [Baker Development Corporation]

A disputed plan to offer a tax break for a burgeoning pharmaceutical lab overlooking the Chicago River North Branch is set to resurface on Tuesday, six months after it ran into resistance from city planning officials.

The proposed class 6(b) property tax incentive for Baker Development Group to build out tenant renovations at 2017 N. Mendell St. in the 2nd Ward is one of four tax sweeteners due for consideration by the City Council Committee on Economic, Capital and Technology Development during its 1 p.m. meeting on Tuesday.

The James Sneider Apartments in Rogers Park [Colin Boyle/Block Club Chicago]

Aldermen are set on Monday to hold a hearing on the heat-related deaths of three women at the James Sneider Apartments in Rogers Park last month.

Ald. Stephanie Coleman (16) and Kamm Howard, national co-chair of the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America, speak during a committee meeting Thursday.

Advocates and aldermen continued during a committee meeting Thursday to push city officials on progress in creating a plan to offer reparations to Chicago’s Black residents and descendants of enslaved Africans as little work on the effort has gotten off the ground since a subcommittee was created to explore the issue nearly two years ago.

Ald. Rossana Rodriguez-Sanchez (33), left, and Chicago Federation of Labor deputy chief of staff Andrea Kluger speak during a City Council committee meeting on Thursday.

Chicago is broadening its funding for mental health services, but the spending boost won’t mean much if it keeps outsourcing services to organizations that underpay their workers, multiple aldermen and labor groups said Thursday.

Ald. Rossana Rodriguez-Sanchez (33) called the chronic underpayment of nonprofit mental health workers contracted by the Chicago Department of Public Health key “context” behind a resolution she sponsored (R2022-144) expressing the City Council’s support for a unionization drive by workers at the Howard Brown Health Center. The City Council Committee on Workforce Development unanimously advanced the resolution, as well as a seven-year extension on a deal with Cook County to fund workforce programming, during its meeting on Thursday.

Ald. Walter Burnett (27) voices an endorsement for Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s campaign alongside fellow West Side elected officials Ald. Emma Mitts (37), Ald. Jason Ervin (28) and retiring Metropolitan Water Reclamation District Comm. Barbara McGowan.

A trio of West Side aldermen showcased an early mark of political force for Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s fresh-off-the-ground reelection campaign, highlighting her efforts to jump-start economic activity in historically overlooked neighborhoods while she faced unprecedented headwinds.

Kenneth Williams has been chief administrative officer of the City Council Office of Financial Analysis since 2020. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line; City of Chicago]

A City Council office designed to give aldermen an unclouded lens into the city’s finances is falling short of its mandate, according to a former employee and a city watchdog agency.

The council’s Office of Financial Analysis, which is housed under the Committee on Budget and Government Operations, has failed to file multiple mandated reports, and the work it has produced has been met with allegations of sloppiness and even plagiarism. Critics say the result is that aldermen must rely on Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration for guidance and information.