The mayor announced a special budget-related discussion to gather input from the city’s youth, and the City Council contracting committee will consider extending a pilot program that ensures veteran-owned small businesses have an equitable place in city contracting.

Chief Sustainability Officer Angela Tovar speaks during a committee meeting Wednesday. [Erin Hegarty/The Daily Line]

An ongoing assessment of the effects environmental, health and social stressors, including pollution, have on Chicago neighborhoods is expected to shape the policy of at least one ordinance related to how the city plans and approves zoning for developments.

A proposal up for consideration in committee Thursday would change several aspects of the appointment process for the city’s inspector general and deputy inspector general for public safety.   

In addition to tweaking the appointment process, the proposed ordinance from Ald. Matt Martin (47) would limit the number of four-year terms anyone can serve as inspector general to two terms. 

Ald. Debra Silverstein (50) is seen during a City Council meeting in July 2022. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line]

The City Council Committee on Transportation and Public Way will consider an ordinance Thursday that would require the city’s transportation department to analyze fatal crashes to identify trends and suggest solutions.

The city’s housing commissioner will soon vacate her post, and the state and Cook County have declared disasters in response to recent storms affecting the area.

Ald. Brian Hopkins (2) chaired the meeting of the Committee on Public Safety Tuesday. [City of Chicago livestream]

Alderpersons gave an initial OK to an ordinance clarifying that candidates for Police District Councils can run as slates and setting new parameters around the number of signatures each candidate needs to get on the ballot.

The Committee on Environmental Protection and Energy will meet Wednesday. [Erin Hegarty/The Daily Line] 

Officials from Chicago’s Department of Public Health on Wednesday will update alderpersons on an ongoing study assessing the effects of exposure to environmental, health and social stressors across Chicago’s various communities. 

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle speaks during a virtual preliminary budget hearing on July 11, 2023. [Office of the President livestream]

The mood was mostly warm and grateful during a virtualy and livestreamed public hearing Tuesday night on the preliminary Cook County budget forecast for 2024, but advocates still asked the county to keep their organizations in mind when crafting the annual spending plan. 

Cook County is anticipating an $85.6 million budget gap for the upcoming Fiscal Year 2024 budget, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle and county officials said last month.

Members of the City Council Committee on Economic, Capital and Technology Development met Monday. [Erin Hegarty/The Daily Line]

A proposal introduced last month calling on state lawmakers to allow alderpersons to hold hybrid meetings failed a critical committee vote Monday after alderpersons said they were concerned the resolution didn’t have strict enough parameters for attending meetings virtually.

Members of the City Council Committee on Housing and Real Estate met Monday. [City of Chicago livestream] 

Plans to establish a pilot program for housing stabilization at a former motel on Chicago’s North Side took a step forward Monday after a City Council committee unanimously approved the city’s purchase of the former motel. 

The Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability will meet Thursday to vote on a list of three names they will send to Mayor Brandon Johnson as candidates for the new superintendent of the Chicago Police Department. The City Council Committee on Public Safety will meet Tuesday for the first time under its new leadership of Ald. Brian Hopkins (2). 

Two City Council committees will meet at City Hall Monday. [Erin Hegarty/The Daily Line] 

Chicago alderpersons are asking state lawmakers to consider expanding opportunities for members of the City Council to attend meetings virtually, harkening back to what was allowed during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

A decades-old anti-patronage case concluded last week when the final government body bound by a consent decree was freed from monitoring, and the governor made a historic appointment to the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago’s governing body.

Mayor Brandon Johnson speaks during a news conference Thursday. [Facebook livestream]

Mayor Brandon Johnson should bring back the city’s Department of Environment and dedicate at least $5 million to fund the standalone department, a report from the mayor’s transition team recommended in a report published Thursday. 

The 223-page mayoral transition report titled “A Blueprint for Creating a More Just and Vibrant City for All” comes from the nearly 400 people who worked on 11 subcommittees over the past few months to make policy recommendations for Johnson. The report is meant to serve as a guide for the new administration. 

Amazon was Chicago’s top non-government employer in 2022 for the second year in a row, the city’s recently published annual financial report shows. 

The tech company first took the top non-government employment slot in 2021 when for the first time in recent years Chicago’s top spot did not belong to a healthcare system. Since first breaking into the top 10 non-government employers list in 2017, the tech company has steadily grown its employment base in Chicago each year.