Chicago News
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City Council’s Committee on Finance meets Tuesday morning to discuss a resolution [R2017-208] and an ordinance [O2017-4915] related to prescription drug pricing. The ordinance, sponsored by Chairman Ed Burke (14) and Ald. Sophia King (4), mandates that “pharmaceutical manufacturers whose drugs are sold in Chicago must disclose price hikes 90 days in advance if those increases fall into one of a series of categories. It also calls for the establishment of a price review board by the Health Department.” About a half dozen people are expected to testify in support. The Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce and CVS have both lobbied against the requirements, but aren’t expected to testify.
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On this week’s Aldercast, The Daily Line publisher Mike Fourcher sits down with two of our favorite sources on black politics in Chicago: Brian Sleet, a principal at Kivvit, and former campaign manager for State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, and Jedediah Brown, an activist, pastor and organizer with Chicago Life. The three sat down at WGN Radio in the Loop for a spirited (and split) discussion about who benefits from economic development in black communities, who has credibility on police reform, and the lack of candidates in the 2018 gubernatorial race that are talking about issues that matter to African American voters.
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Cook County officials logged $1.1 million in total campaign fundraising receipts for the second quarter of 2017, according to an analysis of quarterly disclosure filings with the Illinois State Board of Elections. Between April 1st and June 30th, the total cash on hand among commissioners and elected officials is roughly $4.3 million. Unsurprisingly, Assessor Joe Berrios holds more than a third of that ($1.6 million) between his personal fund, Committee to Elect Joseph Berrios Assessor, and his political ward fund, the 31st Ward Democratic Organization. During this period, Assessor Berrios deactivated an older political fund, “Joseph Berrios, 31st Ward Committeeman”, but Cook County Democratic Party spokesperson Jacob Kaplan would not comment on why.
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The legal wrangling over the county’s soda tax seems far from over, as both sides–Cook County and the Illinois Retail Merchants Association–filed motions in Cook County Circuit and Appellate Courts Monday. IRMA filed a motion to appeal Friday’s ruling that allowed the tax to go forward. The county countered with a motion seeking damages, about $17 million in revenue it says it lost out on collecting because a judge delayed the effective July 1st date to today.
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AUG 02, 2017
South Works (Credit: Chicago Department of Planning and Development)
After a previous redevelopment plan led by McCaffery Interests floundered, a new development team has been selected to take over the redevelopment of the former U.S. Steel factory, a 440-acre stretch of prime lakefront land on the southern edge of Chicago.
In an early morning announcement released via email Tuesday– one that wasn’t paired with an on-site staged event–the Mayor’s Office revealed a green-tech development company, Emerald Living, is in the process of acquiring the property owned by the former manufacturing giant U.S. Steel.
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Chicago City Clerk Anna Valencia’s office released its request for proposals for its municipal ID program, which is still on track to go live by the end of this year. The RFP requests potential vendors provide the services, technology, and hardware to print the identification cards, store “minimal” user data for applicants, integrate the city’s service departments into the program, and allow for fraud prevention.
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The city’s Budget Office released its Annual Financial Analysis Monday afternoon, boasting a record-low structural deficit (but leaving out some big ticket items), and revealing big costs down the road as the city grapples with legacy debt, growing pension payments, and personnel costs.
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AUG 01, 2017
Chicago finished out the 2016 fiscal year with $514.1 million cash on hand. Revenue collection was nearly 3-percent less than 2015, for a difference of $207.5 million, while expenditures continued to outpace receipts for a year-end net deficit of $27,429.9 million. Those are some of the big-picture numbers revealed in the city’s Comprehensive Annual Financial Report for FY 2016.
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Cook County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Kubasiak granted Cook County’s motion to dismiss the Illinois Retail Merchants Association’s (IRMA) case against the county’s sweetened beverage tax Friday afternoon. The decision surprised both sides, who expected for the motion to be denied and for the case–similar to the county’s proposed tax on ammunition–to drag on for some time. President Preckwinkle’s administration, in the midst of layoffs and position eliminations, applauded the decision.
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JUL 29, 2017
UNLOCKEDHappy Saturday! I enjoyed Illinois’ great Amtrak connections and shuttled between Chicago and Springfield this week. Chicago’s education issues are tied up with Springfield, while Springfield is weighed down by Chicago’s education demands. But first, some business from last week...
Editor’s Choice It Is: Results Of The Great Twitter Poll
A mad onslaught of thirty-two people converged on our Twitter account last week to cast their votes on what this email should be focused on for future editions. And you said for it to neither focus on Chicago or Springfield, but to be “Editor’s Choice”. I’m supposing that the thousands more of you reading this every week, according to our email statistics, are so confident in our ability to please your need for good reading, that you’re comfortable with casting this email’s fate to the the winds. -
JUL 28, 2017
UNLOCKED
A sign at a Chicago supermarket
Over this past month, Cook County politics has sizzled. We’ve seen Democrats turning on Democrats. Courtroom conflicts. Massive potential layoffs. Budget holes that need to be filled. Accusations of shell games and “Kabuki math”. All because of a tax on sweetened beverages and a lawsuit that sought to halt it. On this week’s episode of The Aldercast, we recap the month that was, and how Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle might’ve narrowly avoided further budget (and party) chaos.
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The West Side Chapter of the NAACP and the Chicago Urban League have both signed on to the class action lawsuit that seeks to bring court oversight to reform the city’s police department. Attorneys for the MacArthur Justice Center at the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, who filed the case in June, celebrated the “broadening coalition” and say the move “increases the pressure on the mayor to enact reforms with the community and with court oversight.”
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JUL 27, 2017
Correction (July 27, 2017, 11:20 a.m.) – An earlier version of this story was corrected to reflect the correct local of SEIU seeking to represent airport workers. It's SEIU Local 1, not SEIU Local 73.
The City Council advanced a major zoning overhaul that repeals the strict planned manufacturing designation of the North Branch Industrial Corridor, initiating a new chapter for the area that had been closed off to non-industrial development for the past 30 years. Wednesday’s meeting was also one for the history books, as it was the first time in City Council history that members of the public were allowed to speak following a year-long legal battle initiated by two Uptown activists.
