One provision of the budget Management Ordinance set for approval on Friday would extend the authority of the Department of Water Management commissioner to replace the city's lead service lines. [Pexels] 

Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s $16.7 billion budget plan is set to clear another major hurdle on Friday, as her administration’s more than 600-page budget appropriation ordinance (O2021-4238) comes up for a committee vote.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s proposed ordinances to fund next year’s spending plan are set to face a committee vote on Thursday. 

Aldermen are set on Thursday to take an initial vote to approve the funding mechanisms for Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s proposed $16.7 billion spending plan. And while the plan may not technically include new fines, it does propose to capture revenue from hiked fines for environmental violations and a modest property tax increase.

A trio of aldermen are pushing for the 2022 budget plan to include a “formalized” mechanism for oversight of how the city spends nearly $2 billion in American Rescue Plan funds. [Colin Boyle/Block Club Chicago]

Aldermen are furiously negotiating with Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration this week to finalize an array of tweaks they hope to insert into the city’s spending plan before it reaches a final vote next week.

A rendering of Cabrera Capital Partners’ plan to rebuild the LeClaire Courts, which were torn down in 2011. [Department of Planning and Development]

A sweeping but overdue plan to rebuild a demolished Southwest Side public housing complex is set to clear a key city hurdle on Thursday, laying the groundwork for a new health center, grocery store and 725 homes in the Garfield Ridge area.

Chicago City Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin more than doubled the money in her campaign account between July and September. 

Chicago City Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin added more than $111,000 to her campaign fund during the past three months, more than her account had in it at the beginning of July and significantly more than she’s raised during past quarters. 

A meeting of the Chicago Board of Ethics in 2019. [Heather Cherone/The Daily Line]

Jay Doherty, the indicted former president of the City Club of Chicago, faces a $75,000 fine from the Chicago Board of Ethics for repeatedly breaking city lobbying rules.

Department of Public Health Comm. Allison Arwady [right] disagrees with a proposal drafted by Ald. Rossana Rodriguez-Sanchez (33) and backed by more than half of the City Council to reopen shuttered public mental health clinics. 

Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration is pushing back hard on a proposal from the City Council to reshuffle mental health spending to reopen city-backed clinics, saying the plan would veer the city off its existing path to widening psychiatric outreach.

Dijana Cuvalo of the Department of Planning and Development presents plans during a committee meeting Monday for a Class L tax incentive to support the Morton Salt redevelopment

Aldermen swiftly advanced more than $19 million in tax incentives on Monday to boost four separate developments, including two new industrial warehouses on the Near South Side and a plan to transform a former West Town industrial space into a concert venue.

Former Inspector General Joseph Ferguson during a virtual City Council committee meeting in April. “On the basis of the existing record, I don’t have high confidence” in Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Supt. David Brown’s ability to oversee police reforms, Ferguson told the CloutCast last week.

Chicago’s City Council lacks the resources and wherewithal to be an effective check on Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration, imbuing an “incredible concentration of power” in the mayor’s office, former Inspector General Joseph Ferguson said on The Daily Line’s CloutCast podcast as his city tenure came to a close.

CloutCast: Joe Ferguson on Chicago’s struggle for good government

Members of the City Council Latino Caucus speak during a press conference the morning of Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s budget address. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line]

As budget negotiations heat up, leaders of the City Council Latino Caucus are hoping their proposal for a “Hispanic Inclusion Plan” will push the city closer to racial parity among city employees, particularly those in top leadership positions. 

Pictured above are models of designs for the 100 new affordable homes set to be built in North Lawndale. 

A sweeping plan to build 100 new affordable single-family homes in North Lawndale is one step closer to full approval after a City Council committee gave the proposal unanimous support on Friday.  

The Morton Salt shed at 1357 N. Elston Ave. would be turned into a concert venue with space for up to 4,000 people under a plan set to be boosted by city-backed tax credits. [Department of Planning and Development]

A ballyhooed proposal to convert the former Morton Salt shed in West Town into a 4,000-ticket concert venue and dining destination is set to clear another hurdle on Monday as aldermen consider awarding the developer a key tax break.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot speaks during a news conference Thursday. [Erin Hegarty/The Daily Line]

E-scooter companies officially got the greenlight on Thursday to come back to Chicago with the City Council’s approval of a citywide program for the controversial two-wheeled modes of transportation. 

The City Council rules committee is planning a hearing to consider overhauling the City Council's decennial remap process, but this year’s process is already well underway.

The City Council had been poised during a Friday afternoon hearing to consider pitches for an overhaul of the council’s once-in-a-decade remap — even as aldermen are already waist-deep in this year’s redrawing process. But the meeting was abruptly canceled on Thursday.

A Lime worker places scooters during the city's 2019 scooter pilot. [Hannah Alani/Block Club Chicago]

Up to 6,000 e-scooters will be scattered across the city next spring, potentially more than doubling soon thereafter, under an ordinance set for final approval by the City Council on Thursday.