The Council’s Public Safety Committee delayed a vote on a plan to address on carjackings at dealerships and car rental lots in Chicago, because businesses that operate around the airports want a carveout.

The ordinance would require all dealerships, showrooms and rental lots to store car keys and dealer plates in lockboxes to deter theft. One of the co-sponsors, Ald. Harry Osterman (48), said his local Police Commander for the 20th District, Sean Loughran, first brought the issue to his attention.

10:30 a.m. – Special Events Committee

O2017-4842 - One ordinance is listed on the agenda: A proposal to use Open Space Impact Fees for a new public park in West Town. The nearly one acre park would be located on city-owned land at 642 N. Milwaukee Ave., adjacent to the Kennedy Expressway and Erie Street.

The Council’s Aviation Committee approved the second phase of the city’s plans to open up city airports to food trucks, although Midway was removed from the plan at the last minute.

Three applications seeking a reduced property tax rate are up for consideration by the Council’s Committee on Economic, Capital and Technology Development.

The Committee on Human Relations quickly reappointed Human Relations Commissioner Mona Noriega and three members of the commission Monday morning, and approved two new appointees from Mayor Rahm Emanuel to the Advisory Council on Equity. Aldermen did not ask any questions. The positions are uncompensated.

Cook County Commissioners will gather beginning at 9:00 a.m. Tuesday for their usual consent calendar gathering, followed by a packed day of audit and financial findings, hearings about fairness in property assessments from Joe Berrios’ office, issuance of new bonds, and a more than $8 million increase to a series of energy conservation contracts.  

The Council’s Aviation Committee meets Tuesday to amend an ordinance approved in April that opened up the city’s airports for food trucks. It’s one of two items up for consideration by Chair Mike Zalewski’s (23) committee. Neither concerns the ongoing issue over the blurred roles of Aviation Security Officers and Chicago police officers stationed at O’Hare, despite a recent security audit released by the Department of Aviation (CDA) and a letter of no confidence in the department’s commissioner by the union that represents ASOs. Both the audit and letter were made public last week.

The fee change under consideration today gives the CDA Commissioner the authority to assess a fee of up to $200 a year, “subject to escalation at the the Consumer Price Index for tall Urban Consumers (CP1-U) on any operator of a mobile food vehicle” at O’Hare and Midway Airport.

While the city has found a staging area for food trucks at O’Hare, located at the taxi cab staging area, a location at Midway has not been determined. A representative from the Department of Consumer Affairs and Business Protection told aldermen that Midway was included in the plans, so staging of food trucks would be allowed pending the successful implementation at O’Hare. The representative also noted the food trucks will only serve taxi drivers, not the general public.

The committee approved the original ordinance on the same day they held a highly publicized hearing on proper security protocols at city airports days after a passenger was dragged off a United Airlines flight. That day, the committee conducted regular business in Room 201A before moving to the City Council Chambers for the subject matter hearing with Airports Commissioner Ginger Evans and United Airlines executives.  

The original ordinance provides two key exemptions for food trucks at city airports–the city-wide two hour time limit on parking and the restrictions on parking within 200-feet of the entrance to any “principal customer entrance or to a restaurant. Both rules were established in 2012, when the city made it legal for food trucks to do business in the city.

The second item on the Aviation Committee agenda concerns a transfer ownership of concession leases and subleases at Chicago O'Hare and Midway International Airports. Whenever a concessionaire plans to transfer ownership stake in its concession agreement with the city, aldermanic approval is required. This transfer concerns Dufry International AG, one of the companies in the corporate ownership structure of both the Hudson Entities and the Hudson Subtenant Entities. Dufry is seeking to transfer 100% ownership interest in Dufry Americas Holding, Inc. to a newly created company, Hudson LTD.
According to a press release from the Mayor’s Office, the lease change is part of a larger initiative to establish “a new, uniform rate structure for aeronautical real estate leases at O’Hare International Airport.” The release notes several cargo and hangar leases are set to expire in May of 2018.

Renewed terms for two Police Board members and an ordinance that would require additional security measures for car dealerships in Chicago are under consideration Tuesday by the Council’s Public Safety Committee. The committee has also scheduled a subject matter hearing on the police department’s outstanding missing persons cases to get a better understanding of why a disproportionate number of unsolved cases concern African-Americans.

Only one of the three items under consideration by a joint meeting of the Council’s Finance and Economic and Technology Development committees has been made public ahead of the Tuesday afternoon meeting. The other two items will be directly introduced in committee by sponsor Finance Chair Ed Burke (14). Neither committee was able to provide language or background information on the direct introductions.  All three items appear to be related to privacy concerns and mobile technology.

One ordinance, introduced by Ald. Burke (14) and Ald. Leslie Hairston (5) would create a new section of the municipal code entitled the Mobile Phone Privacy Act. It would require all mobile phone retailers in Chicago to notify customers that smartphones come equipped with geolocation technology that could be sold to third-parties.

The mayor’s procurement task force is behind schedule in instituting its own reforms, one of the co-chairs told aldermen Friday. Mayor Rahm Emanuel created the task force in 2015 to reform how the city bids out contracts, but the group is delayed, mainly due to technology constraints of creating a city-wide procurement database that would include all sister agencies.

City Council’s Committee on Human Relations meets Monday to consider four reappointments to the city’s Commission on Human Relations, and two new appointments to the city’s Advisory Council on Equity.

 

Aviation officers represented by SEIU Local 73 upped their criticism of Chicago Department of Aviation Commissioner Ginger Evans last week, sending her a letter of no confidence that said she’s made “repeated attempts to downgrade their ability to protect public safety.” Evans’ office announced it would institute new measures meant to enforce that Aviation Security Officers (ASOs) “perform security functions, not policing functions” at the city’s airports, and repeating a January mandate that the word “police” be removed from uniforms and ASO vehicles.

On Friday afternoon, Board President Toni Preckwinkle issued a press release announcing 300 layoff notices were issued “to address an approximately $68 million gap in our FY2017 that is directly related to the Illinois Retail Merchants Association’s (IRMA) lawsuit and Temporary Restraining Order that prohibits us from collecting the Sweetened Beverage Tax... Along with the layoffs, we are closing more than 600 vacant positions.” There is likely more pain to come: these layoffs cover the FY2017 gap, but not FY2018, which is projected to be $287.5 million.

The administration has denied repeated requests for department-specific breakdowns of requested budget reductions, or layoffs in Offices Under the President, citing ongoing talks and the impact of collective bargaining agreements. But crucial public safety departments–the Public Defender and State’s Attorney–told The Daily Line they’re laying off roughly 100 employees. Sheriff Tom Dart’s office was asked to reduce its budget by $21.4 million–the equivalent of 925 positions–to meet its target by the end of FY 2017, but has not reached final numbers yet.

Budget Director Tanya Anthony sent notice to bureau chiefs, department heads, and separately elected officials last week calling for a 10% holdback effective August 1 to cover the remainder of the fiscal year. Department heads could meet those targets with layoffs, vacancy eliminations or other spending reductions, including on capital equipment, planned projects, or contracts.

Cara Smith, a spokesperson for Sheriff Tom Dart, said the Sheriff’s Department–one of the county’s biggest–will “be coming to a conclusion with our plan early next week.” She said President Preckwinkle’s budget office asked for a $21.4 million reduction in the budget for the rest of the 2017 fiscal year, equal to 925 employees. That’s 15.4% of the workforce, Smith said, and would likely impact guards at the County  jail the most. “We’re in a painstaking, thoughtful process of evaluating our budget and operations to see where savings will be realized,” she said. “It’s a very heavy, heavy assignment.”

Earlier this week, Sheriff Dart joined Commissioners Richard Boykin (D-1), Tim Schneider (R-14), and Jeff Tobolski (D-16) to blast the proposed cuts, which they said would have the biggest impact on public safety operations. “County Board President Toni Preckwinkle’s solution to her inability to collect her sweetened beverage tax is to take a hatchet to the county’s public safety departments,” Boykin said in a statement. “That is the height of irresponsibility” that could lead to the Sheriff’s Department re-entering federal oversight. “With these layoffs, it is only a matter of time until the federal government again intervenes and again forces the county to boost the numbers of officers in the jail. Where will these supposed savings come from then?”

The State’s Attorney’s office is laying off 39 people. A spokesperson said the office was able to hit its $4 million reduction target by making non-personnel cuts, implementing two mandatory unpaid furlough days for non-union staff, and laying off 17 prosecutors and 22 staffers. The office had a budgeted total of 1,168 employees for this year.

There were no layoffs in commissioners’ offices, nor at the Cook County Assessor’s Office. Assessor spokesperson Tom Shaer said the office was able to “find savings elsewhere in our budget and avoid layoffs at this time… We hit the total dollar figure we were asked to reach,” but said he could not share that figure.

Recorder of Deeds Karen Yarbrough’s office also avoided layoffs, but has significantly reduced its headcount in recent years. “When I came in it was 200 people, now we’re down to about 130,” she said.

This round, “we gave up a couple of vacancies. It was over $200,000 from other stuff. They asked for 8% last year, and we gave it to them,” Yarbrough told The Daily Line. “The rest of these folks didn’t do anything,” she said, referring to other offices. “[Finance Chairman John] Daley had commented on it, that were one of the only separately elected officials to do that. Last year we gave up 15 people from layoffs.”

Fewer than 100 employees were given layoff notices at the Cook County Health and Hospitals System, spokesperson Alex Normington said. “We have complied with the requested 10% reduction through a number of expense reduction strategies designed to minimize service disruption including deferring planned projects and reducing vendor contracts. This has enabled us to keep staff reductions to fewer than 100.” Normington did not respond to a request to break down how the cuts affected nurses, technicians, doctors, or administrative staff.

Lester Finkle in the Public Defender’s Office said there were 69 total layoffs in the office. Of those, 63 are attorneys. That’s a 15% cut in attorney staff, he estimated. “The situation is evolving,” he said, noting the Budget Office asked for $2.5 million in cuts. “The [layoff] notices went out for 30 days from today. We’ll do everything we can to find other resources to prevent those layoffs from occurring.” Union members in the public defender’s office warned in a budget hearing Wednesday that the cuts would lead to unsustainable caseloads for attorneys and a potential for the county to become the next “center of national scandal [for] miscarriage of justice,” akin to New Orleans or Missouri.

Officials with County Clerk David Orr’s office, Clerk of the Circuit Court Dorothy Brown’s office, and Chief Judge Timothy Evans’ Office could not be reached by publication. Pres. Preckwinkle’s statement said she would continue to work with the Chief Judge and Sheriff Dart “to ensure real expenditure reductions in their budgets,” and more layoffs are likely coming.

“I regret that these actions are necessary – and I deeply regret the impact they have on individual employees,” Pres. Preckwinkle said in a statement. “One of the main reasons I proposed the modest tax on sweetened beverages last year was specifically to avoid these kind of cuts.”  

“The FY2017 budget, which was passed by the Board last November in a 13-4 vote, included that revenue. Unfortunately, the lawsuit filed by the IRMA and others just days before the tax was to take effect has led to what is likely to be a protracted legal fight. And while we believe we will ultimately prevail, we must take fiscally responsible actions now.”

 



Cook County Democratic Committeemen from the city’s South and West Sides “unanimously” chose Dr. Dennis Deer Thursday afternoon to replace the late 2nd District Commissioner Robert Steele. Deer is a psychologist who operates a rehabilitation and training center in North Lawndale. He is also the longtime head of Steele’s political organization, and came into the crowded proceedings with the endorsement of Chairman Michael Scott (24), former Board Pres. Bobbie Steele and the Steele family, who sat front row, just to the left of candidates. The day’s proceedings were held in an unfinished, echoey space at the Lofts at Arthington in North Lawndale. There were about 30 people in the audience, a dozen interviewees, and 15 committeemen conducting interviews.

The Council’s Workforce Committee meets Friday to amend a section of the Municipal Code concerning city benefits for domestic partners in light of a state law that already extends those protections to same-sex couples. Also up for discussion: a hearing procurement task force report, the first of its kind.