Erin Harkey’s confirmation as commissioner of the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events [YouTube/Design Museum of Chicago]

Aldermen are set to confirm a new commissioner to oversee the city’s cultural programming, tighten city labor regulations and dispense with a series of real estate transactions during a trio of virtual committee meetings on Thursday.

The Chicago City Council’s months-in-the-making push to redraw the boundaries of its 50 wards ground to a crawl on Tuesday, throwing the process into confusion hours before a critical deadline that could soon put the issue in the hands of voters.

Members of Asian Americans Advancing Justice speak during a news conference on Tuesday. [Erin Hegarty/The Daily Line]

Advocates calling for aldermen to include the city’s first Asian American-majority ward in a new ward map made a final push on Tuesday for better representation in City Council. 

Fleet Fields at Lincoln Yards [Sterling Bay]

This article was first published in Block Club Chicago.

A collective of independent Chicago music venues wants the future Lincoln Yards development drawn out of the city’s 2nd Ward during the remap process currently underway at City Hall.

Ald. Michelle Harris (8) and Ald. Gilbert Villegas (36) speak during a Monday Rules Committee hearing on ward mapping. 

An apparent plan to unveil a city-backed ward map proposal was scuttled Monday, just two days before a critical deadline to approve a new map as aldermen dug into each other in a fracas over the process by which the map is being drawn. 

Mayor Lori Lightfoot offered an update on the city’s response to a new variant of COVID-19. Cook County released a Request for Proposals for off-site renewable power generation. And a meeting designed to put Cook County Assessor Fritz Kaegi face-to-face with Chicago aldermen was postponed until next month.

A map of Chicago's existing 50 wards. Aldermen have until Wednesday to approve a new 

Updated November 29, 7:52 a.m. The Chicago City Council is set to hold a flurry of public meetings this week to hammer out a new ward map — but the council's Caucus pulled back on special meeting it had called for Monday morning.

Cook County Assessor Fritz Kaegi outlined his reelection pitch in an interview on the CloutCast podcast. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line]

Three years after Cook County Assessor Fritz Kaegi rode into office on a promise of reform and predictability, he’s facing a primary challenger trying to capitalize on what she’s calling three years of tumult and confusion.

Ald. David Moore (17) earlier this month proposed a measure that would establish an anti-littering campaign in the city. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line]

A proposal from a South Side alderman would direct the city’s chief sustainability officer to establish a citywide campaign to combat littering — an issue regularly broached by aldermen during city budget hearings.

Members of the Aldermanic Black Caucus announced their ward map proposal on Monday. [Don Vincent/The Daily Line]

The Aldermanic Black Caucus on Monday unveiled its proposal to draw 17 majority-African American wards — a concession after caucus leaders had vowed to keep the 18 majority-Black wards drawn in 2012. But their plan still only maps out 14 majority-Latino wards, a setup the Latino Caucus calls “problematic.” 

A person receives a COVID-19 vaccine at the mass vaccination site in the Jones Convocation Center on the campus of Chicago State University on April 7, 2021. [Colin Boyle/Block Club]

This article was first published in Block Club Chicago.

More than 92 percent of city workers have reported their vaccination status, according to a Monday news release.

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters

Hammond Elementary, a predominantly Latino school in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood, lost almost 30% of its enrollment during the pandemic, shrinking to about 250 students from a peak of more than 500 back in the mid-2010s.

Date:11/22/21
Location: Harold Washington Cultural Center

Click read more below to watch the full presentation and question & answer session.

 

 

Chinatown residents held a rally in Chinatown square on Nov. 12 to demand a majority-Asian American ward in the city's next remap. [Alex Nitkin/The Daily Line]

Even as the City Council Aldermanic Black Caucus and Latino Caucus drive toward a standoff over their dueling proposals for a new city ward map, the groups have found agreement on at least one point. Leaders of both groups say they’ve submitted proposals to carve out a majority-Asian ward on the city’s Near South Side, bowing to growing calls from Asian American advocacy groups arguing the city’s fastest-growing racial group deserves a louder voice in city government.

Civic Federation president Laurence Msall testifies during a meeting of the Cook County Board of Commissioners on Thursday.

Cook County leaders gave a unanimous final stamp on Thursday to an $8 billion 2022 spending plan praised by a key fiscal watchdog as a responsible and innovative path out of the COVID-19 pandemic. But more budget fights are waiting on deck as the Board of Commissioners prepare to iron out the details of the county’s American Rescue Plan spending and launch a campaign to persuade voters to raise their own taxes for the sake of the county forest preserves.