Stories by Heather Cherone

For 184 years, members of the Chicago City Council have been known as aldermen — even though its first female members were elected a half-century ago. That is set to change.

New rules for Chicago’s home-sharing industry are set to take effect Tuesday, including a ban on short-term rentals that last only one night, in an effort to block huge parties that have become a regular nuisance in some neighborhoods.

For the first time in nearly a year, visitors to Chicago from anywhere within the United States do not have to quarantine for 10 days or record a negative test for COVID-19, city officials announced Tuesday.

After two months and 42,000 jabs, the city-run mass vaccination site near Wrigley Field will close Saturday, as efforts to bring a COVID-19 vaccine directly to residents ramp up, officials said.

A Chicago Police Department representative did not respond to questions about why Brown has yet to act on the recommendation made by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, known as COPA, April 28.

Changing the addresses of the four museums could cost the institutions a significant amount of money and complicate their efforts to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, officials said.

The city has yet to replace a single lead service line in the eight months that have elapsed since Mayor Lori Lightfoot rolled out her plan, officials acknowledged.

Opponents of a plan to rename 17 miles of Lake Shore Drive for Jean Baptiste Point DuSable, Chicago’s first permanent non-Indigenous settler, blocked a vote on the measure Wednesday, enraging supporters of the plan, who called the move racist. 

The proposal brought an immediate backlash not just from those who enjoy an impromptu late-night tipple, but business owners who said the rules would push sales outside the city — and give bars and restaurants an unfair advantage over stores. 

Mayor Lori Lightfoot included the cap on fees as part of larger package designed to help Chicago businesses recover from the COVID-19 pandemic “quickly and holistically.” 

Police reform advocates and progressive aldermen blasted Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s plan to create a seven-member civilian board to oversee the Chicago Police Department, saying Tuesday that it would not help restore trust in the beleaguered department.

Both lawsuits claim police officers improperly arrested men for crimes they did not commit. The settlements are set for a final vote Wednesday by the full City Council.

The project is backed by Ald. Walter Burnett (27th Ward) and Ald. Brian Hopkins (2nd Ward), putting the massive development on track to win final approval at Wednesday’s City Council meeting.

The measure unanimously advanced by aldermen Tuesday would pave the way for the sale of the much beloved and equally loathed James R. Thompson Center in the heart of the Loop.

A boil order was not necessary on Tuesday “because of the temporary nature of the issue,” according to Chicago water officials. 

Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s proposal would keep the power to run the embattled police department concentrated in the mayor’s office even after decades of scandals, misconduct and brutality. 

A joint session of the City Council’s Public Safety and Finance committees declined to advance the measure backed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot and blasted by Inspector General Joseph Ferguson and other transparency advocates as nothing more than “smoke and mirrors.”

Cardinal Blase Cupich reinstated the Rev. Michael Pfleger as senior pastor of St. Sabina Catholic Church after an investigation of allegations of sexual abuse of a minor more than 40 years ago “concluded that there is insufficient reason to suspect Father Pfleger is guilty of these allegations.”

It’s crunch time for Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who first promised to introduce her own plan for an elected board to oversee the police department eight months ago.

A trio of aldermen gave Mayor Lori Lightfoot poor marks for her accomplishments during her first two years in office, citing her record on crime and divisive governing style during an interview Thursday on “Chicago Tonight.”

Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Thursday renewed her campaign promise to breathe new life into neighborhoods that have faced decades of disinvestment. And she acknowledged that she felt “despair” at times during the past two years while she confronted the COVID-19 pandemic, civil unrest and an economic meltdown.

Chicagoans struggling to make ends meet because of the COVID-19 pandemic can apply for grants to cover 15 months of missed rental payments starting Monday, officials said.

Full-capacity block parties will return to the city’s streets starting July 5 as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to wane — but bounce houses will not be allowed, officials announced Thursday. Applications for the street gatherings will be accepted starting June 6.

The measure would give the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection the authority to license tow trucks in Chicago in an effort to crack down on the kind of operators immortalized in song by Steve Goodman as “Lincoln Park Pirates.”

Independent journalist Jamie Kalven called the revised plan for the database “nothing more an exercise in smoke and mirrors.” The city's watchdog hammered the plan as “significantly smaller step, in scope and scale” than the one presented to aldermen in April.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced Monday that the state’s ban on evictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic will be phased out during the next three months before expiring in August.