Stories by Heather Cherone

Approximately 62% of applicants have jobs, and nearly half have sought medical attention at a hospital’s emergency room in the past year, officials said. An initial lottery will identify 10,000 applicants to verify the information contained in their applications.

During the Chicago Police Department’s annual budget hearing, under intense questioning from members of the Chicago City Council, Brown said he had “zero tolerance” for police officers who are members of hate groups or associate with members of hate groups.

The Civilian Office of Police Accountability, known as COPA, recommended that Officer Eric Stillman be fired for shooting Toledo in the instant that the 13-year-old turned toward him and put his hands in the air, according to the video of the incident.

Thanks to a “little-known loophole,” hedge funds, private equity firms and real estate investors have “siphoned” approximately $280 million from schools, parks, libraries, fire departments and other government agencies between September 2015 and September 2022 in Cook County. 

The FBI labeled the Proud Boys as an antisemitic white supremacy organization and several current and former members of the Proud Boys have been charged with seditious conspiracy for their role in the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.

One year after the Chicago City Council approved what Lightfoot calls the Chicago Recovery Plan, city officials have spent just $130.5 million of the $1.227 billion earmarked for a host of programs including affordable housing, mental health, violence prevention, youth job programs and help for unhoused Chicagoans, according to data released as part of the mayor’s 2023 budget proposal.

The FBI labeled the Proud Boys as an antisemitic white supremacy organization and several current and former members of the Proud Boys have been charged with seditious conspiracy for their role in the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.

The Community Development Commission sent the proposal to the Chicago Plan Commission, which is scheduled to consider the issue at its meeting scheduled for Oct. 20.

A coalition of progressive groups has been working for nearly a year to prevent Mayor Lori Lightfoot from being re-elected by uniting behind a single candidate. Nothing in the Lightfoot’s spending plan is likely to alter that determination — and may give them more ammunition to use against the mayor.

A vote on a measure that would strip members of the Chicago City Council of their authority to ban commercial property owners from hiring a firms to patrol their parking lots and swiftly immobilize cars that are parked there illegally was delayed. A familiar lobbyist and campaign cash factor into the debate. 

Chief Financial Officer Jennie Huang Bennett faced pointed questions from members of the City Council’s Budget and Government Operations Committee on Thursday about the "advanced pension payment" proposal.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s plan to close a projected $170.6 million budget gap in 2023 relies on booming tax revenues that she said proves Chicago’s budget has fully recovered from the economic catastrophe caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot did not explain Thursday how she would propose to bridge the city’s projected 2023 budget shortfall, which is now 33% bigger than the gap she detailed nearly two months ago.

Chicago Police Department officers agreed to allow those arrested access to a phone within three hours in order to resolve a lawsuit filed by the Cook County Public Defender’s Office after mass arrests during the protests and unrest triggered by the police murder of George Floyd in May 2020.

Brandon Johnson, 46, has yet to formally announce that he will run for mayor of Chicago — but the backing of the Chicago Teachers Union will ensure that he will have ample resources if he does take on Lightfoot, who has long been at odds with the city’s most politically powerful labor union.

The unanimous Supreme Court decision, released Sept. 22, resolves a 7-year-old lawsuit brought by Charles Green, who was sentenced to life in prison at age 16 after being convicted in a 1985 quadruple murder. Green was released in 2009, and wants to prove his innocence.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot said she was determined to chart a “bright and lasting” future for LaSalle Street between Washington Street and Jackson Boulevard, an area of the city she said had been permanently altered by the shifts triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.

State Sen. Emil Jones III, D-Chicago, pleaded not guilty Friday to charges he took a $5,000 bribe from a firm that installed red-light cameras throughout the state and lied to Federal Bureau of Investigation agents.

Chicago and Cook County last faced a low risk of COVID-19 on May 5. The region has bounced between a medium risk and a high risk all summer.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who is running for re-election, said it was not enough for the lawmakers to resign as leaders of the Democratic Party in the Illlinois Senate.

In all, the payments approved Wednesday are equivalent to 30% of the city’s annual $82 million budget to cover the cost of police misconduct lawsuits.

The new law is modeled on the city’s rules designed to protect immigrants from prohibiting members of the Chicago Police Department from cooperating with federal law enforcement agencies.

The charges against state Sen. Emil Jones III were made public by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Northern District of Illinois through an information, a court document that is typically filed in cases where the defendant has indicated they plan to plead guilty.

Despite promises, a federally-funded program has removed just 154 lead service lines from Chicago homes as of Monday, according to data provided to WTTW News by the Department of Water Management.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced her choice of Timmy Knudsen less than 24 hours before the City Council’s Rules Committee is set to consider his nomination. A final vote by the Chicago City Council is expected Wednesday.

The Chicago City Council is set to pay $9 million to a man who spent 25 years in prison after being convicted of murder in 1994 following an investigation led by a Chicago Police detective accused of routinely framing suspects.