Stories by Heather Cherone

The $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure plan signed into law Monday by President Joe Biden includes $1.7 billion that will help Chicago “kick-start” lagging efforts to replace lead service lines responsible for contaminating the tap water in homes across the city, Mayor Lori Lightfoot said. 

“It is not surprising to me that he did not want to face accountability for his own conduct,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said.

More than 4,900 members of the Chicago Police Department are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or have refused to disclose their vaccination status to city officials, one month after the deadline set by Mayor Lori Lightfoot, according to data released Monday by city officials.

The announcement by the Cook County Department of Public Health comes after health officials in New York City, Colorado and California urged all adults to get a booster dose of the vaccine.

The Chicago Police Board on Monday will hold the first in a series of hearings that could lead to the termination of police officer and union head John Catanzara for defying the department’s brass and ignoring its rules.

Cinespace Studios, which helped spark a boom in movie and television production in Chicago, has been sold to a private equity firm that tapped a former Netflix executive to lead the operation on Chicago’s West Side.

The largest settlement — $2 million — would go to the family of Julia Lynn Callaway, who was killed in May 2018 when she was struck by a car being pursued by police. 

The sergeant who led the botched raid in February 2019 that left Anjanette Young handcuffed while naked and pleading for help should be fired, Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown told the Chicago Police Board.

Chicago Park District Board of Commissioners President Avis LaVelle said Wednesday she was not forced to resign by Mayor Lori Lightfoot for her handling of complaints that girls and young women were being abused while working at Chicago’s parks.

The online tool will allow Chicagoans to use map-drawing software similar to the kind that members of the Chicago City Council have been using since the end of July — but Chicagoans have less than three weeks to send in their proposal.

Chicago officials removed Arkansas from the city’s COVID-19 travel advisory Tuesday even as confirmed cases of COVID-19 continue to rise in Chicago as colder weather blanketed the city. 

Opponents of the measure are concerned that greenlighting sports betting lounges at Wrigley Field, United Center, Wintrust Arena, Solider Field and Guaranteed Rate Field would stunt the growth of a casino-resort in Chicago.

In spite of Lightfoot’s solemn pledge to immediately go after the “blood money” earned by gangs who terrorize Chicagoans, the mayor has not publicly mentioned her so-called “Victims’ Justice Ordinance” since that City Hall news conference on Sept. 14.

Members of the Latino and Black Caucuses are still split on how to draw the new city ward map. The Latino Caucus unveiled a map that reduces the number of wards with a majority of Black voters, intended to reflect a growing Latino population in the city.

Small businesses and nonprofits grappling with lower-than-expected revenue and higher-than-expected costs have until Nov. 12 to apply for a new round of grants, between $5,000 and $10,000, from the city of Chicago.

The full U.S. Senate is set to consider Rahm Emanuel’s nomination to serve as President Joe Biden’s ambassador — but if the former Chicago mayor is confirmed, it will happen without the support of at least two progressive Democratic senators.

The former member of the Illinois House told a federal judge Wednesday that he offered a member of the Illinois Senate monthly payments of $2,500 to support a bill supported by a sweepstakes firm that he worked for as a lobbyist.

Three of the four lifeguards accused of wrongdoing resigned as a result of the investigation, while Chicago Park District Interim Inspector General Alison Perona recommended the fourth be terminated in connection with the allegations. 

The advisory continues to cover 41 states as well as Guam, announced Dr. Allison Arwady, the commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health. 

Three firms want to build a casino and resort in Chicago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s office announced Friday. All five proposals are of a “high-caliber,” Lightfoot said in a statement released by the mayor’s office.

The resignation of Deborah Witzburg as the deputy inspector general for public safety comes 15 days after former Inspector General Joseph Ferguson left office at the end of his third term in office.

Approximately 130 employees — most of whom are members of the Chicago Fire Department and the Department of Water Management — were not likely to succeed on any of their claims, the judge ruled.

The Chicago City Council voted 13-30 Friday to reject a push to reverse Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s order that all city employees disclose whether they have been vaccinated against COVID-19 — and get fully vaccinated by Dec. 31.

Thirteen alderpeople invoked state law to call a special meeting of the Chicago City Council for 11 a.m. Friday in an attempt to force a vote on a measure that would reverse Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s order that all city employees disclose their vaccination status.

The Chicago City Council approved Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s $16.7 billion budget on Wednesday with the backing of progressive members who celebrated the spending plan’s focus on affordable housing, mental health, violence prevention, youth job programs and help for unhoused Chicagoans.

Ald. Patrick Daley Thompson is one of three sitting members of the Chicago City Council to be charged with federal crimes.