The Chicago Transit Authority unveiled its budget proposal for next year. The proposed $1.8 billion budget avoids service cuts and price increases while making investments to upgrade the transit system. 

The upgrade is likely to boost efforts by Mayor Lori Lightfoot to convince Chicago City Council members to support her budget, which she hopes to pass on Nov. 7.

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.

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.

In 2019, Chicago paid more than $1.31 billion to its four pension funds benefitting police officers, firefighters, municipal employees and laborers. In 2023, Chicago will pay more than $2.34 billion to the same four funds.

Chicago’s financial picture has been buoyed by the city’s red-hot real estate market and nearly $2 billion in federal aid designed to help the city withstand the ravages of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The vote capped months of parliamentary shenanigans and came after a concerted effort by advocates for pedestrians and bicyclists to convince undecided members of the City Council the tickets were an effective way to reduce headline-grabbing and heartbreaking crashes.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s office will host three “budget engagement forums” on July 21, July 23 and July 30 to give Chicago residents a chance to “share their priorities regarding city services” and “have a dialogue” with the mayor, budget director and other city officials.

A push to roll back a law hitting drivers who zip past Chicago parks and schools monitored by speed cameras traveling between 6 mph and 9 mph above the limit with $35 tickets is set to get an up-or-down vote by the Chicago City Council on July 20, according to records obtained by WTTW News.

Ald. Jason Ervin (28th Ward) led the push to prevent a vote on the measure Wednesday, using a parliamentary procedure to delay a vote until the City Council’s next meeting, scheduled for July 20. That tactic is often used by members of the City Council to push back an up-or-down vote when the outcome is uncertain.

The proposal now heads to Wednesday’s meeting of the full Chicago City Council, where its prospects are uncertain at best.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Monday that her strategy to fill the “significant gaps” in Chicago’s mental health care system that she inherited by expanding city funding for nonprofit organizations — but not reopening city-run clinics — is succeeding.

The $1.73 billion proposal now heads to the Illinois Gaming Board, which must license Bally’s to operate the Chicago casino set to be built along the Chicago River near Chicago Avenue and Halsted Street.

The Chicago City Council is expected to give its final stamp of approval to the Bally’s plan on Wednesday, sending the proposal to the Illinois Gaming Board, which must license Bally’s to operate the Chicago casino set to be built near Chicago Avenue and Halsted Street.