Gov. Bruce Rauner’s criminal-justice reform commission urges removing overbroad occupational licensing restrictions that bar ex-offenders from pursuing work in over 118 professions.
Since Chicago officials received a city watchdog investigation recommending six officers be disciplined for their roles surrounding the killing of David Koschman by a nephew of former Mayor Richard M. Daley, three have retired.
The district’s borrowing does take pressure off of the district’s immediate cash-flow problem. However, it does nothing to solve the CPS’ long-term financial crisis and its structural imbalances – in fact it only makes things worse.
The crisis threatens to burden taxpayers with massive, ever-escalating taxes to bail out a system that is not sustainable – government-worker pensions consume a fourth of the state’s budget.
Mere months after passing the largest tax hike in modern Chicago history, Mayor Rahm Emanuel vows to hit residents with even higher property-tax bills, this time to bail out pension mismanagement by Chicago Public Schools officials – behavior tacitly endorsed by the Chicago Teachers Union.
Chicago teachers’ salaries are based on a complex and convoluted system that has provided teachers with annual pay increases well in excess of the 2.75 to 3 percent raises proposed by the district.
The commission’s 14 policy suggestions aim to safely reduce Illinois’ prison population by 25 percent by 2025.
Illinois’ weak jobs growth is driving more residents to other states on net than Illinois gains from other states, from natural growth in births or from international immigration.
Amid CPS’ postponed $875 million bond sale, Chicagoans should question whether the district can fill its budget hole and whether Emanuel will stand up for Chicago taxpayers or give in to more teachers union demands.
Government-worker union officials filed papers with the Illinois General Assembly in favor of the “pension holiday” that contributed to the state’s $111 billion pension debt.
CPS is broke. To preserve funding for the classroom and Chicago's children, and to keep CPS from going belly up, CPS officials must broker significant concessions from the union.