North American mayors, governors and economic developers are sure to be working overtime in the coming months, following Amazon’s announcement that it is seeking a second headquarters city where it can create 50,000 new jobs.

Chicago’s Rahm Emanuel confirmed he’s among those mayors already making his case to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to bring the transformational deal to the Midwest’s unofficial capital.

Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos, one of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs, is also — suddenly — one of the most important figures in Chicago. His Thursday announcement that Seattle-based Amazon is searching for a North American location in which to establish a second headquarters puts this city in the running for an extraordinary prize.

The powerhouse digital retailer plans to invest $5 billion to create a massive office complex that in time could employ 50,000 people. These would be great-paying tech, white-collar and other positions in such vast numbers they could transform the economy and identity of whichever city Amazon chooses. As one commentator noted, the nearest comparison might be the competition to choose an Olympic host city — except Amazon’s jobs won’t disappear after three weeks.

More than two months after lawmakers put an end to the state’s historic budget impasse by voting to override Gov. Bruce Rauner’s veto of a new spending plan, his administration has started to move forward with key provisions of the proposal he continues to criticize.

On Friday, the governor’s office said it would begin to sign contracts with nonprofit groups who are waiting on more than $70 million that was set aside in the budget to pay for autism, epilepsy and immigration programs, among others. The full amount won’t be paid, his office said, but the money is likely to be welcome for agencies that went without regular funding during the budget stalemate.

Illinois employers can begin filing unemployment insurance and wage reports through a simplified online system beginning Monday.

The Department of Employment Security and Department of Revenue worked on the upgrades to mytaxIllinois.gov for several months. The system allows employers to set up a free account for management of monthly wage reports, quarterly unemployment insurance reports and unemployment contribution payments. The system also allows for registration of new businesses, account information updates, online confirmation of payments, verification of account balances, and updates of correspondents with the state agencies.

A Cook County judge has ruled that Mayor Rahm Emanuel does not have to produce an index of private emails and text messages he sent and received, dealing a setback to the Chicago Tribune in its continuing fight with the city over the mayor’s electronic communications.

Judge Kathleen Pantle made the ruling Thursday in the Tribune’s ongoing lawsuit that alleges Emanuel skirted the state’s open records laws by refusing to release communications about city business that he had conducted through private accounts.

Officer Daniel M. Houlihan had been working on Mayor Richard M. Daley’s security detail for about a year when he was charged with drunken driving for an off-duty car crash that sent him, the other driver and three children to the hospital in 2004.

The Chicago cop’s blood-alcohol level was 0.30 percent, police records show — more than three times the 0.08 percent legal standard at which a driver is presumed drunk.

Nearly 50 Cook County Criminal Courthouse deputies and supervisors are in trouble with the sheriff after allegedly coming to work late and leaving early while still getting paid, Sheriff Tom Dart announced Friday afternoon.

The 48 workers at the Cook County Criminal Courthouse at 26th and California now face either termination or suspension.

Plans are underway for $20 million in renovations at Northern Illinois University’s Holmes Student Center.

Though designs are still in progress and pending approval from the state university’s board of trustees, the aim is to begin work next year in the summer or fall and finish by the fall of 2019.

You can’t blame taxpayers for wanting a return on their investment. In fact, you expect them to insist on it and city leaders to take heed.

Still, there seems to be a lot of concern about the Illinois 15 corridor. That concern over the progress of two developers should be weighed against some solid bricks and mortar.