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* Sun-Times | Senior citizens are the safest drivers on Illinois roads: According to the “2023 Study on Age-Related Driving Abilities,” conducted by the secretary of state, drivers in Illinois between 75 and 79 are the safest drivers on the road. “Statistics show that seniors are among the safest drivers of any age category,” said Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias, who is urging lawmakers to permanently increase the age requirement for driving tests from 75 to 79.
* Crain’s | Migrant crisis pits Pritzker vs. City Council: During a tense Immigrant & Refugee Rights Committee hearing on Friday, Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa, 35th, repeatedly attacked the governor for not doing enough to assist the city. The mayor’s floor leader first mounted his criticism against the governor yesterday after Pritzker expressed concerns over the city’s contract with security company GardaWorld to build large tents to house migrants. The $29 million contract, part of an existing agreement GardaWorld made with the Illinois Emergency Management Agency, has come under fire in recent weeks since the company also transported migrants north from Florida.
* Tribune | After months of protest, Amazon set to open in West Humboldt Park to mixed reception. ‘A job beats no job.’: Community groups have attempted to wrangle commitments from Amazon related to local hiring and wages for around two years, but they have mostly stopped short of trying to keep the warehouse from opening.
* ABC Chicago | UAW strike: Ford’s Chicago assembly plant workers join walkout Friday: In addition to the Chicago Ford plant, Fain said workers at a GM plant in Lansing, Michigan Delta Township plan will also join the strike. Fain said the Lansing regional stamping plant will continue working.
* Sun-Times | Poised to shutter Catholic parishes, Joliet bishop tight-lipped on financial impact of the priest sex abuse scandal: “The diocese has demonstrated slavish adherence to off-the-books, unwritten policies that derail justice for abuse survivors and much-needed institutional transparency,” Attorney General Kwame Raoul said in the May report, adding that the diocese’s “current approach to abuse allegations against a religious order priest who ministered in the diocese are particularly opaque and ill formed.” That lack of transparency also extends to church finances, a Chicago Sun-Times examination has found.
* Tribune | Will Mayor Brandon Johnson’s transfer tax plan deliver for the homeless amid a real estate downturn?: The debate about overhauling the real estate transfer tax comes at a time when revenues from it are already falling. The tax will end this year 37% lower than initially anticipated, according to the Johnson administration’s own projections. What’s more, revenues from the tax since 2003 have been fickle and followed fluctuations in the real estate market, spiking at $242 million in 2006 and tumbling to $62 million at the height of the Great Recession in 2009.
* Tribune | Some allies break with Mayor Brandon Johnson over migrant response: During a tense meeting of the City Council’s immigration committee, three of Johnson’s hand-picked committee chairs criticized the mayor’s response to the migrant situation, including his plan to utilize a controversial private security firm to establish tent encampments for some of the more than 15,000 migrants who have been bused or flown to Chicago from southern border states since August 2022.
* Sun-Times | Ed Burke once bragged about his work for Trump — now he doesn’t want jurors to know: Former Chicago Ald. Edward M. Burke once touted his work for Donald Trump’s companies by handing out copies of a 2016 Chicago Sun-Times report that Burke’s firm had saved Trump and investors $11.7 million in property taxes on a luxury downtown hotel.
* Tribune | ‘Everyone is so freaked out’: Armed robbery crews sweep city as Chicago police task forces struggle with brazen crimes: To try to thwart the growing problem, Chicago police have used an array of tools including helicopters, phone tracking, physical surveillance and fingerprint analysis to try to catch the robbery crews in real time and develop the evidence to make charges stick in court, sources told the Tribune.
* Sun-Times | Menashe Properties takes a chance on West Loop’s elusive revival: Menashe Properties bought a 29-story office building at 230 W. Monroe St. The family-owned firm, based in Portland, Oregon, and making its first investment in Chicago, took the plunge as other property moguls talk about tax rates, high crime and the still-uncertain comeback from COVID-19 as reasons to shun deals here.
* Tribune | Enrich Chicago’s racial impact survey finds equity still lacking across arts and culture ecosystem: According to the survey, 30% of Asian American and Latina cisgender females don’t feel safe bringing their whole selves to work. And 40% of Black folks who identified as LGBTQ said they “disagreed or strongly disagreed” that they are fairly compensated. And nearly 24% of respondents who identified as Hispanic/Latino strongly disagreed that they were fairly compensated.
* Sun-Times | Black Cook County residents face scarcity of mental health resources as their suicide rates remain high after the pandemic: The problem is even worse for men, who have suicides rates that are more than three times higher than women in Cook County. Advocates say there isn’t much encouragement for men — particularly Black men— to discuss mental health.
* VCE | Governor JB Pritzker to Visit DACC Wed Oct. 4 for Senator Bennett Memorial Dedication: Illinois Governor JB Pritzker will visit Danville Area Community College on Wednesday, October 4, to pay tribute to the late State Senator Scott Bennett during the Memorial Tree Dedication ceremony at 11:00 am. The ceremony will take place on the lawn south of Prairie Hall. Additional speakers include former colleagues and members of the Senator’s family. The public is welcome.
* The Atlantic | The Best Thing About Amazon Was Never Going to Last: What happened to Amazon? The company no longer excels at the thing it’s supposed to be best at: shopping. Its unparalleled convenience and cost helped turn it into an e-commerce juggernaut, one that now faces an antitrust lawsuit from the Federal Trade Commission over alleged anticompetitive practices. Now around every corner lies a brand you’ve never heard of, selling a product you’re not sure about. Good deals on name brands are harder to come by. Amazon’s dominance has also transformed it into a different kind of company. Along the way, the famously customer-obsessed company has lost track of what its customers actually want.
* SF Chronicle | The Trump administration touted him as a victim of #MeToo. Now he’s accused of dismembering a girlfriend: The Trump cabinet member referenced Roberts as she announced sweeping rollbacks of Obama-era reforms to Title IX, the law prohibiting sex discrimination at schools that receive federal funding. High-profile sexual assaults at universities had prompted the Obama administration to strengthen enforcement in 2011 and 2014, but critics like DeVos said the rights of the accused were being trampled.
* Tribune | Chicagoan sets record for oldest skydiver at 104 years old: ‘Age is just a number’: The crowd gathered along the skydiving resort’s landing strip roared. Friends rushed to share congratulations. Someone brought over Hoffner’s red walker. She rose fast, and a reporter asked how it felt to be back on the ground. “Wonderful,” Hoffner said. “But it was wonderful up there.”
* Crain’s | Chicago-born rapper Common lends his star power to a new ad campaign for WTTW: Chicago has always been a city that gave Common “so much,” he said. “It’s a city that has been the foundation of many of the stories I have told throughout my career,” he said in a statement. “Through my work with Art in Motion and the Common Ground Foundation, I’ve realized there are so many stories just like mine that deserve to be told with reverence.”
* Sun-Times | 75 years covering race in Chicago: A newspaper for a diverse city: As the Sun-Times looks back during its 75th year of continual daily publication, race is a key lens through which to understand the newspaper’s history.
posted by Isabel Miller
Monday, Oct 2, 23 @ 7:40 am
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On Twitter Ramirez-Rosa claimed the city had given the state the go ahead to open a shelter in May, and the governor’s office said that only happened a few weeks ago. Has that discrepancy been run down by anyone?
I get that it’s all just finger pointing at this point, no politician ever wants to be held responsible for anything no matter how much power they have, but them being so far apart on what seems objective facts caught my eye.
Comment by Perrid Monday, Oct 2, 23 @ 10:18 am