QUOTE OF THE DAY
Chicago Tribune: New trains? That’s not where your Metra fare hike will go
Let’s set the record straight right up front: That 10.8 percent fare increase Metra wants for next year is not about buying new trains.
Only $2.4 million of the $27.3 million the fare hike would generate next year would go toward the purchase of new rolling stock. The rest would plug holes in the 2015 operating budget, including almost $20 million in increased wages and benefits. Metra’s operating expenses are going up 6.4 percent, well above the rate of inflation.
And that 68 percent fare hike projected over the next 10 years? Most of that would cover day-to-day expenses, too.
Public Sector: Why public pension plans are left unfunded
Public pension plans remain massively underfunded, but the standard explanations of the problem-egregious benefits, loopholes and abuse – are the effects, not the root causes, of failures that run much deeper. Pliable accounting rules and weak or non-existent funding mandates are what truly jeopardize the solvency of pension plans and their government sponsors.
When the costs can be hidden and then deferred for future payment, politicians can easily get away with making unreasonable promises without fixing the cracks in the system.
In principle, pension plans need to employ actuarial consultants to project the cost of the benefits pledged. These projections rely on many assumptions, but the most important are those regarding rates of return on fund assets, contribution rates, pay raises, longevity and cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs). When the first two factors turn out to be lower and the rest higher than originally assumed, the actuary has underestimated the costs and underfunding is the result.
Chicago Tribune: Craft brewery on tap for Oak Park?
Oak Park may soon become home to a craft brewery.
On Monday, the Village Board voted to refer to the Plan Commission a zoning amendment that would allow craft breweries to locate in the general business district as a special use, and the board also forwarded an application to open such a business at 6806 Roosevelt Rd.
The commission will hold a public hearing for the text amendment on Nov. 6, according to village documents.
Reading Eagle: University of Illinois at Chicago plans proposal for Obama library corridor
The University of Illinois at Chicago plans to submit a lofty proposal to create an Obama presidential library corridor, using public transportation to link its Near West Side academic campus to a desolate site in North Lawndale that has been devoid of new development for nearly a half-century.
It would be an ambitious experiment in urban renewal, university officials said, designed to redefine the city circle by stretching it farther west and bringing far-flung neighborhoods the kind of prosperity that has long been reserved for those closest to the lakefront.
In doing so, the university hopes to capitalize on its prime real estate — Harrison Field on the eastern edge of the campus, which boasts stunning views of the city’s skyline — while meeting a crucial demand of The Barack Obama Foundation to create an economic engine in other communities.
Bloomberg View: Sorry, Obamacare Is Still Unfixable
For the most part, the political debate over President Barack Obama’s health-care overhaul has become a duel between vague slogans: Republicans say they want to “replace” the Affordable Care Act but generally don’t say with what. Democrats say they want to “fix” it but usually don’t say how.
So Democratic Senators Mark Warner and Mark Begich deserve credit for advancing specific legislation to change the law. The main change they’re advocating, though, is unlikely to make people any happier with the law — and could cause new problems.
The senators want to give customers buying insurance on the Obamacare exchanges a new option with low premiums and high deductibles. It would be called a “copper” plan, in contrast to higher-premium, lower-deductible plans already on the exchange (platinum, gold, silver and bronze).
Chicago Sun Times: Key player in red light camera scandal plans to plead guilty
“Martin O’Malley — a key player in Chicago’s red light camera scandal involving Redflex Traffic Systems — plans to plead guilty in December, according to court records filed Wednesday.
…his main role was allegedly to funnel cash and perks to his pal, city worker John Bills, who is accused of helping rig the contract for Redflex in return for kickbacks.”
O’Malley has been cooperating with federal prosecutors for some time, sources say.
CNN: Americans taking fewest vacation days in four decades
Feeling buried by work, like you can’t find time for a few days off, like your entire work-life balance is out of whack?
If you’re an American worker, it just might be.
A new study has found that U.S. workers forfeited $52.4 billion in time-off benefits in 2013 and took less vacation time than at any point in the past four decades.
American workers turned their backs on a total of 169 million days of paid time off, in effect “providing free labor for their employers, at an average of $504 per employee,” according to the study.
Chicago Sun Times: Feds say Emanuel’s former comptroller deserves 15-year sentence
Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s former city comptroller Amer Ahmad should be sentenced to 15 years in prison, federal prosecutors say.
Ahmad — who skipped bail and fled to Pakistan in April after pleading guilty to a kickback scheme he ran while he was Ohio’s deputy state treasurer — deserves the hefty sentence for “a remarkable abuse of office,” the U.S. Attorney’s office in Columbus, Ohio wrote in a sentencing memo filed late Thursday.
The 39-year-old admitted in December last year that he used his position in Ohio to steer $3.2 million in securities and brokerage work to a high school classmate who kicked back $500,000 to Ahmad.
Crain’s: Curing corruption in Illinois, one politician at a time
A former governor was convicted of public corruption recently. What many Illinoisans probably found surprising wasn’t the verdict but the fact that the governor was from Virginia.
One wag tweeted, “That’s so Illinois!” When it comes to public corruption, Illinois is the punchline of every joke, even when the corruption is not our own.
Illinois has a huge problem with political corruption, and it goes beyond a few bad apples or simple human weakness. The reality is bad, and the public perception is worse. Illinoisans believe that their politics, public officials and governments are corrupt at every level.
Red Eye Chicago: Chicago police to check CTA passengers for explosives
Starting next month, Chicago police officers will be swabbing the bags of some riders entering some CTA rail stations to make sure the bags don’t have explosives, Chicago Police announced Friday.
There is “no known terrorist threat” that prompted the new procedure, which should be starting the week of Nov. 3, said Nancy Lipman, Chicago Police commander for public transportation. “We are adding this as another protective measure,” Lipman said.
A team of officers will be stationed outside the turnstiles of a randomly selected rail stop to ask randomly selected riders to swab the outside of their bag. The bags are not opened.
CARTOON OF THE DAY
