QUOTE OF THE DAY
Crain’s Chicago: Enough with the corporate handouts, Mr. Quinn
We know the quid, but not the quo.
Gov. Pat Quinn and U.S. Sen. Richard Durbin breathlessly announced.
Amazon.com Inc.’s plan to open a warehouse in Illinois that will employ 1,000 people by 2017. But they haven’t told us what Illinois will give Amazon in return.
Built In Chicago: Chicago’s first health tech hub announces its inaugural class
For the first time in Chicago, a healthcare robotics company, a pharmaceutical focused on rare, life-threatening diseases, a platform for connecting patients, healthcare givers and doctors and a company working on hearing therapies will all be housed together. These are just a few of the 10 innovative companies changing the healthcare landscape in Chicago. They’re all also part of the inaugural class of companies working at Matter, Chicago’s newest tech hub.
The hub aims to bring together the innovators working on the healthcare sector. Before Matter, this type of work (the type that saves lives, makes healthcare communication easier and finds new solutions to age-old problems) was done at leading research institutes, hospitals, established companies and startups, but the groups didn’t have a centralized place to communicate. While other technology hubs exists (Matter is closely tied to 1871), none specifically focused on healthcare.
WSJ: Obama Soaks the Rich, Drowns the Middle Class
The curse of the U.S. economy today is the downward trend in “take-home pay.” This is the most crucial economic indicator for most Americans, but when President Obama said in a recent speech at Northwestern that nearly every economic measure shows improvement from five years ago, he conspicuously left this one out.
Most workers’ pay has not kept up with inflation for at least six years. Even as hiring picked up over the past year, wages and salaries have inched up by 2%, barely ahead of inflation. This probably explains why half of Americans say the recession never ended. They are experiencing what Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen last week described as “stagnant living standards for the majority.”
Why aren’t wages rising? There are several reasons, including that many jobs today don’t pay as well as the ones lost during the recession. ObamaCare has made health insurance more expensive for businesses—as the nation’s biggest employer, Wal-Mart , recently reported—and that takes a bite out of take-home pay. Yet one factor is often overlooked: the tax increase on “the rich” at the beginning of 2013.
ABC 7: AMAZON JOBS COMING TO ILLINOIS
Amazon plans to bring 1,000 full-time jobs to Illinois.
Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn and U.S. Senator Dick Durbin called the plan a $75 million investment in the state. Amazon officials have not decided on a location but will begin site visits. The online seller plans to open its first facility in the state next year.
Top draws to the state include the area’s transportation network and skilled workforce, according to a release from Quinn and Durbin. They say Amazon will have the chance to expand.
Chicago Tribune: Former Illinois tax havens face new taxes, budget cuts
Kankakee residents, already dealing with increased city fees, face a potential hike in their sales taxes, as this town 60 miles southwest of Chicago has lost its luster as a business tax haven.
Dozens of companies that opened satellite offices in Kankakee in the past decade, lured by the municipality’s 6.25 percent sales tax rate and tax incentives, have left. The departures have deprived the town and Kankakee County of millions of dollars in tax revenue.
When voters in Kankakee go to the polls Nov. 4, they will have to decide whether to raise their sales taxes by 1 cent per dollar, to 7.25 percent, or face the threat of budget cuts to public safety. Earlier this year, Kankakee instituted new fees on car owners and households to deal with a shortfall in its budget.
WICS: Companies Donate To Support Morgan County Tax Increase
New questions and concerns over a proposed sales tax increase in Morgan County
Lonnie Johns’ a spokesman for Facts Steering Committee, is taking issue with construction companies O’Shea Builders and BLDD architects.
He says their $2,500 dollar donation each to the Morgan County School Facility Tax Support Committee is a conflict of interest. A Jacksonville committee advocating for the 1 cent sales tax increase in the county is backing a plan to use funds to renovate district 117 schools.
Tax Foundation: 2015 State Business Tax Climate Index
Chicago Tribune: City has $35 million backlog in razing abandoned buildings
Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s proposed 2015 budget would have to commit another $35 million to razing dangerous, vacant buildings that blight communities to clear a backlog of nearly 1,400 court-ordered demolitions, an administration official said Monday.
The city would spend about $8.1 million next year on demolitions after setting aside about $11.6 million this year, according to budget documents. But new demolition orders come in at a rate of about 100 a month, which has left the city with a backlog of 1,362 demolitions, said Felicia Davis, city Buildings Department commissioner. The city spends an additional $2 million a year to board up buildings, she said.
“This is the biggest challenge we have in the department, as it relates to not keeping pace with vacant and abandoned buildings in the city,” Davis said during a hearing on the mayor’s $7.3 billion spending plan.
Chicago Sun Times: Tourism biz should be more transparent
Eighty-five cents of every dollar spent by Chicago main’s tourism promoter, Choose Chicago, comes out of your pocket as a taxpayer. That works out to $28.4 million for a year.
But Choose Chicago doesn’t have to tell you how it spends your money because technically it is not a public agency. Choose Chicago lives off your money like a rich kid lives off his daddy’s trust fund, but it is allowed by state law to pretend to be a private, not-for-profit business.
Too bad. Because best we can tell, based on what Sun-Times reporter Chris Fusco recently found when he turned over a few rocks, Choose Chicago is playing the same old political insider’s game for which Illinois and Chicago are notorious. Who gets a consulting contract and who gets hired seem remarkably aligned with Choose Chicago’s desire to curry favor with the single most powerful elected official in Illinois, House Speaker Mike Madigan.
Chicago Tribune: Company that operates Divvy bike-share program being sold
The company that operates the Divvy bicycle-sharing program in Chicago is being sold, the new owner announced Tuesday.
Bikeshare Holdings said it has reached an agreement to acquire Alta Bicycle Share. Alta manages Divvy and bike-share programs in about nine other metropolitan areas in the U.S., Canada and Australia.
Bikeshare Holdings said the purchase will allow Alta to improve customer service. Alta, which is based in Portland, Ore., will move its headquarters to New York.
Daily Herald: Waukegan teachers strike continues
Waukegan Unit District 60 students will be off again Wednesday because of a teachers strike that began Oct. 2. District 60 and Lake County Federation of Teachers union representatives said negotiators met until about noon Tuesday before ending for the day. District 60 said in a statement that both sides exchanged revised proposals. Union and school negotiators are scheduled to resume talks at 10 a.m. Wednesday. About 17,000 students have been idled since the strike started.
Chicago Tribune: Illinois ranks 45th in the nation in job growth, report says
Illinois ranks 45th in the nation in job growth, according to a report published Tuesday by Arizona State University.
Employers have created more than 2.4 million jobs through September, an increase of less than 2 percent from the same period last year. While all states have chipped in for those jobs, some states’ job growth rates are rising faster than others.
Lee McPheters, a research professor at the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University, said some big states, like Illinois, are growing at a rate below the national average and thus are lagging behind.
Wire Points: Bloody Tuesday for Illinois Taxpayers: Tens of millions to fund Quinn’s new jobs claims
Not just another day in Illinois. The election is coming up, so open your wallets to fund the pork. Here’s what we got today:
Chronus will build a fertilizer plant downstate employing 175, and 25 jobs will be created in Chicago. Cost: $52 million for just 200 permanent jobs!
Coyote Logistic will supposedly add 500 jobs in Chicago. Cost: $2.5 million to taxpayers.
Chicago Tribune: City will keep $7.7M from quiet change to red light camera tickets
Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration will not refund $7.7 million in red light camera tickets it collected after quietly lowering the yellow light standard, the city’s transportation chief said Tuesday.
The mayor told the Tribune earlier this month that he would consider refunds, but Chicago Department of Transportation chief Rebekah Scheinfeld made it clear that would not be happening — even though the city made a determination in September to restore the longer yellow light standard.
“These were violations of the law, they were legitimate tickets and we stand behind them,” Scheinfeld said at a City Council hearing on red light cameras. “But going forward we want to make sure the situation is not distracted with continuing questions about this, and that we have full public confidence.”
CARTOON OF THE DAY
