Get the latest news from around Illinois.
Chicago Tribune: CPS school year won't end early, Emanuel says after judge rejects state funding suit
Mayor Rahm Emanuel said schools would remain open for the full academic year on Friday just hours after a judge tossed a lawsuit Chicago Public Schools had framed as a last resort to secure enough money to keep classes in session.
“The kids of the City of Chicago will be in school until the end of the school year,” Emanuel said at a late afternoon news conference at City Hall. “That is where they belong.”
Chicago Tribune: CPS eludes a reckoning, but the rolling fiscal disaster doesn't end
First, the good news: Chicago Public Schools will remain open this spring until June 20, as scheduled. Students, parents, teachers, principals, you may now exhale.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced that decision late Friday. But follow the still unexplained millions of dollars required to achieve that end
Chicago Tribune: Byrd-Bennett sobs while trying to explain corruption, gets 4 1/2 years in prison
Former Chicago Public Schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett began to sob in a federal courtroom Friday as she struggled to explain where “the tipping point” was that led her down a path of corruption.
The pressure of leading the nation’s third-largest school system was enormous, she said. The mayor had shuttered dozens of schools, there was a bitter teachers strike, relentless budget issues and students dying virtually every day from gun violence. Still, those stresses were no excuse for lining her own pockets, she said.
Chicago Tribune: Was Pat Quinn running the state of Illinois — or a job fair?
The emails flew among Illinois agency officials and staffers in then-Gov. Pat Quinn’s office as Democrats scrambled to get their friends and family on the public payroll.
Chicago Sun-Times: Rauner has stake in 100-plus firms, disclosure report shows
Gov. Bruce Rauner — a former venture capitalist and multimillionaire — on Friday released his statement of economic interests.
Rauner — who doesn’t take a salary as governor — is required to list information about entities and investments that could give rise to conflicts of interests. But he doesn’t have to offer full financial disclosures.
Belleville News-Democrat: Tossing out squirrely distractions easier than cracking hard nuts in Illinois
In the animated movie “Up,” there was a collar that allowed Dug the dog to talk: “My master made me this collar. He is a good and smart master and he made me this collar so I can talk.
“Squirrel!”
We keep thinking about Dug, intentions and distractions with every headline that comes out of Springfield.
Decatur Herald & Review: State legislation needs price tags
Whether it’s the grocery store or a used car lot, any item up for sale usually has a price tag – or at the very least, an asking price.
Unfortunately, that’s not the way Illinois government works.
Chicago Tribune: House backs study of pharmacy safety, consumer needs after Tribune investigation
The Illinois House voted overwhelmingly Friday for a bill that would set up a task force to study pharmacy issues and develop recommendations with an eye toward improving consumer safety.
The legislation, sponsored by Democratic Reps. Mike Zalewski of Riverside and Mary Flowers of Chicago, calls for a task force report to be delivered in fall 2019. House lawmakers voted 101-0 to send the bill to the Senate, where a similar proposal is pending.
Chicago Sun-Times: Files give a rare peek inside mayor’s security detail
When one of then-Mayor Richard M. Daley’s daughters lost her ID in Mexico, a member of Daley’s Chicago Police Department security detail was sent to get a copy of her passport from a City Hall safe so she could return to the United States.
When another of Daley’s police bodyguards was accused of asking First Lady Maggie Daley for help getting his kids into a school, he was banned from driving her around town.
WTTW Chicago Tonight: 5,000 Chicago-Area Nursing Home Workers Threaten Strike
Thousands of nursing home workers at 53 Chicago-area facilities have threatened to go on strike beginning next week, according to an announcement Thursday from SEIU Healthcare Illinois.
The union has been in negotiations with the Illinois Association of Healthcare Facilities over workers’ wages and staffing since their contract expired Feb. 15, 2016, according to union President Greg Kelley.
Chicago Tribune: Newly minted Cook County judge who refused traffic court duty quits bench
A new Cook County judge who for months defied orders from his supervisors to work in traffic court has resigned, according to an Illinois Supreme Court spokesman.
Richard Cooke stepped down from his $194,000-a-year post two days after a committee of 17 Cook County presiding judges voted to refer his “non-compliance with reporting to a judicial assignment” to the state agency that investigates allegations of judicial misconduct. The resignation was “effective at the end of business on Tuesday,” Chris Bonjean, a state Supreme Court spokesman, wrote in an email to the Tribune on Friday.