Get the latest news from around Illinois.
Chicago Tribune: A taxing year ahead: Expect to pay more for your home, parking, water and more
Chicago property owners hoping for a respite from rapidly rising taxes will be disappointed in 2017, when city government and Chicago Public Schools will continue digging deeper into their pocketbooks.
Two more major property tax increases are coming. So is a new tax on water and sewer service. And some city dwellers will face other rising costs: a fee for each store-provided disposable bag and slightly higher Park District fees.
WTTW Chicago Tonight: Study: Illinois’ Fiscal Mess Will Take a Decade to Fix
It’s no secret that Illinois is in a perilous fiscal situation, with a massive budget deficit and an ever-expanding backlog of unpaid bills. But just how bad is it, and how difficult is the solution?
A new study aims to answer those questions definitively, and here’s a hint: the answers are not pretty. But the silver lining? All is not lost – yet.
Chicago Sun-Times: City to repeal plastic bag ban, delays 7-cent bag tax to Feb. 1
The city is repealing its ban on plastic bags as of Jan. 1, 2017, and pushing back the implementation of a new checkout bag tax by one month, to Feb. 1, 2017.
No provisions of the plastic bag ban will be held over, according to Molly Poppe, a spokeswoman for the Office of Budget Management.
Chicago Sun-Times: Fines for ignoring railroad crossing gates double Jan. 1
Metra officials are reminding motorists that fines for driving over railroad tracks while crossing gates are down will double Jan. 1.
Gov. Bruce Rauner signed a law in July that increased the penalty for disregarding activated gates and warning lights from $250 to $500 the first time. It doubles to $1,000 each time after that.
Chicago Sun-Times: City: Switch to grid-based trash collection saves $30 million
After the city switched from ward-based garbage collection to a grid system in 2012, the Department of Streets and Sanitation kept looking for more potential inefficiencies.
After its latest examination, dubbed “Grid 2.0,” the department is now using 292 garbage trucks, down from 352 in 2011.
Associated Press: Budget woes delay $2.5M owed to exonerated ex-inmates
Illinois’ budget impasse has put a hold on millions of dollars in payments to former inmates who’ve been exonerated of crimes.
Fourteen men are owed a total of $2.5 million as compensation for the years they served in prison before they received certificates of innocence from the state, The (Bloomington) Pantagraph reported. The payments range from $5,000 to a maximum $220,732. The claims weren’t approved as part of a short-term budget that expires Friday. The payments are based on the length of time in prison.
Chicago Sun-Times: Sheriff’s deputies investigated for allegedly lying on time cards
Several dozen Cook County sheriff’s deputies are being investigated for possibly lying on their time cards about how much they worked, authorities confirmed this week.
Cara Smith, chief policy officer for Sheriff Tom Dart, divulged few details of the ongoing probe but confirmed 60 sheriff’s deputies are the target of an “alleged attendance fraud” investigation.
Chicago Tribune: Surge in Chicago rents may be starting to ease
After experiencing a painful surge in rents during the last six years, Chicago tenants finally are getting a break.
Rents have dropped in areas of downtown where there has been massive new construction of luxury high-rise apartment buildings, and rents are rising only modestly throughout the metropolitan area, according to Axiometrics, a Dallas firm that tracks rental data throughout the country.
Chicago Sun-Times: Rahm hauls in $1.6 million in campaign cash in 2016
A year ago, Mayor Rahm Emanuel was fending off calls for his resignation.
Now he’s sending a message: Anyone who wants to take him down is going to have to contend with a lot of dough and the attacks it can buy.
Belleville News-Democrat: Take bucket of cash, dump it into a township and give pennies to poor
We need to set the record straight: When the News-Democrat recently reported that the sole reason East St. Louis Township exists is to help some of the neediest people in the state, that was not exactly a true statement.
East St. Louis Township exists solely to provide a few dozen people with government jobs and to give political leaders control of those patronage jobs so they can extend their political reach.