Chicago has a new comptroller, and the latest financial information indicates her chief task will remain the same as her predecessors: curbing steadily increasing city pension debt.

In the first of a pair of announcements over the holiday weekend, Mayor Lori Lightfoot named veteran city and county financial official Reshma Soni to serve as city comptroller, the woman who will control the city’s check book and be responsible for managing Chicago’s finances.

A tax on white-shoe law firms might play well politically, but it won’t put much of a dent in Chicago’s fiscal deficits.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot said earlier this week she’s considering a tax on high-end professional services to help plug yawning budget gaps and massive pension funding shortfalls. It’s not clear exactly what she means by “high end,” but her target appears to be fees paid to big LaSalle Street law firms and major accounting firms.

Getting hired to be a university president is great. Getting fired isn’t so bad either.

Down goes another university president in Illinois, the fourth such casualty since 2015.

Just because Gov. J.B. Pritzker has signed a massive gaming expansion into law, which, among other things, legalized sports wagering in Illinois, it doesn’t mean people can wager on their favorite pro sports teams’ games right away.

The Illinois gaming expansion is one of the revenue sources being used to help pay for the state’s $45 billion Rebuild Illinois capital bill and is planned to go toward projects at state facilities. The expansion legalized sports betting, authorized up to six new casinos, casino-like gaming at horse racetracks, and more video gaming in restaurants, taverns, fraternal organizations and truck stops.

“Here, take my seat.”

Those are words the CTA hopes will be directed at more pregnant women on trains and buses after an upcoming awareness effort that will include buttons expectant mothers can wear to indicate to fellow riders that it would be nice if someone offered up a seat.

The program will be launched later this year, the CTA confirmed.

A state law that took effect July 1 could help curb the costs of court fees and fines that disproportionately affect minorities and impoverished people.

The Traffic and Criminal Assessment Act offers criminal defendants in Illinois the chance have court fees waived or partially waived. These fees are tacked on to misdemeanor and felony sentences and distributed to state and local agencies. It also helped establish flat rates for filing and appearance fees in civil cases.

There’s only one consensus on extending Route 53 into Lake County and that is — the issue has dragged on for many years.

Since the 1970s, the project has been studied multiple times, analyzed to death in myriad committees and voted on in a 2009 referendum where residents said yes.