Chicago

Another misstep in CPS’ school closing boondoggle

07/24/2013
Buried beneath the news of Chicago Public Schools’ dismal Illinois Standard Achievement Test scoreslast week was another bombshell: students from receiving schools – those schools that students from closed schools will attend next year – saw less than half of the gains on the ISAT as the rest of the district. In other words, thousands of displaced...

Chicago’s speed camera deal brokered behind closed doors

By Brian Costin
07/23/2013
Turns out there’s no proof that Chicago’s red-light camera program has done anything to improve safety. In May, the Chicago Inspector General released a scathing audit of Chicago’s controversial red-light camera program. The audit found the Chicago of Department of Transportation couldn’t prove it placed cameras at Chicago’s most dangerous locations or that the cameras actually...

CPS layoffs should not surprise CTU

07/19/2013
When Chicago Public Schools officials announced Thursday that the district will be laying off more than 2,000 employees – including 1,036 teachers – Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis issued a press release that made no mention of the role the CTU played in creating CPS’s $1 billion deficit. These important facts were missing: The CTU supported all of...

Taxing sophistry

By Benjamin VanMetre
07/18/2013
Earlier this month, the Chicago Tribune published an editorial sounding the alarm on “the next Illinois tax hike” – a progressive tax. While many in the state have come to recognize this upcoming tax fight, others, such as Jan Goldberg of Riverside, Ill., refuse to admit the truth. In a recent letter to the editor titled “Benefits of a...

Illinois unemployment above 10 percent in many metropolitan areas

By John Klingner
07/18/2013
Illinois has the nation’s second-worst unemployment rate. At 9.1 percent, it’s 1.5 percentage points higher than the national average of 7.6 percent. The lack of jobs continues to be a major burden to the people of Illinois, at both the state and local level. A year-over-year comparison of Metropolitan Statistical Areas, or MSAs, reveals an uneven...

Chicago’s triple-notch credit downgrade

07/18/2013
Pension costs are already unraveling the state’s finances. Now it’s the city of Chicago’s turn. The city’s out-of-control pension liabilities and “accelerating budget pressures associated with those liabilities” has resulted in another credit downgrade by Moody’s Investors Service. The national credit rating agency downgraded the city’s nearly $8 billion in general obligation bonds to A3...

TAGS: pensions, Rahm Emanuel

Pool of ObamaCare insurance providers continues shrinking in Illinois

By Jonathan Ingram
07/17/2013
The nation’s largest insurance company, UnitedHealth Group, won’t be participating in Illinois’ health insurance exchange, Crain’s Chicago Business reported on Monday. UnitedHealth Group is the second-largest insurance company in Illinois’ nongroup market, the market in which the exchange will operate. Although state officials recently predicted 16 insurance companies would participate in the exchange, Crain’s reports that just...

Twinkies and the bakers union: don’t call it a comeback

07/13/2013
by Paul Kersey Plans to reopen Hostess Brands bakeries, including one in the Chicago suburb of Schiller Park, are going forward. The company has announced that the Twinkie will make its glorious return on July 15. But while the reorganized Hostess is making what it calls “the sweetest comeback in the history of ever,” the bakers...

90 out of 102 county-level governments failed the 10-Point Transparency Checklist

07/12/2013
by Brian Costin Illinois is notorious for government corruption. Since 1976, the state has had the third-highest amount of public corruption convictions in the country — including four out of the last seven governors. Outside of Springfield, things aren’t much better. Chicago has been called “the most corrupt city in America.” A report by the University of Illinois-Chicago and...
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FAQ: How the federal scholarship program would help Illinois students

Illinois students could soon benefit from scholarship money to help them find a tutor, attend ACT or SAT prep sessions, pay tuition, get special education services or assist with other academic needs. That will happen in Illinois only if Gov. J.B. Pritzker lets the state’s schoolchildren benefit from the Federal Scholarship Tax Credit program, established...

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Diana Graham

Process for unionizing non-state workers raises red flags

By Paul Kersey
06/19/2014

CBS Chicago: Illinois’ highest-paid superintendent receives $400K per year to oversee 1,200 students

By Ted Dabrowski
05/02/2016