* City crime off 10.3% this year: cops

There were eight fewer murders reported during January and February than during those months last year, according to preliminary statistics released Friday by the Chicago Police Department.

There was a 15.1 percent decrease in violent crime. Aggravated assaults declined by 21 percent, robberies dropped 15.3 percent, and aggravated batteries dipped 7.9 percent, police said.

Motor vehicle theft was up, however, by 8.3 percent.

* Chicago police to straighten up rule book

CHICAGO — For the first time in four decades, the Chicago Police Department’s rule book is getting an edit.

Department officials say the approximately 16-inch stack of paper is full of outdated orders and entries.

* City probes big no-bid deal

The Daley administration is conducting an internal investigation to determine why a technology consulting firm that employs a former city budget director got a $26 million contract expansion from the Health Department without competitive bidding or sign-off from the Sole Source Advisory Board.

* Check out Chicago’s new $1.8M Web site

* City of Chicago unveils redesigned Web site

* Judge will decide on Daley testimony in Boender case next week

* Garage attendants could be dinged for damage

At Wednesday’s City Council meeting, Lyle introduced an ordinance that would require operators of every parking facility in Chicago that’s not self-park to inspect vehicles for damage “in the presence” of the owner and provide “written notice” of that damage before the vehicle is parked.

* TIF? What TIF?

* Chicago Housing Authority program teaches: ‘You can’

In all, 643 people have achieved education and career advancement, employment and homeownership via FSS since 1997, accessing life coaches and financial incentives.

* Big labor strikes are becoming more rare in Illinois, across U.S.

* Ride CTA all over place in fund-raiser

Train buffs can take a special trip to cover almost every line of the CTA L system, plus non-revenue and yard trackage, on Sunday, March 28, for the Illinois Railway Museum’s 2010 “Snowflake Special.”

The $42 trip is a fund-raiser to secure indoor storage space for IRM’s cream-and-green 2000 series L cars from the 1960s.

* Traffic victims need to step up

Very few take the time to go to court, resulting in many charges being tossed out

* Ireland’s PM: Chicago isn’t a ’second city’

The Prime Minister of Ireland, Brian Cowen, assured a St. Patrick’s Day crowd in Chicago Friday night that the Irish government does not consider this a “second city.”

“This is not a flyover zone for us, but a key destination,” Cowen told attendees at the Irish Fellowship Club at the Chicago Hilton and Towers. He stopped in Chicago to lead today’s downtown parade on his way to Wednesday’s St. Patrick’s Day celebration at the White House.

* S. Side Irish march on in tiny parade with one ‘float’

* Lack of South Side Irish Parade pinches Beverly businesses

* Some multiracial people unsure how they fit in 2010 census

* Ex-Bears help on census push

* Body scanner debuts at O’Hare

* O’Hare to begin full-body scans Monday

* This isn’t your parents’ college dorm

URBANA — At a time when college students bring more electronic equipment than ever to school, there is one item missing this year in University of Illinois dorm rooms: land-line phones.

* Uniform educational standards help kids

We’re all for local control in education — communities and parents should decide how best to teach their kids, where to invest dollars, which schools should open and which should close.

But that doesn’t mean a kid in Illinois should be allowed to skate by while a kid in Massachusetts is pushed to reach the stars.

Unfortunately, that’s what happens under our nation’s patchwork system of educational standards.

* Schools are more anxious than usual this year

Illinois’ budget mess makes districts even less unsure about how much to spend on teachers next fall, as layoffs kick in

* Illinois increases juvenile court age cutoff to 17

* Kids killing kids

Over the past 10 years, Bigeck and Morfin have traveled annually from a downstate prison to talk with Chicago-area school and youth groups. They explain, mostly in calm terms, what it’s like to spend their decades doing penance for gunplay. They try to press home to young audiences an underappreciated concept that Illinois law calls “Accountability for Conduct of Another.” Its essence: You were part of the crime but you didn’t fire the murder weapon? You’re as guilty as the person who did.

* Jacobson eager to share opinions on radio

Amy Jacobson begins a new chapter in her Chicago broadcast career March 24, when she becomes co-host with Big John Howell of the morning drive “Big John & Amy Show” on WIND-AM (560), a politically conservative talk station:

* Toxicity of pile remains undetermined at site

BURNS HARBOR — More than a year and a half after ArcelorMittal first applied for a landfill in Burns Harbor, the company has not disclosed the toxics in all the waste to be landfilled.

* Cadet suit: Fired over raspy voice

A man has sued the City of Evanston, claiming he was fired as a police cadet because of his “very raspy” voice.

* Wind turbines stir up bad feelings, health concerns in DeKalb County

Yet the story playing out just an hour and half from Chicago is one of policy-meets-reality. While the idea of creating power from the wind sounds ideal, the massive structures that have gone up have dramatically affected the people who live there, country life and the landscape.

* Springfield airport wins $1M grant

* Oak Lawn wants Google ultra-high-speed Internet service

Village officials plan to ask Internet search-engine giant which later this year will select one or more communities nationwide to test out its planned fiber-optic network at speeds 100 times faster than existing broadband services.

* Elmhurst council debates prayer before meeting

Elmhurst City Manager Tom Borchert said the Elmhurst City Council used to begin its meetings with a prayer when he began working for the city in 1971. That practice ended in the early 1980s. Borchert said as long as the prayer is said before roll call, it’s technically not part of the meeting, in his opinion.

DiCianni said that he doesn’t believe there is much opposition to the prayer proposal and that the minority, while vocal, is small.