* ICYMI: Chicago is elimiating submininmum wage for tipped workers. Summary of a Tribune story…

- The new law will shrink the gap between tipped and minimum wages by 8% each year until 2028.
- The legislation passed 36-19.
- Restaurant owners worry about the impact of high labor costs.

* Related stories…

∙ Block Club: Chicago Will End Subminimum Wage For Tipped Workers After Council Approves Plan
∙ Crain’s: Slow end for the sub-minimum wage
∙ NBC Chicago: Chicago eliminates subminimum wage for tipped workers. Here’s what that means

* Isabel’s top picks…

* Capitol News Illinois | Nurses unions push for mandatory staff-to-patient ratios: The proposed Safe Patient Limits Act, by Sen. Celina Villanueva and Rep. Theresa Mah, both Chicago Democrats, was introduced in February and was the subject of a joint hearing last week in Chicago by two House committees. It’s an issue that has been discussed in the General Assembly since 2019 but has thus far failed to gain the necessary traction for passage. The latest hearing came just three weeks before lawmakers return to the Capitol for their fall veto session, which begins Oct. 24.

* Melissa Conyears-Ervin | I was a victim of domestic violence. Other victims should know they aren’t alone: Two days later, my mother and I filed a petition for an emergency order of protection in Coles County Circuit Court, which was granted and remained in effect until early January 1998. I ultimately decided not to proceed with a plenary order. I believed, as so many women do, that the system would protect him and not me. Since then, I’ve never stopped looking over my shoulder or fearing he would follow through on his threats.

* Tribune | Chicago spent at least $3.5 million for NASCAR weekend and got $620,000 in return: The $3.5 million figure stands in contrast to the $620,000 NASCAR paid the city to transform streets surrounding Grant Park into a 12-turn, 2.2-mile racetrack. NASCAR paid a base $500,000 permit fee to the Chicago Park District in April and in late September cut a final check for the 2023 race for nearly $120,000 to pay the city its portion of ticket sales as well as commissions for food, beverage and merchandise, according to city records.

* Illinois Republicans supporting Ron DeSantis for president announced their statewide delegate slate. Illinois will have 64 delegates, including Sen. Sue Rezin and Awake Illinois founder Shannon Adcock. Click here for the full release.

* Here’s the rest of your morning roundup…

* Sun-Times | Evanston mother, daughter missing in Israel after Hamas attack and are feared kidnapped: Natalie Raanan, 18, and her mother, Judith, 59, have not been heard from since around noon Saturday, the day Hamas launched its offensive, according to family. They were last in Nahal Oz, a kibbutz about 1.5 miles from the Gaza border that was attacked by militants.

* NBC Chicago | Gov. JB Pritzker to speak at JUF Israel Solidary Event in Glencoe following Hamas attacks: According to organizers, Pritzker is expected to speak at approximately 10:15 a.m. Other speakers include Rep. Brad Schneider, State Comptroller Susana Mendoza and JUF President Lonnie Nasatir.

* Sun-Times | As migrant crisis grows will faith groups step up and offer unused buildings?: The Council of Religious Leaders of Metropolitan Chicago “has been trying to figure this out as well,” said its executive director, Nisan Chavkin. “We don’t have anything official to share yet.” The council represents some 40 denominations and theological schools. Many groups are involved in assisting individual migrants or families. Some congregations have organized food deliveries to migrants. One is Santa Teresa de Avila, an Episcopal church on the Southwest Side that has provided sandwiches for people at the nearby Chicago Lawn police station, said the Rev. Sandra Castillo, a retired Episcopal priest who assists at the church.

* Sun-Times | Amundsen Park closure delayed as city looks for an alternate site for migrant shelter: Ald. Chris Taliaferro said the city was considering a site across the street from the park to house asylum-seekers. Community members complained about the potential loss of a valuable resource for young people.

* Sun-Times | Rocks thrown at Gov. Pritzker’s Gold Coast home, suspect taken into custody: The suspect is alleged to have thrown rocks at the home’s windows, breaking three of them, according to police. The governor and first lady were both home at the time of the incident, but no injuries were reported.

* Center Square | Illinois manufacturers the focus of statewide tour: The “Makers On The Move” bus tour started at The Boeing Company in Mascoutah on Friday, Oct. 6, and made stops Monday in Springfield, Jacksonville and Peoria.

* Tribune | Illinois population becoming higher-paid, more foreign-born, but state losing older, Black and rural residents, study finds: A net loss of 460,000 residents moving to other states was largely offset by incoming immigrants, researchers found. In addition, more arrivals are working, generating about 200,000 more workers paying income taxes over the past decade.

* Shaw Local | Are millions of dollars in TIF spending compliant with state law?: However, many municipalities use the tax dollars to augment their budgets, utilizing the money to pay for administrative and police salaries. Meanwhile, millions more are spent with no officially reported purpose at all, a Shaw Media review of tax increment financing records over the last 10 years has found.

* IPM | Champaign Police investigate ‘agency culture’ of not following domestic violence reporting laws: Conerly said her experience proved to her that the Champaign Police Department does not know how to handle domestic violence situations. “I didn’t feel listened to. I didn’t feel respected. I didn’t feel like they were going to respond to me appropriately,” Conerly said. The Invisible Institute generally does not identify survivors of intimate partner violence, but Conerly consented to tell her story on the record.

* Sun-Times | Millions in PPP, other COVID-19 relief funds went to gangs, fueled Chicago’s illegal gun market: “We’ve repeatedly seen a connection between violent crime, violent criminal street gangs and the COVID fraud space throughout the country,” says Michael C. Galdo, director of COVID-19 fraud enforcement for the Justice Department.

* Tribune | Marijuana dispensary in former Rainforest Cafe won flip-flop from state regulators, but remains on hold as one man fights against it: The holdup comes from one resident fighting against what he characterizes as an improper partnership in which social equity cannabis license holder Bio-Pharm LLC, is acting as a front for an established multistate company, Progressive Treatment Solutions, or PTS. In the meantime, no work has been done on the site, and the original plans to open this year have gone by the wayside.

* WaPo | Is Chicago’s NHL team supporting Native causes — or buying silence?: The late senator John McCain (R) and his Arizona colleague, former senator Jeff Flake (R), called it “paid patriotism.” The Pentagon, they discovered, funneled millions of dollars to sports, pro and college, drenching games in patriotic imagery, with color-guard presentations and tributes to soldiers and veterans that made our sportscape look like it harbored organic adoration for the military.

* AP | A workforce crisis is damaging families’ access to therapies for babies with developmental delays: Since all U.S. states and territories accept federal funding for Early Intervention, they are obligated to provide services to kids who qualify under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. But providers are scarce in almost all states. Some children wait months or years for the care they need, and many age out of the program before they access any services at all.

* StreetsBlog Chicago | From bad to worse: Unpacking the CTA’s latest schedule changes effective October 8th: In communicating its schedule changes, CTA has been very careful to avoid the term “service cuts.” Instead, through carefully crafted newspeak, it tells the public about “schedule optimizations.” One day, we hope to have a CTA that is straightforward to the public, and more importantly their riders. Until then, Commuters Take Action has assumed that role. We compiled comprehensive service cut statistics on our website for both bus and rail schedules. While publishing such data would be effortless for the CTA themselves, it deliberately chooses not to do it.

* STL Today | Missouri eyes electronic monitoring of inmates in state prisons: In documents submitted to Gov. Mike Parson, the Missouri Department of Corrections is asking for $12.5 million to place tracking devices on all inmates that can identify a prisoner’s location within the state’s 19 lockups. Along with saving time on head counts, which are necessary to ensure no one has escaped or is hiding, the devices could lead to improved reaction times during medical emergencies.

* Bloomberg | The Moral Case for No Longer Engaging With Elon Musk’s X: A man was murdered in my neighborhood on Monday. Ryan Carson was waiting at a bus stop with his girlfriend just before 4 a.m. when a man stabbed him repeatedly in the chest. The couple had been at a wedding. […] I don’t follow this account, but X’s algorithm makes absolutely sure that I see what it has to say. A senseless murder is apparently a content opportunity not to be missed. The user’s post on Tuesday contained all the ingredients for success: It was timely. It was shocking. It was an innocent 32-year-old man dying on the streets of New York City. It was a chance, duly taken, to write an inflammatory comment on Carson’s work in public policy, as though it had somehow led to this moment, as though he had it coming.

* NBC | What was Elon Musk’s strategy for Twitter?: Musk’s purchase of Twitter, the 3,000-word anonymous article said, would amount to a “declaration of war against the Globalist American Empire.” The sender of the texts was offering Musk, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO, a playbook for the takeover and transformation of Twitter. As the anniversary of Musk’s purchase approaches, the identity of the sender remains unknown.