* ICYMI: Bears would put $2B in private money in publicly owned lakefront stadium under new push. Sun-Times…

-The Bears have confirmed they have shifted plans from building a new stadium in Arlington Heights back to the Museum Campus.
- The team says it will invest more than $2 billion in private money in a publicly-owned stadium and park space.
-The plans call for creating nearly 20% more open space than exists now.
-The plan also presumes that much of Soldier Field — except the historic colonnades and war memorial — would be torn down to create the additional promised green space.

* Related stories…

∙ WBBM: Black legislative leaders cool to idea of helping subsidize Bears, White Sox stadiums
∙ CBS: Bears announce plan to spend $2 billion on stadium in Chicago
∙ NBC Chicago: Chicago Bears’ new stadium plan shifts to publicly owned domed stadium on Museum Campus, source says

* Isabel’s top picks…

* Daily Herald | How much of state’s capital improvement dollars are targeted for suburbs?: Nearly $200 million worth of state capital improvement grants are earmarked for hundreds of projects throughout the suburbs. Some grants are worth millions of dollars, while others are just a few thousand dollars, according to the most recent report from Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s Office of Management and Budget.

* Tribune | Trump’s Illinois delegates: Some tout election denials, others claim vaccines were useless or QR codes lead to government tracking: Many of Trump’s delegate candidates share the former president’s false claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen and the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol was merely a protest of “patriots.” But a deeper examination of the delegates’ backgrounds, their public comments and social media posts shows some also have repeatedly promoted the belief that COVID-19 vaccines were useless — including a state veterans’ home nurse — and some have pushed conspiracy theories that 5G phone transmission towers, wind turbines and QR codes lead to digital government tracking.

* Here’s the rest…

* WBEZ | Ex-Ald. Ed Burke keeps his law license after most Illinois Supreme Court justices recuse themselves: And it’s not clear whether a mechanism exists that would allow the state to touch Burke’s law license. “It is a most Chicago and most Illinois of absurdities that you have identified,” Civic Federation President Joe Ferguson told WBEZ when asked about the Supreme Court’s surprising incapacity to discipline the former alderman.

* WBBM | Pritzker’s $52.7B budget plan falls short in 2 key areas, allies say: Illinois Rep. Carol Ammons, who represents Urbana and chairs the Legislative Black Caucus, said there’s been widespread praise for the new Evidence Based Formula (EBF) that’s currently being used to distribute school funding. She credited the new formula with bringing more help to underfunded districts, but she said the state needs to take it further.

* Sun-Times | Women in Illinois make 80% of what men make, and advocates want to close the wage gap: Illinois is among the first states to pass legislation requiring employers to disclose salary ranges and banning employers from asking about salary history, according to the National Women’s Law Center, but Chicago advocates say there’s more to be done to level the playing field for women.

* Tribune | Illinois abortion providers praise Walgreens, CVS plans to carry mifepristone: Dr. Amy Whitaker, chief medical officer at Planned Parenthood of Illinois, said the availability of abortion pills at drugstores with a prescription will “let people get the care they need in the way that works best for them.” “We believe medication abortion pills should be treated like any other prescription,” she added. “Abortion care should be treated like any other health care. Making medication abortion pills available in pharmacies moves in the right direction toward making abortion care considered and treated like the basic health care that it is.”

* Tribune | Democratic incumbents face primary competition as party seeks to keep hold on Illinois legislature: In 2022, Democrats, aided by a newly drawn map of district boundaries, held on to their supermajority in the Senate and built on it in the House, expanding to 78 members, the most for that chamber in modern times. The Democrats have controlled both chambers of the General Assembly since 2003. This year, all 118 House seats and 23 of 59 Senate seats are on ballots.

* IPM | Two Republicans look to challenge U.S. Rep. Budzinski in Illinois’ 13th District: Thomas Clatterbuck, R-Champaign, and Joshua Loyd, R-Virden, are vying for their party’s nomination later this month in the contest for Illinois’ 13th Congressional District, which snakes from a majority of the Metro East to Springfield and on to Urbana-Champaign. Republicans have an uphill battle in the Democratic-leaning district. Democrats in the state General Assembly redrew the congressional districts in 2021 to gain a U.S. House seat. In 2022, Cook Political Report projected Democrats would have a 3-point advantage in the 13th District. However, Budzinski cruised to victory, beating now-state Rep. Regan Deering, R-Decatur, 56.6% to 43.4%.

* Sun-Times | Is time running out for April Perry to become Chicago’s first female U.S. attorney?: Perry’s confirmation has instead been blocked by U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, to protest the indictments of former Republican President Donald Trump. Vance also blocked the confirmation of the top federal prosecutor in Cleveland. Senate rules allow any senator to hold up a nominee.

* Sun-Times | Dem candidates for Cook County state’s attorney distance themselves from FOP head’s encouraging words: Both Burke and Harris released statements Friday saying they had not sought the endorsement of the FOP or its controversial president — and seeking to tie the other to the union. Burke’s campaign said she “rejects” the endorsement and called Catanzara’s comments “inappropriate.”

* Patch | IL State Rep Candidate Once Censured For ‘Mishandling Client Funds’: Oak Lawn attorney Rick Ryan asserts he never stole clients’ money and accused his 36th District Democratic primary opponent of mudslinging.

* Daily Herald | Hanson, Boxenbaum meet again in 83rd state House race: Hanson bested Boxenbaum to secure the Democratic nod in their first matchup in 2022. Hanson went on to defeat four-term Republican Keith Wheeler in the redrawn 83rd Illinois House District, now a long strip encompassing parts of St. Charles, Batavia, North Aurora, Aurora, Montgomery and Oswego.

* Crain’s | Bally’s hunting for $800 million to kick off Chicago casino project: The financing challenge puts Bally’s in the same boat as many real estate developers looking to jumpstart ambitious projects, with higher interest rates over the past two years and a tight lending environment hampering new construction. While Glover said during the meeting that Bally’s still projects the 1 million-square-foot project will be open by the third quarter of 2026, nailing down a construction loan remains a formidable hurdle.

* Tribune | Chaperones may offer one solution to sexual abuse of patients by medical providers: The Tribune found that Endeavor and other health systems have faced few consequences from state or federal regulators for allowing providers accused of sexually abusing patients to continue working. Sometimes, all regulators required was a plan to do better in the future. The Tribune also found that the state agency that regulates many medical licensees can be slow to take disciplinary action, and providers who worked outside of hospitals sometimes practiced for months while police investigated allegations against them, because of loopholes in state law.

* PJ Star | Magazine recognizes Illinois and Texas for positive business climates: Illinois was ranked the second-best state in the nation for corporate projects for a second year in a row by Site Selection Magazine. Illinois had 552 projects in 2023, up from 487 in 2022. Texas was No. 1 in the country with 1,254 projects, according to the magazine. Illinois also was second in projects per capita, up from No. 4 the previous year, according to a press release. South Dakota was No. 1 in that specific metric.

* Tribune | Johnson to choose from 15 candidates for civilian police oversight board: Mayor Brandon Johnson has 30 days to make final selections from the pool, per the ordinance. Those he chooses will be the first permanent members of a board established after years of advocacy and negotiation, intended to improve public safety as well as accountability for cops accused of misconduct.

* Sun-Times | With shelter evictions looming, migrants worry about access to housing, work permits: “We know that the people that are being evicted do not have the resources they need,” said Merita Bushia, an organizer with Community Care Collective and 33rd Ward Working Families — two of the groups organizing the protest. “People say this is a migrant crisis, but it really isn’t. It’s a housing crisis, and it just has illuminated what many houseless Chicagoans have faced for years. We need to build permanent housing that is affordable to everyone.”

* Tribune | Why the ‘A League of Their Own’ TV show continues to resonate with fans — and why the Rockford Peaches remain timeless: Justine Siegal founded Baseball for All in 2010, a nonprofit providing opportunities for girls to play, coach and lead in baseball, because she was tired of waiting for opportunities. Siegal is a trailblazer in the sport, most notably becoming the first female coach of a professional men’s baseball team in 2009 and to be employed by a Major League Baseball team when the Oakland A’s hired her in 2015 to coach in their instructional league. Between MLB now supporting girls baseball programming and involvement at the international level, including a Women’s World Cup, the growth for girls and women in baseball has been phenomenal, Siegal said.

* Gregory Royal Pratt | ‘They won’t burn my city down.’ How Mayor Lightfoot handled the rioting in 2020: As protests enveloped the country, Chicago Police leaders felt they were in good shape for expected demonstrations. Department chief of staff Bob Boik, however, had some concerns and proposed the idea of raising bridges to limit downtown access. Chicago has 18 drawbridges over the river around the central business district. The brass and Lightfoot aides thought raising the bridges would be overkill and didn’t like the optics of cutting downtown from the rest of the city. They also felt they were best in the country at handling protests, a reputation Chicago police feel they earned after successfully handling left-wing demonstrations against NATO in 2012 and every action since. The lack of widespread violence over McDonald’s murder also inspired a sense that the city would be OK.

* WGN | The Workers’ Mic with Local 150’s Jim Sweeney: This week on The Workers’ Mic, Powered by the MCL, Ken Edwards flies solo in the captain’s chair while Ed Maher is out on assignment and Phil Davidson enjoys spring break shenanigans! Ken shares the conversation from the live taping at Café Bionda with Jim Sweeney, President-Business Manager of the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 150, as he tells “Scabby the Rat” stories as well as the exceptional time to organize is right now.