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* Two days ago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced the appointment of Kevin Barszcz as the city’s Director of Veteran Affairs. She also signed an executive order and declared a state of emergency earlier this week. Today, Lightfoot signed several more executive orders, just days before her term ends…
• Executive Order Requiring Recommendation on Continuation of Key Fines and Fees Reform Programs
• Executive Order Establishing the Pension Advance Fund
• Executive Order Establishing the Youth Commission as a Formal Advisory Body to Ensure Youth Voice Remains in City Government
• Executive Order Expanding Access to U/T Visa Certification
• Executive Order Formally Establishing the Office of New Americans
• Executive Order Enhancing Zoning Transparency and Consistency
• Executive Order to Promote LaSalle Street Revitalization
• Executive Order to Operationalize Annual Progress Reporting of City Departments’ Requirement to Create and Maintain Racial Equity Action Plans
• Executive Order to Ensure Implementation of ‘We Will Chicago’ Citywide Plan
• Executive Orders on Procurement and Delegate Contracting Reforms
The move follows an executive order on Wednesday on environmental justice and another on Tuesday declaring a state of emergency due to a wave of asylum seekers arriving in Chicago.
Similar to those executive orders, the Johnson transition team was caught off guard by the orders and were not briefed in advance. Johnson’s transition team declined further comment until they read through the implications of the orders. […]
Those orders can be rescinded by Johnson, but their issuance forces him into the tough position of publicly doing away with policies, even if they are largely ceremonial. Some of the orders touch on policies Johnson has expressed are priorities of his incoming administration, but would want to craft the specifics of the policy with his own team.
Crain’s has posted the orders on its site.
* From the BGA’s David Greising…
Under Lightfoot, the City Council began to exercise a modicum of independence. There even was talk about appointing a parliamentarian to help the council further assert autonomy. Or perhaps a legislative counsel might supplant the city’s corporation counsel — a mayoral appointee — in ruling on legal matters before the body.
Such talk has mostly gone silent — at least for now. Waguespack was banished to the backbenches, and in case the point wasn’t made, Lightfoot-era heavyweights Aldermen Anthony Beale, 9th; Brendan Reilly, 42nd; Brian Hopkins, 2nd; and Walter Burnett Jr., 27th, were sent there too. They hold not a single committee chairmanship among them.
The guy needs a fact-checker. Hopkins will chair the Committee on Public Safety. And, according to a Brandon Johnson press release today, “Ald. Walter Burnett will make history as the first African-American Vice Mayor.” The current Vice Mayor is Tom Tunney.
Ald. Beale was quoted as saying “The only candidate in this election who has encouraged racial division is Brandon Johnson.” Ald. Reilly worked more closely with Vallas than just about anybody.
* The ILGOP is fundraising off the new mayor-elect…
Incoming Chicago Mayor and avid defund the police advocate Brandon Johnson appeared before the Illinois General Assembly to talk about his agenda for the city.
It’s worse than you’d think…
It’s such a shame… After the failed policies of Lori Lightfoot, the people of Chicago deserve leadership that would actually combat crime, improve city infrastructure, stand with law enforcement, and reduce the cost of living in America’s third largest city.
Chicago deserves better, and we will work with Republicans and conservatives across Chicago and Cook County to win in future elections and combat this failed agenda.
You can aid us in our efforts to combat the radical agenda of Brandon Johnson and the Chicago Democrats with a contribution of any size today
STOP THE JOHNSON AGENDA IN CHICAGO
SEND $10
SEND $25
SEND $50
SEND $100Standing up for a better Illinois,
Illinois Republicans
* The Triibe…
In the month leading up to the April 4 mayoral runoff, Tio Hardiman Jr., a native of the Austin community on Chicago’s West Side, was paid to work for former Chicago Public Schools (CPS) CEO Paul Vallas’s unsuccessful campaign for mayor. […]
In the final push for votes ahead of the runoff, Vallas spent more than $600,000 to hire hundreds of people like Hardiman Jr. to get out the vote in the Black community. Payments to such workers were listed under the catchall category “services” on campaign expenditure reports. A TRiiBE analysis found much of what Vallas spent on individual services went to residents of South and West Side wards.
And that doesn’t include the $700K he paid to Chima Enyia. We won’t see his April spending until July.
* A few more…
* Tribune | Incoming City Hall chief of staff was suspended for role in free United Center parking ‘scheme’: The city suspended Richard Guidice for 30 days in 2017 after a report from the Chicago Office of Inspector General found he and several other city employees participated in a “scheme” in which they set aside free street parking for friends and family during Blackhawks playoff games and Bulls games in 2015 and 2016.
* Sun-Times: NASCAR to use mufflers in Chicago, keep lakefront accessible: “Given the information provided from NASCAR related to their noise-reducing mufflers, we do not anticipate any negative noise or vibration impacts on our facility or to our animals,” Shedd Aquarium spokesman Johnny Ford said in an email Thursday.
* CBS Chicago | Lightfoot going on bus tour as part of final send-off as Chicago mayor: Today, Lightfoot will visit the Bronzeville Winery as part of a bus tour around the mayor’s INVEST Southwest and Chicago Works community development programs. Then at 4:30 p.m., a final sendoff as she leaves City Hall for the last time.
* Greg Hinz | As Mayor Lightfoot becomes Citizen Lightfoot, a look back at the good — and the bad: Mayor Lori Lightfoot had some choice words earlier this week when she declared a city emergency over a renewed wave of immigrants and asylum seekers now flooding the city, many of them on buses and planes dispatched from Texas.
* Tribune | Meet ‘Chonkosaurus,’ the Chicago River’s massive, fat snapping turtle: Scoot over Chance the Snapper: There’s a new famous critter in town. Its name is “Chonkosaurus” and it likes to bask in the sun. The massive snapping turtle was caught on camera by botanist Joey Santore as it lorded over a Chicago River pylon Saturday. In a widely shared video, the turtle suns itself as its fat, leathery legs burst beyond its shell.
posted by Rich Miller
Friday, May 12, 23 @ 2:48 pm
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Johnson hasn’t even been sworn in yet, but the GOP is already calling his a “failed agenda”. Maybe they should think about why their efforts to elect Republicans in the city are a failure.
Comment by JoanP Friday, May 12, 23 @ 3:01 pm
=Today, Lightfoot signed several more executive orders, just days before her term ends=
It appears LL learned this from the Pat Quinn School of Government.
Comment by Stuck in Celliniland Friday, May 12, 23 @ 3:06 pm
If you give the ILGOP cash-money because of the Dem Chicago mayor-elect… and not realize you are a mark… because the ILGOP has yet to *run* a GOP mayoral candidate… you deserve to get soaked for as many dollars that the GOP can get from you.
Oh.
Yeah.
That “Vallas speaks to the GOP” while shunning the GOP label, which is more toxic, a mayor-elect or the ILGOP?
The ILGOP will take EFTs too
Comment by Oswego Willy Friday, May 12, 23 @ 3:07 pm
=== It’s such a shame… After the failed policies of Lori Lightfoot, the people of Chicago deserve leadership that would actually combat crime, improve city infrastructure, stand with law enforcement, and reduce the cost of living in America’s third largest city.===
Yes the people of Chicago do. So they voted in Brandon Johnson.
Comment by Betty Draper’s cigarette Friday, May 12, 23 @ 3:17 pm
The Chicago river “Chonkosaurus” snapper turtle is my favorite video/story of the month so far. And those 2 guys that WGN interviewed were hilarious.
Comment by Baloneymous Friday, May 12, 23 @ 4:00 pm
==Standing up for a better Illinois==
You would think that with all of the elections the Republicans lose that it might dawn on them that people don’t want their agenda. Maybe try something new.
Comment by Demoralized Friday, May 12, 23 @ 4:03 pm