Thanksgiving is on the horizon. Before you take some needed rest, catch up on these local stories from WTTW News.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Chicago Police Department Headquarters, 3510 S. Michigan Ave. (Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News)
|
Mayor Brandon Johnson announced Monday he would reverse deep cuts to the number of employees charged with implementing the federal court order requiring the Chicago Police Department to stop routinely violating residents’ constitutional rights, bowing to intense pressure from advocates for police reform.
In all, Johnson said he will ask City Council to restore 162 now-vacant positions to the Chicago Police Department charged with implementing the court order known as the consent decree. Johnson reversed course after Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul and the monitoring team warned the cuts would make it impossible for the city to comply. As the cost of funding the positions is unclear, it will certainly complicate efforts to ink a budget deal by the Dec. 31 deadline set by state law.
Some backstory:
City records show the average cost of a Chicago Police Department officer is $150,000 annually, including benefits. That means restoring 162 positions to the city’s 2025 spending plan could swell the city’s budget gap by more than $24 million, according to a WTTW News analysis.
CPD has fully met just 9% of the court order’s requirements in the more than five years since it took effect, according to the most recent report by the monitoring team.
Johnson’s decision to reverse course comes less than a week after WTTW News and ProPublica reported that the effort to implement the reforms required by the consent decree is at a tipping point, with advocates for police reform losing faith in the process.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Learn more about advertising & sponsorship with WTTW.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
A newly hatched piping plover chick snuggles up to its parent at Montrose Beach, June 30, 2024. (Courtesy Chicago Piping Plover Watch)
|
Barely two weeks after Chicagoans celebrated the arrival of four endangered piping plover chicks at Montrose Beach in summer 2024, three of the hatchlings were dead. It was a devastating turn of events.
“Failure to thrive” was determined as the official cause of death following necropsies conducted by staff at the Lincoln Park Zoo, according to Brad Semel, endangered species specialist with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. That failure was likely due to a stretch of bad weather in the days after the chicks hatched.
Plover chicks are what’s known as “precocial,” meaning they start running around and foraging on their own within hours of hatching. But they can’t regulate their temperature, so they rely on their parents to keep them warm.
Tamima Itani, lead plover monitor, noted that early on, the chicks “spent lengthy periods of time sheltering under Mom (Searocket) or Dad (Imani) instead of feeding.” Experts also suspect because the Chicago plovers were initially foraging in a more sterile area of Montrose Beach, that may have had fewer food resources.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
(WTTW News)
|
Education leaders from across Illinois are pitching a new statewide learning strategy focused on school safety, finding and keeping high-quality teachers and enhancing postsecondary success. That new plan, called Vision 2030, is built around three main pillars: future-focused learning, shared accountability and predictable funding. “Vision 2030 seeks to put systems and processes in place that support all school districts throughout the state in sharing what works for our kids and our communities, while also preserving local flexibility and leadership so that the best decisions are made closest to home,” Kimberly A. Small, executive director of the Illinois Association of
School Boards, said in a statement.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Learn more about advertising & sponsorship with WTTW.
|
|
|
Back in the Day: November 26, 2019 - Jeff Tweedy’s House Hit By Gunfire
|
When musician Jeff Tweedy is in the local news, it’s usually for releasing a critically acclaimed album with his band Wilco, publishing a New York Times best-selling book or playing a hometown show somewhere in Chicago. However, on this day five years ago, the beloved songwriter through no fault of his own made headlines for a different reason. Around 2 a.m. on Nov. 26, 2019, Tweedy and his family were woken up by loud noises. “You know how every time you hear loud pops you think ... was that
fireworks or gunshots? Well, when it’s really gunfire there is zero question about it,” Susan Miller Tweedy, Jeff'’s wife, wrote via social media. After calling 911, she noticed the family’s home had been shot. “A bullet went through the storm door to our balcony and lodged in the wooden door,” she said. “In the light of day today, Jeff found 7 shell casings outside.” Thankfully, no one was hurt.
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
Tell us about your Thanksgiving plans. Are you staying in Chicago? Going anywhere? What’s your
favorite local memory of the holiday?
|
|
|
Email DailyChicagoan@wttw.com with your responses and your answers might be published.
|
|
|
|
|
- The latest updates on Chicago's City Council with the Spotlight Politics team.
- The co-hosts of "America's Test Kitchen" on their new cookbook and helpful hacks for holiday meals.
|
5:30 PM|11:00 PM
|
|
|
|
Want more WTTW News content? Follow WTTW on Instagram to check in with us daily, go behind-the-scenes, and more.
|
Newsletter Producer: Josh Terry
|
|
|
|
|
