This bill, for $22 million to cover revenues the company lost from motorists using handicapped parking placards or license plates over a one year period, brings the current tab the city owes Chicago Parking Meters LLC to $50 million. more ›

History doesn't preserve itself. And in places like the Pullman neighborhood, the crushing economy makes holding onto some of the most important bits of the past all the more difficult. Luckily the City can help. more ›

One biker is trying to compile a list of lanes that are in desperate need of repair and a fresh coat of paint. more ›

A City Hall official described as a "big shooter" was arrested on charges of healthcare fraud on Wednesday. Mohammed K. Rashed, 45, was arrested at his office, where he is a coordinating engineer for the city’s Department of Transportation. Rashed was allegedly involved in a scheme that pocketed about $1.5 million in Medicare funds through the company House Call Physicians, LLC. His partners in were co-owner Bahir H. Khalil and employee Paschal U. Oparah.

The defendants allegedly billed for podiatry services as if they were performed by a licensed podiatrist — when they were actually carried out by Oparah, whose podiatry license was suspended. more ›

Emanuel's decision to lay off city employees most likely intensified any tension between the city workers and the new mayor. more ›

Labor organizations were unable to meet Rahm's deadline to come up with a viable strategy to handle the debt, and it looks like more than 600 city employees will be seeing pink slips on Monday. more ›

By cutting security detail for several top officials, new "Top Cop" McCarthy cut costs by $650,000 and likely pissed off Ald. Ed Burke. more ›

According to the recent food truck story from the Sun-Times, 44th ward Alderman Tom Tunney has some specific concerns over the possibility of food trucks coming too close to established brick-and-mortar restaurants. Rightfully so - City Hall reporter Fran Spielman called him the "restaurant-owning Alderman," which is confirmed by financial disclosure forms Tunney filed with the City Clerk. Is that enough to establish a conflict of interest, as defined by the city's Board of Ethics? Or is the money he's been paid by the city for catering enough to do it? more ›

The city's outdoor music and festival season took another step to being fully fleshed out with the announcement of dates for Summerdance by the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. more ›

Did you know there was a crippling blizzard in Chicago a few days ago? Although it appears that most roads are pretty clear and the CTA is running close to normal, a lot of the Chicago side streets have been waiting patiently to be cleared by the city. more ›

The City of Chicago has posted the applications they've received from citizens who'd like to be the interim Alderman of their ward on their website. By and large it's pretty standard Chicago job-application boiler plate: I've served the neighborhood here, I've been a resident for X amount of years, my dad was the Alderman here for X amount of years. Two of those applications have been denied. One of them is awesome. more ›

• Chauvet Stiggers was charged with aggravated criminal sexual assault with a firearm and aggravated criminal sexual assault committed with a threat to life in connection to last week's Southwest Side rapes.
• As many as 50 people have been sickened this week by a Shigella outbreak traced back to a Subway in Lombard.
• Cook County Sheriffs have busted up another prostitution ring resulting in 14 arrests.

Citing an oversight in city policy, Chicago's Human Resources Director is requiring that some 250 volunteers at the city's Animal Care and Control Department undergo criminal background checks. Human Resources spokesperson Connie Buscemi told the Sun-Times that background checks have been a standard practice at city facilities since 2008, even though they haven't been performed. "Animal Care should have been going through that same process. It was an oversight that they didn't. That oversight was identified and is being corrected," Buscemi told the paper. more ›

The order requiring CPS to include racial minorities at the city's most sought-after schools, was thrown out by the US District Court Sept. 24, ending almost 30 years of enforced integration. The order required that white students could not account for more than 35 percent of the students at the city's most sought after magnet schools. WBEZ has more on the story here and you can read the full court decision here [PDF] more ›

A new ordinance will give Chicago aldermen at least 60 days to review major city lease agreements and sales in the city. The law, which was approved by the city council June 3, permits aldermen to call in independent auditors before the city contracts are put out to bid. It also allows the council to call on the office of the inspector general for review agreements, though the council retains its usual responsibility for review. more ›

We know the city's hard up for cash. With tax revenues falling and city budgets tapped out we understand that the city is looking long and hard for any additional revenue streams. But this? more ›