Results tagged “daley”

With a massive budget deficit looming, property taxes on the rise, and the mayor talking about more furloughs and service cuts, the Chicago Public Schools have still found over $150,000 to hire a city hall insider to handle "forging partnerships with the business community to support school programs," the Sun-Times is reporting. Better yet, the hire is Barbara Lumpkin, who has served as Daley's city comptroller, budget director and city treasurer, and who was involved in several city hall scandals during her previous tenure.

Some officials believe building a land-based casino could provide help during Chicago's financial crisis but Mayor Daley has some reservations that must be met first.

We're a short time away from hearing all about Mayor Daley's budget for 2010 - hint: it won't be pretty! - and Daley continues to slash at the budget like Jason Voorhees so that he can avoid raising taxes to help fill a budget gap in the neighborhood of $500 million. Items have been trickling out in the days ahead of his presentation to the City Council and now we've got a clearer idea of what's going to be cut. We already know that the city's non-union workers will be asked to take nearly five work weeks worth of furlough days (24 to be exact), that there will be no cost of living increases in wages, and at least three more reduced services days. Daley has also suggested that while money from the Skyway lease will remain untouched, he could borrow heavily from the parking meter lease to help cover the budget gap.

Sticking to his vow not to increase taxes to close next year's budget deficit, Mayor Daley announced on Monday a portion of his plan to save millions of dollars in city spending next year. That includes 24 furlough days for city non-union workers (that's five weeks off, the equivalent of a 10 percent pay cut), no cost of living increases and three reduced service days. “The economic recession that has plagued our nation for well over a year continues to affect most of Chicago working families,” Daley said at a City Hall news conference. “I understand that times are still tough for people and I don’t feel right asking them to pay for more city government right now,” he said.

Oh, to have been a fly on that wall: former world champion boxer Mike Tyson stopped in to see Mayor Daley this afternoon after appearing on Oprah this morning. He and Daley became acquainted a few years ago, and Tyson stopped in today to say hello and talk about youth violence with the mayor during a 30-minute private meeting. Tyson said he has a unique perspective on the subject because he grew up in rough parts of Brooklyn.

With the release of his 2010 budget approaching next week and a budget gap of over $550 million in the city budget, Mayor Daley's going to have to get creative if he wants to close that gap. He'll have to be even more creative now that's he promised he won't raise any taxes, fines, or fees. Said Daley yesterday, "I understand that times are very tough for people. I don't feel right asking them to pay for city government right now." The most likely option being bandied about, it seems, is still dipping into reserve funds from the city's parking meter and Skyway leases.

Now that Mayor Daley is firmly back on Chicago soil, he's staring down not only a dangerously low popularity rating, but also a city that's on the verge of economic disaster. Impending budget holes, (yet another) CTA Doomsday scenario, unemployment and of course the on going parking meter fiasco. Before any of these crisis, individually or in total, do him in, Mayor Daley is trying his darnedest to to some serious spin. He's already insisted he won't raise property taxes to close the budget gap, likely taking reserve funds to help him do that.

As Harold Washington Library displayed its new teen media center, Mayor Richard M. Daley focused on ways to stem the rash of youth violence the city has experienced in recent weeks, Chicago Breaking News reports. The library's new YOUmedia lets teenagers edit music and video projects on computers. A program like this teaches marketable skills and provides a "safe place" and an alternative to hanging out on the streets, Daley said.

The CTA continued its jostling yesterday by electing a new chairman of the board. Former CHA chief Terry Peterson will fill the spot vacated a month ago by Carole Brown.

In his first local press conference since Chicago lost its bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics, Mayor Richard Daley declared that he would pay no political price for the loss, "none whatsoever." “You wrote my obituary, didn’t you? Some of you have, I guess,” the mayor told the press. “I don’t know why you already put me in the grave,” he said. “I know you’re all planning on it, don’t worry,” he said, after asking that we at least run a nice picture of him.

Losing the 2016 Summer Olympic bid was shocking enough to many Chicagoans; coming in last place was a blow to the ego of a city with a chip on its big shoulders. After two years of wrangling, six months of hype, arm-twisting in the city council and literally millions of dollars in private contributions to pull the bid off, Mayor Daley is coming back to Chicago empty handed, and many people (including those inside City Hall) are asking what went wrong.

This just in! Exclusive footage of Mayor Daley just after the announcement!

The news hit Chicago hard today, as the IOC announced that the City by the Lake would not be hosting the 2016 Summer Olympics. Even more shocking, the city did not make it past the first round of voting. Mayor Daley's admonitions that the games are the best economic engine that the city has will be tested in the coming years, and an increasingly frustrated and angry electorate will be looking for leadership out of the financial and political swamp they've been dragged into.

Brazil's Olympic promoters are fanning the flames of comments made last week by Mayor Daley regarding the competition between cities to host the 2016 Games. Daley minimized the odds of Tokyo and Madrid, based on geography, and dismissed Rio's bid chances in light of their hosting the World Cup in 2014. When asked last week if Rio hosting the World Cup would help it's bid for the 2016 Games, Daley said ``I don't think so. The World Cup is completely different than the Olympics,'' adding. ``that's all soccer stadiums, it's completely different. They don't have all the other events there that we have.'' The IOC prohibits bid cities from criticizing rivals.

Mayor Daley spent a little quality time with our favorite City Hall reporter, Fran Spielman from the Sun-Times, to reassure jittery Chicagoans that they won't have to worry about having to foot the bill for the IOC's summer sports extravaganza, should Chicago get the 2016 Summer Games. “They have been very, very fiscally responsible in regards to their presentation. I really believe that. Unless … ,” Daley told Spielman, before ominously leaving his sentence unfinished. “An earthquake or something or a tornado,” he responded when pressed for an answer.

Mayor Daley's pilgrimage to the south lawn of the White House Wednesday appeared to clear up what has been the subject of much speculation of late: will Obama be going to Copenhagen? The answer: no. That's bad news for Mayor Daley; while it's still plausible that Chicago will get the games (or that the always politically shrewd Barack Obama will show up in Copenhagen anyway) without the American president, and potentially millions of federal dollars in security, logistics and infrastructure, Rio's bid is looking especially attractive.

Not content with the $1 billion-plus the city has already received in federal stimulus funding, Mayor Daley is appealing to President Obama for even more cash. $800 million more, to be exact. Said Da Mayor, "This is not pork barrel. This is not wasted money. This is all about the future of this country." According to the Tribune:

The Independent Voters of Illinois-Independent Precinct Organization will file suit against the City of Chicago today, alleging that the deal inked with Morgan Stanley to lease the city's parking meters for the next 75 years is illegal. According to a press release the organization will make copies of the suit public at a 10:30 a.m. press conference. The organization is working with Clint Krislov, of Krislov & Associates, Ltd.

It's been quite a week for Mayor Daley's favorite change jar: TIFs. The city's new TIF sunshine ordinance went into effect on Saturday (the website that's supposed to list all of the information sucks, oddly enough), the mayor announced that the city will cough up $25 million to help relocated United Airlines into what used to be named the Sears Tower, and Chicago will create a TIF to help build the proposed Olympic Village. Whew! That's a lot of hot TIF action for only seven days.

Chicago's Chief Financial Officer Gene Saffold is predicting that the city's budget hole will be worse next year. This is after the city burns through a new $320 million "rainy day fund" created from the parking meter lease. Saffold predicted a deficit of upwards of half a billion dollars next year, citing declining tax revenue and increased wages, compared against a projected budget of $6 billion. (Is this the first time the city has engaged in long-range financial planning? Publicly, at least?) While raising taxes is a last resort, according to Saffold, "nothing is ruled out at this point," Saffold told the Tribune. "The mayor has instructed us not to look at property taxes as we move forward in 2010."

Later Tunney acknowledged that there isn’t a consensus in the LGBT community whether to pursue a special category as a qualified minority. He told the Sun-Times:

As the city looks hard to close a budget hole of more than $300 million, Mayor Daley is announcing plans to furlough more than 2,000 non-union employees in the park district, the public schools, the city colleges, the Chicago Housing Authority, the Public Buildings Commission and the CTA. The unpaid days are expected to save the city $18 million. "We must continue to demand more from every employee and do more with less," Daley said at a press conference Tuesday. The bulk of the cuts will happen at the management level, affecting those earning around $90,000 a year or more. "Those savings demonstrate that we, starting at the top levels of governments in Chicago, understand the need to be part of the solution during these very, very difficult times," he said. Last month city hall laid off more than 400 city workers, after they refused to take overtime reductions and 15 unpiad furlough days.

As the deadline passed for two holdout unions to agree to concessions with the City of Chicago, the Mayor announced over 400 layoffs of city workers Wednesday. "I don't want to lay anyone off. It could have been avoided," Daley said Wednesday. "I feel for the members and of course their families." Referring to the truck drivers, library and public health and safety employees that were laid off, he said that Teamsters Local 726 and AFSCME Council 31 "have failed to reach an agreement with the city to take unpaid furlough days for the rest of the year to help us address our budget deficit and of course save our taxpayers money."

While Laborers Union Local 1001 was one of the city unions that agreed to concessions as part of Mayor Daley's master plan to save the budget, the city did give one concession to Streets and Sanitation workers, without even being asked by the union. With Newly appointed Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Tom Byrne has implemented a disciplinary amnesty. In a department where nearly one third of the workforce is absent. Every day.

Council 31 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees has issued a statement in regards to the impending city job cuts coming from the Daley administration as a result of that union's refusal to make concessions with City Hall.

The City of Chicago is strapped for cash. Some would argue that we're on the verge of bankruptcy. Layoffs, budget cuts and asset sales? Those are all on the table, if they haven't been tried already. But Mayor Daley is ready to throw down the gauntlet on people that shirk their responsibility to pay traffic tickets, municipal utility bills and other debts owed to the City that Works. Daley announced yesterday that the city plans to outsource its debt collection to, well, debt collectors. "We escalated it in the '90s...We've been doing this for 15 to 20 years," Daley told the Tribune. "People refuse to pay...they say it's too much," the mayor said, adding "it's hard, to be very frank. Some went bankrupt, some you can't find, some are just refusing to pay...this is nothing new."

We were excited to learn that EveryBlock co-founder Daniel X. O'Neil was working with Harper Reed of Threadless fame to develop a new online gadget - but it's not the hyper-local t-shirt you might immediately presume (pretty please?). Instead, the pair produced a new city government transparency toy: CityPayments. And it's likely to be all the rage among us reporters as it gathers momentum. But what does it do? And why do we care?

In a rare moment of aldermanic clarity, it seems some members of the city council don't believe what they're being told about the city's Olympic bid. Led by 1st Ward Alderman Manny Flores, a group of aldermen are asking for an independent third-party auditor to look through the city's bid book for potential cost overruns. "It is critically important that we pursue the bid in a financially responsible manner and also in a manner where we provide full transparency for the city of Chicago, and fully vetting and evaluating the merits of the Games," Flores told CBS2. "That's what the residents of the city want," Flores said. "They want the assurance they're not going to be put on the hook long term."

In a move to tackle poor supervision and excessive spending, Mayor Daley rearranged his cabinet yesterday, removing Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Michael Picardi and replacing him with Thomas Byrne, who is currently head of the city's Transportation Department. Picardi, who has been the Streets and San boss since 2005, was criticized after the city inspector general dinged Picardi for lax field supervision, after investigators witnessed garbage crews taking long lunches, drinking beer on the job and urinating in the streets last fall.

In a column run yesterday on Crain's Taking Names blog, Greg Hinz pretty much summed up the mess Mayor Daley is returning to here in the City by the Lake.