One hundred and thirty-two million in transit money, a renter ordinance landlords are already war-gaming before it’s even introduced, and the city finally collecting on those rogue migrant buses — Friday actually came with receipts. This is Chicago Politics and Urbanism Daily — I’m Sarah, Brian’s here, and today we’re skipping the structural hand-wringing. We’ve got dollar figures, ordinance language, and a state-versus-city zoning fight that is very much live. And I want to know how much of that $132 million a South Side rider actually feels — not just a Metra platform renovation in Wheaton that makes a suburb feel better about downtown. That’s the first fight. We’re also getting into whether Johnson’s renter protections survive an aldermanic council that’s already hearing from landlord reps, and what the $440k migrant-bus fine actually closes out. Here's Chronicle Media:
The Regional Transportation Authority Board of Trustees unanimously approved a plan for distributing about $132.2 million in new revenue to the CTA, Metra and Pace later this year. This is a portion of around $320 million in funding that Chicago area transit agencies are expected to get thanks to the Northern Illinois Transit Authority Act. The rest will be allocated later.
The RTA board voted unanimously to move $132.2 million out to CTA, Metra, and Pace — and day one of NITA is today, the agency that replaces it. So the new era starts with a check, which is a lot better than starting with a press release. Forty-five percent of that — nearly sixty million — goes to security, and CTA’s slice is basically doubling its off-duty Chicago police headcount from 99. That’s a political choice wearing a safety label. What I want to know is how they split the service-improvement money and the seamless-transfer money across three agencies. A Metra fix in Wheaton and a CTA fix at 79th are not the same political ask, and the board approved this unanimously, which usually means somebody got what they wanted. And the other $188 million sits with the new NITA board until September — a board that doesn’t exist yet. So the real decisions get made by people who haven’t been appointed. That’s not a transition plan; that’s a delay with branding. Chicago just said CARE Teams are expanding citywide — but what actually happens the minute somebody calls 911 for a mental-health crisis? Who shows up, and what are they allowed to do? So on a qualifying mental-health call to 911, the idea is that instead of — or sometimes alongside — a police officer, you get a two-person CARE team: a mental-health professional and an EMT. Per CBS Chicago, the program now covers all 77 community areas after Mayor Johnson’s May announcement. The van is stocked with food, drinks, and resource connections — the goal is de-escalation and linkage to services, not arrest or forced hospitalization. The city says this expansion is funded with $5.2 million from the last tranche of federal pandemic stimulus money, according to WBEZ. That’s a real dollar figure attached to a real deadline — once that stimulus money is gone, there’s no identified permanent funding stream yet. And the backdrop matters: the Chicago Department of Public Health says more than two-thirds of Black and Latine residents experiencing serious psychological distress are getting no treatment at all, so the need these teams are walking into is huge. That whistleblower story from last summer raised red flags about short-staffing and limited hours holding teams back from responding — has any of that actually been fixed in the expansion? That’s the thing to watch. Last August, a whistleblower told CBS Chicago the crews were ready to work but got boxed in by limited hours and bureaucratic red tape — and the mayor’s office answered by pointing to hundreds of people helped, without releasing hard call-volume or diversion-rate data. The numbers that would actually tell us this is working are pretty straightforward: total calls dispatched to CARE versus sent to police, how often CARE leads to a hospital diversion or a successful service connection, and whether coverage hours keep up with the citywide rollout. Until the city publishes that consistently, “citywide coverage” is still a promise, not a track record. This one's from AOL:
Gov. JB Pritzker’s proposed BUILD housing plan would shift some zoning authority from local governments to the state to speed up housing construction and address Illinois’ housing shortage. Critics, including some Chicago officials and community groups, argue the plan could weaken local control, alter neighborhood character, and contribute to gentrification and displacement. Supporters say the proposal would expand housing options, reduce development delays, and help create more affordable homes while still allowing for local oversight and preservation efforts.
Pritzker’s BUILD plan is the same institutional fight the Bears stadium deal was — Springfield deciding it knows better than local zoning boards. The difference is that this one has LUCHA and Palenque LSNA rallying in Avondale against it, which is not exactly the coalition you’d expect to be standing with suburban mayors. State overriding local control is a tool — the question is who’s holding it. When Springfield carved the Bears a special tax deal, that override worked for a billionaire. Now they want the same lever for housing supply, and suddenly the nonprofits in Avondale are worried about displacement. Both things can be true. Right, but “local oversight and preservation” is doing a lot of work in Pritzker’s framing. Chicago officials opposing this aren’t all wrong — aldermanic prerogative has been a disaster, but it’s also the only tool some of these neighborhoods have ever had to slow down bad development. And Johnson’s Protecting Renters Ordinance isn’t even formally introduced yet, and landlords are already organized. Fifty-one school board candidates are inheriting a council that can’t pass renter protections, and now we’re asking that same council to fight off a state zoning override? I want to know which aldermen Pritzker’s people are already working. From Chicago Tribune:
The measure would create a citywide rental registry that would require the disclosure of major building owners, many of whom remain hidden now through legal shell groups, and a new Bureau of Rental Housing Services tasked with enforcing tenants’ rights, according to a draft ordinance and presentation obtained by the Tribune. It would also ban “junk fees” issued by landlords, create a new “Tenants Bill of Rights” and fund legal representation for tenants facing eviction.
The Protecting Renters Ordinance hasn’t even been formally introduced yet, and landlords are already organized against it — that gap between announcement and introduction is the whole story. Johnson is sending it straight to committee to skip the usual stall tactics, which tells you he already knows the floor count is going to be a fight. Who’s bankrolling the opposition right now, before there’s even ordinance text on the table? Because that kind of organizing speed doesn’t happen without money and aldermen already taking calls. I want to know which wards are getting worked, and by whom. The committee-bypass move is worth flagging too — the Tribune says it’s unusual procedure, and it is. Johnson’s using it because his Council track record this year has been rough. The procedure itself is basically an admission of that. Block Club Chicago, with Quinn Myers:
CHICAGO — Almost four years since buses from Texas began dropping off migrants in Chicago with little to no coordination with local officials, the city’s law department has secured fines against some of the bus companies involved. Taken together, the fines and default judgements against the bus companies that brought migrants to Chicago total about $441,000, most of which will be donated to the United Way of Metropolitan Chicago, city officials said this week.
Block Club’s got the exclusive: the city’s law department has secured roughly $441,000 in fines and default judgments against the rogue bus companies that were dumping migrants in Chicago — sometimes in the middle of the night, sometimes in freezing weather — starting in 2022. Most of it goes to United Way of Metropolitan Chicago, not directly back into migrant services. Almost four years later and we’re closing out with $441k. Do the math on how many bus runs Greg Abbott’s operation made — that fine is a rounding error. What I want to know is whether the city ever actually built the landing-zone infrastructure it promised, or whether it just took a check and called it resolved? Credit where it’s due — Block Club broke this, and the law department actually followed through to judgment, which is not nothing. But closing the legal loop is different from closing the policy loop. “Most goes to United Way” is not the same thing as reinvesting in the communities that absorbed those arrivals. If Chicago Politics and Urbanism Daily helps you stay oriented, take a moment to subscribe and leave a review wherever you’re listening. It’s a small thing that helps other people find the show.
You’ll find links to every story we covered in the show notes, so if one caught your ear, take a moment to read more there. That’s Chicago Politics and Urbanism Daily for today. This is a Lantern Podcast.