Chicago

Inactive State Committees Costly
Fri, 02/24/2012
Lawmakers in the Illinois House earned an extra $661,000 last year for serving as committee officers, even though some committees met fewer than five times and a handful met once, a Chicago News Cooperative analysis found. The House paid members who serve as committee chairmen and spokesmen (Springfield’s term for ranking minority members) $10,326...
Bradley, Education, General Assembly, Government, Health, health care, Healthcare, House Committees, Metro, Michael Madigan, Springfield

Big Quinn Cuts Target Human Services
Thu, 02/23/2012
Following Republican criticism he didn’t announce budget cuts during his Feb. 1 State of the State address, Gov. Pat Quinn proposed chopping $420 million from agency budgets Wednesday through state facility closures and consolidations. Delivering his annual budget address to an attentive, quiet chamber of lawmakers that did not interrupt his...
budget cuts, Department of Corrections facilities, Department of Juvenile Justice centers, Early Childhood Education, Illinois General Assembly, Jacksonville Developmental Center, Medicaid, Monetary Award Program, Pat Quinn, Springfield

Electronic Filing Lags in Cook County Court Cases
Tue, 02/21/2012
Cook County Clerk of the Circuit Court Dorothy Brown, who is seeking her fourth term in office, often talks about how she has modernized the technology in her office, which maintains the records for one of the largest court systems in the country. But even as court systems elsewhere move ahead in the critical area of electronic filing–or allowing...
Bar, Blagojevich, business, Cook County, Cook County Clerk of the Circuit Court, Dorothy Brown, Illinois Supreme Court, Matteson, OLIS, On-Line Information Services, Ricardo Munoz, Thomas Kilbride

County Jail a Large Mental Ward: Dart
Mon, 02/20/2012
The sounds of chaos bounce off the dim yellow walls. Everywhere there are prisoners wearing orange, red and khaki jumpsuits. An officer barks out orders as a thin woman tries to sleep on a hard bench in a holding cell. This is a harsh scene of daily life inside what has become the state’s largest de facto mental institution: the Cook County Jail....
American Civil Liberties Union, Bechara Choucair, Bridget O'Shea, Chicago Police, College, Cook Country Jail, Cook County, Cook County Jail, Criminal Justice, Health, Mental Health, Mental Health Clinics, Mental Illness, Tom Dart

Proposal Would Limit Protests in Council Chambers
Wed, 02/15/2012
Ahead of this spring’s NATO and G8 summits, four influential aldermen on Wednesday proposed prohibiting audience members from waving signs or engaging in any “demonstration of approval or disapproval” during City Council meetings. Under the proposal, the banned conduct in the council chambers would include — but would not be limited to — “cheering...
Austin, business, Carrie Austin, City Council, City Hall, Ed Burke, G8, G8 Summit, Garry McCarthy, George Cardenas, Government, Hunter Clauss, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, NATO, Rahm Emanuel, Ray Suarez, Richard Mell