Clik here to view.
Editorial: If only Juan Rangel would learn to play by the rules
Follow @csteditorials The tragedy of Juan Rangel, who built up a system of charter schools in Chicago serving thousands of lower-income Hispanic kids, is that he has failed to hold himself to the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Razing high-rises reshaped city — a Sun-Times/BGA special report
As a longtime public housing resident, Robert Tate has had a front-row seat to the demolition and rebirth of the neighborhood where the Cabrini-Green public-housing projects once stood. Tate, 52, has...
View ArticleClik here to view.
As subsidized housing spreads, suburbs face rising number of poor
Decades ago, Yolanda Crawford had a chance to leave the Chicago Housing Authority’s Dearborn Homes in Bronzeville and move to Naperville. She turned it down. That’s a decision she regrets. Now, from...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The CHA’s great upheaval — a Sun-Times/BGA special report
In 1999, Mayor Richard M. Daley boldly promised to transform public housing in Chicago — in part by tearing down the high-rise housing projects that lined the city’s expressways and surrounded the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
WATCHDOGS: Ex-Gov. Jim Edgar aims to cash in on state’s cash woes
At the same time he’s criticized Gov. Bruce Rauner for failing to pass a state budget, former Gov. Jim Edgar and his business partners are looking to profit from the state of Illinois’ financial...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Cook County judges not following bail recommendations: study
Cook County judges routinely make bail decisions for crime suspects contrary to what the judges’ new risk-assessment system calls for, according to a review of more than 1,500 cases this year obtained...
View ArticleClik here to view.
THE WATCHDOGS: Casino owners jump on video-gambling bandwagon
The number of video-gambling machines at Illinois bars, strip malls and other small venues is booming, growing from zero to more than 23,000 in the past four years, records show. That’s nearly double...
View ArticleClik here to view.
WATCHDOGS: Targeted firms still get tax money after charter raids
Days after federal agents swept into the headquarters of Concept Schools and a charter school it operates in Rogers Park in June 2014, top Chicago Public Schools officials took notice of the raids on...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Exiled Muslim cleric with Chicago ties denies role in Turkey plot
As a military coup fizzled in Turkey, that country’s president blamed the uprising on a reclusive, elderly Muslim cleric living in exile in Pennsylvania whose followers have a strong presence in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
THE WATCHDOGS: Chicago’s segregated police stations
Chicago has 22 police stations scattered across the city, and white police officers hold at least half of the jobs in 12 of them — including two stations serving black neighborhoods on the West Side,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Burke’s street plowed early, often: IG report says
Streets and Sanitation plows deviated from their normal course to clear a path to Ald. Ed Burke’s fortress-like house after a major winter storm last year, City Hall’s inspector general said Monday....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Struggling municipal golf courses turn to video poker, slots
Struggling municipal golf courses are turning to video poker and slot machines in an effort to make up for declining revenue. More than a dozen taxpayer-funded golf courses in Illinois have tried legal...
View ArticleClik here to view.
THE WATCHDOGS: State won’t explain ‘Chicago Fire’ tax credits
Gov. Bruce Rauner’s administration issued $15.9 million in tax credits for the hit TV show “Chicago Fire” late last year, but state officials no longer will release the names of the Illinois residents...
View ArticleClik here to view.
WATCHDOGS: CPS gives $250,000 contract to firm linked to top aide
The Chicago Board of Education approved a deal Wednesday that will pay as much as $250,000 to a law firm where Chicago Public Schools CEO Forrest Claypool and his handpicked general counsel, Ron...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Daley nephew’s probation ends in Koschman case
Former Mayor Richard M. Daley’s nephew Richard J. “R.J.” Vanecko has completed his involuntary-manslaughter sentence for throwing a punch that killed David Koschman in 2004. Maureen P. McIntyre — the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Ex-Rep. Lipinski drops federal lobbying after Sun-Times/BGA story
Former U.S. Rep. Bill Lipinski has dropped his federal lobbying practice after the Chicago Sun-Times and the Better Government Association reported the longtime Chicago congressman was paid $4 million...
View ArticleClik here to view.
WATCHDOGS: 18 aldermen avoid hefty property tax hikes, 5 pay less
Three of every four property owners in Chicago have been hit with higher property taxes this year, a Chicago Sun-Times analysis shows — often thousands of dollars more and in some cases in the Loop and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
City’s costly food fight with clout-heavy Park Grill settled
The decade-long food fight between City Hall and Park Grill has come to an end 11 months after a judge ruled Mayor Rahm Emanuel couldn’t break the sweetheart deal Mayor Richard M. Daley gave a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
They were among Chicago’s murder victims in first half of 2016
Many but not all of the 324 murder victims in Chicago in the first half of this year were caught up in gang battles or drug dealing. Some snapshots of the dead: Dying over drugs Derrius Lares. |...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Who gets killed in Chicago — a Watchdogs special report
On July 27, 2015, police on the West Side pulled over a black Chevrolet whose driver, they said, hadn’t signaled a turn. The driver, DeMorrow Stephens, didn’t have a license, according to the police....
View Article