Chicago City Council,
2023 to 2027, pursuant to the Chicago City
Council Rules of Order and Procedure. Rule 49.
The Sergeant at Arms sets forth the following rules of conduct to be
followed during the public comment period and the duration of all committee and
city council meetings. Profane, vulgar, threatening,
abusive, or disruptive language is not permitted.
Demeaning, discriminatory, or harassing behavior and speech
directed towards others is not permitted.
Disruptive behavior, including disruptive or disrespectful conduct
during others' presentations, is not permitted.
Banners, flyers, or signage are not permitted.
Backpacks, large bags, and sharp objects are not permitted.
Clear bags, not tinted in color, that do not exceed 12 by
12 by 6 inches, will be permitted and are subject to search.
All food and beverages, including in metal canisters, are not
permitted. Cell phones must be placed on silent prior to entering the
meeting room. Individuals must remain seated.
Public comment speakers are permitted to stand only when providing public
comment. Small handheld devices may be used only while seated and the
user must refrain from interfering with the view or hearing of other individuals.
Individuals or groups failing to adhere to these rules will be asked to cease
such disruptive conduct and failure to comply will result in their being
subject to removal from the meeting by the Sergeant at Arms.
Good morning, everybody.
Welcome to our
round of budget hearings for this morning. Appreciate everybody being here.
We're going to get started with public comments, and then with our first
department.
First for public comment is Mr. George Blakemore.
Yes, sir.
That I'm all painted up, and I came down here
not only to make a comment
to you,
to the members of the committee, but to the aldermen. Now, Mr.
Blakemore, you don't have to be a rocket scientist.
You don't have to have a IQ of 160
to how many aldermen are here now? One,
two,
three, maybe four,
and-
There's six of us
Oh, it's six. Well, that's disgraceful.
That's un-American. This is not a democracy.
So what they're saying,
the aldermen's not here, so we're here for no big mouth public.
We'll let them get up here and spit in the mic.
I didn't come to spit in the mic for six of y'all.
I'm expecting at least a quorum,
at least 26.
It's something evil here.
Three times that.
It's something corrupt here. It's something un-American here.
But why?
She's going to tell me, this nice lady say, "No, we with the city."
Y'all all hooked up with the Democratic machine.
From the city, the hog pen,
to the county, from the county to the city, and they're
all Democrats.
They're all Democrats. So the system
is broken. In a few minutes, going to say, "Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. Mr.
Blakemore, your three minutes is up."
It's up down here. Down here, that's what is up.
You're not supposed to call us.
Why would you call us now?
I didn't come up here just to talk to you six.
It's more than you six.
Three times.
I am happy being happy.
So your minutes are getting up, Mr.
Blakemore, and we're going to hear from the others from the public.
They are coming to talk to the aldermen, and not to
six aldermen, but to at least 26.
So it's not a damn thing wrong with me.
It's something wrong with the city, and in a few minutes, "Beep, beep,
beep, beep, beep, your time is up."
Y'all time should be up. I'm not happy about Trump, but I
still don't like the Democratic machine, and I voted for Trump for
revenge.
For revenge.
Thank you, Mr. Blakemore.
Next,
we have Tyrone Muhammad.
How y'all doing?
Morning, Mr. Muhammad.
As George said, there's six aldermen that's here.
I'm here to talk about
the hemp ordinance that Alderman Hall--
I've been seeing all over the news.
I presented an ordinance over three months ago
to Alderman Burnett,
who then gave it to Jason Lee,
and then, I guess, the mayor. Now, I'm trying to understand
how
a citizen can present an ordinance to
produce additional monies and taxes to
help minimize some of the effect, to even in
that case, to even help the mayor. I own
a dispensary cafe
in the South Loop.
And since I opened that, as a returning citizen,
which that should be commendable,
especially given that y'all gave all the cannabis dispensaries to white
men
while we still in prison and going to jail every day.
I opened that up and I employ over 18 people,
and the fact that I can present an ordinance and give it to my alderman to even
help the mayor
to make sure-- Even presented it to where $500,000 to $1.5
million additional menu money could go to these wards.
And then see the ordinance not even in the way that I presented it.
Yet we talking about raising taxes on the people.
Here I am, a business, telling you how to raise taxes on me,
and you don't even call us to the table. You don't even call me to the table.
He running around in the news like it's his ordinance.
Most of these people are aldermen. They don't own businesses.
We create businesses and opportunities for our communities,
and y'all don't even use us.
That's why you in the condition you in, because you don't listen to the people
anyway.
All I'm going to say is, man, I think that's very disrespectful, and my ordinance
had Walter Burnett name on it. Jason Lee said he liked the ordinance,
but the ordinance, and the way it's formulated and written by them
now is not the way I presented it.
And it's not the way to deal with the safety and health.
They want us to believe they care about health and safety and public safety
and children. That's a lie, because too many babies get murdered in this city every
day, and it don't make national news.
But then when you got somebody
who present opportunities, even jobs and opportunities
for our communities
so they can stop going to prison, so we can deal with public safety, you don't
even call them to the table.
And this is the problem. If you're not a part of the Democratic bullcrap,
b******t, and I ain't your friend-
Tyrone Muhammad
... you won't call the people that's most on the ground and in the
face of it to the table. And that's very disrespectful, and for
that-
Thank you for your comments, Mr. Muhammad. Your time's up. Thank you.
Our next speaker is Tracy Elliott, and I'll remind all the public speakers of we
do ask that you mind your language and do not use obscene language here.
Thank you. Tracy Elliott?
Mr. Muhammad, we need to have order in the room.
Tracy Elliott, are you in the room?
We'll come back to you. Steve Dale?
Thank you.
My name is Steve Dale. I'm a certified animal behavior
consultant, and for about 30 years, a radio host on
WGN Radio. I speak internationally at veterinary meetings,
have authored and contributed to pet books.
For several years, I chaired the volunteer task force on
companion animals and public safety for the city.
Many heroes work for the city, including police and fire, and I
implore you to consider those who save lives at animal control
do the same, doing all they can to make life-saving
happen. I also suggest you heed attention to inside voices
or experts, those who truly understand day-to-day at CACC.
Acting Executive Director Susan Capella is outstanding, and those who
work directly with her, and I do have a point of
comparison. It's a fact. CACC doesn't
enjoy the financial resources per capita of most cities
such as Austin, Kansas City, New York, and many others.
In fact, to cover what they minimally need at
CACC, they have an Amazon gift list.
What city agency needs that? Understanding the
city's budget crunch, I suggest CACC is different
Dealing with one-time family members 365
days a year, dogs and cats must be cared for on Christmas as
they are any other day. What you likely know is that by law,
like in just about any city, any animal that appears at the door of
C.C. must be taken in, and also the city is responsible
for strays. In fact, animal control was set up many decades ago in
municipalities as rabies control.
Do we want more dogs roaming the city? It's already a problem.
Canine rabies transmission in this country is rare.
We hope to keep it that way. Placing the responsibility on already
overburdened, understaffed Chicago police to deal with strays
sets the clock back. That's never worked anywhere, which is in
part why we have animal control. Those who relinquish dogs and
cats mostly feel their backs up are against the wall,
and they don't really want to. PAW Chicago has set up a
program, and in that program, they offer viable
options for people who come in. Given the current resources, somehow
CACC remains at or
near so-called no kill. However, record
numbers are giving up pets. In November alone, nearly 600
animals were relinquished. This doesn't include those just let loose.
Further, cutting the already inadequate CACC budget
means more euthanasia, which does have an
associated cost. So that would cost the city
money. No single person who works at CACC, no
alder, none of you want to see more euthanasia, I'm sure.
Of course, much more could be done and should be done to examine why
pets are given up in the first place. I see it's out of time.
Thank you, Mr. Dale.
Our next public speaker is Lucy Kaye.
Good morning, city council members and fellow citizens.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.
I deeply appreciate your commitment to improving the lives of homeless animals
that taxpayers are counting on in support of our large urban community
and the neighboring states.
This is written in a spirit of collaboration and in support of the voiceless
animals. My observations are grounded in truth and
first-hand experiences, not hearsay.
I believe it is our shared responsibility to ensure that every dollar
allocated to CACC's budget is spent
effectively, and that every animal, no matter its circumstance and
how it arrived there, receives the compassion and care it
deserves. As a longtime advocate for animal welfare, a
volunteer at shelters and rescues across the United States, and
fostering myself 33 dogs, I'm here to learn and raise awareness
regarding
more transparency and the need for an audit,
and just to make you aware of the deplorable conditions.
CACC plays an essential role in our city,
but significant improvements are urgently needed.
Increased funding without stronger oversight risks
sustaining a system rather than improving it.
Lack of transparency, a need for an audit, and deplorable conditions,
I once again want to state. There's considerable
uncertainty with accountability for the disparaging
numbers of viewable pets in contrast with the website, the large number of
intakes waiting against the clock to be cleared for public view,
the delays in spaying and neutering,
deterring adoptions,
the absurd euthanasia numbers, and the disconnect with the public
to easily communicate. To prevent this, I propose implementing
an annual audit of CACC's operations, focusing not just
on financial accountability, but also on the level of care provided
to the animals. The last audit was conducted in
2013.
Does increasing the budget actually improve conditions for the animals,
or
will it be used to just sustain the current system?
We can do better. Another area in need of
attention is accountability. Despite over 70 plus
employees and individuals involved with the current budget,
it's difficult
to understand the failure in some of the adequate engagement.
The absence of visible staffing and leadership,
and I've observed vacant offices leaving volunteers to
shoulder the responsibility.
The unsanitary conditions and unsafe conditions are troubling.
The animals are not just presented nicely.
They should be warmly describing the animals instead of having to wait in the
lobby line to a computer. On multiple visits, I've seen
cages filled with feces.
Thank you for your comments, Ms. Kaye.
Your allotted time is up. I'm so sorry, Ms. Kaye.
Thank you for your comments, though, and thank you for making the time.
You can submit those to us in writing. We'll make sure everybody gets them.
Thank you. Our next public speaker is, and I apologize ahead of
time if I'm butchering your name, Fiyanu Simber?
Hi. Good morning, Alderwoman and the chair.
Good morning.
My name is Ayana Simba. Sorry, I have really bad handwriting.
And today,
I am testifying on behalf of the Illinois Environmental Council as their city
programs director. IEC represents over 100 environmental
organizations across Illinois, and we led the campaign to reestablish the
Department of Environment.
First and foremost, we want to thank the mayor and his administration for
reestablishing the department in the FY 2024 budget not that
long ago. Since then, we have been ecstatic to see the growth of the department,
and we've appreciated the open communication with Chief Sustainability Officer
Angela Tovar. Additionally, we are excited by the department's accomplishments over
the last year. Some including rolling out the Climate Infrastructure Fund, which
has invested millions in climate adaptation and clean energy projects,
prioritizing low income in Black and brown communities, supporting policies
to electrify Chicago's buildings, and protect environmental justice communities
from cumulative pollution. And then finally, establishing an environmental
working group to develop environmental standards for data centers.
However, despite this progress, the DOE still lacks formal
regulatory and enforcement power.
In his budget address, the mayor announced a transitional plan to identify steps to
granting regulatory authority to the department, which is a necessary move.
Without enforcement authority, the department cannot fully protect Chicagoans.
A 2019 Better Government Association study and a 2023 report by the
Neighbors for Environmental Justice saw that there was a 50% drop in
environmental inspection and enforcement from 2012 to
2022, following the closure of the former Department of Environment.
Moreover, Neighbors for Environmental Justice 2024 Pay to Pollute report found that
no city department enforces or monitors environmental requirements for the city's
contracts, and no department involved in the procurement process
considers environmental justice to be its
priority. This oversight has led to
inequitable outcomes, such as asphalt plants repeatedly violating environmental
standards under contract with the city, disproportionately harming residents near
these facilities.
Simply put, Chicago needs an empowered Department of Environment to protect the
health and the well-being of its residents.
We recognize the city's financial reality, and we implore the city to use
the findings from the transitional plan and the 2023 environmental governance
study to provide a roadmap to restore the department's enforcement
power at zero cost in next year's budget.
IEC and our members will continue working closely with Mayor Johnson, Chief
Sustainability Officer Tovar, and City
Council to ensure we build a department that intentionally addresses the needs
of the city and the current capacity gaps. Thank you for your time.
Thank you very much.
Our next speaker is Jessica Jackson.
Well, sir
and ma'am,
you have to know that the only way that they would be
concerned about the dogs is if they were
illegal immigrant dogs.
No, I'm real talk. If these dogs
came across the border
with they illegal
owners,
you're going to get some help. You need to find out if these
are natural-breeded dogs.
You think I'm trying to be funny. Real talk.
Because you all have a concern about these stray
animals when we looking at a city council that's not even concerned
about housing people.
They are stealing our properties, kicking us out of properties,
doing illegal evictions to human beings.
Taxpaying human beings. Six, seven,
eight generation human beings. So the
fact that they ain't paying attention to your dogs, you know.
I'm just saying. Find out if your dogs
are natural-born breeded or if they've been brought in
illegally. Because if they've been brought in illegally, it's
resources for you. And I suggest that you demand them because it's
there.
Now, the problem that us citizens are having in this
city
is that we got a missing
Illinois Attorney General named Kwame Raoul.
Can anybody find this man? Now, I'm going to have to tell my
age now.
I'm 62 years old, right? And back in the day,
when people were missing, they face used to be on milk cartons.
Can we please bring milk cartons back so we can put
Kwame Raoul's face on a milk carton?
Then maybe we could find him, because that's a big problem that we having
as citizens. Because city council and
prosecutors and all this and that know that they're not going to be
prosecuted because you can't find Kwame Raoul.
And this is the reason why all this stuff is going on, because
nobody's going to be prosecuted, nobody's going to be taken down
because Kwame Raoul can't be found.
He done made some type of deal with somebody.
Now I'm learning that he's a Haitian, so he probably made some immigrant
deal. Right now he's in hiding because ICE is coming.
Find him.
Him and Desmond Yancey,
find him. But that's our problem. Can anybody please
find Kwame Raoul? Please. Do you know where he is, sir?
You looking mighty intense.
Maybe you know.
Find Kwame Raoul, please. Anybody.
It's okay.
Thank you, Ms. Jackson. Our next speaker is Zoe Lee.
That is true about Kwame Raoul. I
was taught by my mother, you go to the top.
And the top for the state is attorney
Kwame Raoul. Again, that's why Kamala
lost, because she was a terrible attorney general in California.
But it's nothing like this man here.
But going back to what Tyrone said about our
communities, and I'm an entrepreneur too, and I've
always been an entrepreneur.
And that's one of the reasons why I'm down here all the time, because y'all are
not going to just knock down my family's building, violate the US
Constitution, the law of the land, its eminent domain, and not pay me.
I don't want to work for nobody. I want to create jobs.
I want to help the community. I want to help these kids that keep coming down
here,
because they don't have nothing in their communities. Okay?
I actually have a plan, always had a plan.
And that's why I'm here, because the City of Chicago,
Cook County,
violated the Fifth Amendment, violated the
14th Amendment on top of other federal laws
for demolition.
Y'all are the government. I can't go nowhere else.
So I'm going to come here, and I'm going to continue to come here.
A lot of y'all people that's in here,
families have been convicted.
Oh, can I say? Y'all been convicted.
We got the most corruption in the City of Chicago and the State of
Illinois,
and everybody knows this.
So the fact that you think that I'm going to continue to come down
here,
and y'all making things like, "Oh,
you need to get a lawyer. Oh, you need to do this." No, y'all need to
talk to
Kwame Raoul, that's number one. Number two is Brandon
Johnson,
his corporate counsel, Mary Richardson Lowry, Bradley
Wilson, that's the lawyer that's on my case, that went and got some Fraulen
documents from Cook County and gave them to the federal court and thought nobody
didn't know what that was. That's what y'all do. Y'all fraud.
If you see the word fraud, you going to see Cook County.
You going to see the City of Chicago.
That's all y'all do. Y'all been doing this forever, since old
man Daley. Y'all think y'all going to continue to do this
on my watch? This Black entrepreneur
that's owed money from the City of Chicago because y'all
violated the Fifth Amendment, which is the US Constitution?
Come on, man.
Read the Constitution. Settle my case, or I promise
you, we almost flipped this state red. I ain't playing.
I'm not playing.
Thank you, Ms. Lee.
I'm going to do one last call for Tracy Elliott.
Tracy Elliott, are you in the room?
Okay. That concludes our public comments.
We're going to continue this morning with the
Chicago Board of Elections. We do have six departments to hear today,
so just for all the alders that are in the room, thank you.
We're going to do a five-minute round one limit, just to try to get
through in a timely fashion. If people need a round two, please feel free to ask.
At this point, I'm going to ask that Director Otogurei
present her report, and then we'll have
Executive Director Holiday
proceed. Go ahead.
Thank you, Vice Chairman Lee, alderpersons, and guests. Good morning.
My name is Janice Otogurei, Director of COFA.
For those of you that are going to be looking in the COFA book to follow this, it's
on page 144. Page 144. Let's look at
a snapshot of the fiscal year '25 budget for the Chicago Board of
Elections.
The proposed budget for fiscal year '25 is $28.5 million, which
is a 17% decrease from
'24.
Personnel services in fiscal year '25 have decreased by
21% compared to the revised fiscal year
'24 figures.
Contractual services are 14% lower than
'24,
going from $23.29 million to $19.9
million.
The number of FTEs remained unchanged at 122.
The department is fully funded at 100% corporate
funded.
The budget allocates $7.81 million for personnel
cost and $20.7 million for non-personnel
expenses. Thank you.
Thank you. We have with us here this morning
Charles Holiday. If you wouldn't mind introducing yourself and the
members of your staff that are here on the dais and in the box, you can continue
with your statement after that.
Good morning. My name is Charles Holiday, Jr.
I am the Executive Director of the Chicago Board of Election.
Today I am joined by Board Chairwoman Marisol
Hernandez,
Board Commissioner William Cressy,
Board Commissioner June Brown,
Assistant Executive Director Sandra Espera,
General Counsel Adam Lasker,
Finance Manager Kimberly Carrillo-Walker,
Human Resource Manager Calandria Rogers,
Pre-Election Voting and Logistic Manager Clint Heard,
Election Judge Supervisor Paulina Malecovic,
Polling Places Supervisor Brandon Pickens, and Public
Relation Information Director
Max Bever.
We are pleased to present our 2025 budget for Chicago Board of Election
Commissioners,
which represents the spending plan for the upcoming year and
includes additional preparation for the 2026
midterm primary and January elections and the Chicago
Electoral Board session, which will begin in November of
2025.
To confirm,
there will be no elections held in Chicago in 2025.
The Chicago Board of Election oversees one of the largest election
operations in the United States.
2024 was a challenging year for election authorities in our
state and across the country. But we are happy to say that both
the March 19th primary and the November 5th general elections in
Chicago saw little to no public safety
incidents or major threats
or interference in our democratic process.
We cannot do it alone. We thank the
Chicago City Council, as well as the countless city workers,
public agencies and partners, law enforcement officials,
and volunteers for their continued assistance administrating our city
elections. We are proud to say that both elections were fully
staffed with poll workers.
And for both elections, nearly one-fourth of our poll
workforce was made up of high school and college
students. We thank our partners at McForChallenge, Chicago
Public Schools,
City Colleges of Chicago, and more for their ongoing
efforts in recruiting students to serve their community.
We also saw that Chicago voters continue to use both early
voting and voting by mail to cast their ballots.
Early voting
proved especially popular this election, which
means we also saw long lines in many locations, including on
Election Day. We hope to work with Chicago City Council to continue
to increase resources for these programs headed into future
election years, as well as locate potential new early
voting sites and retire old sites where voter demand has
outgrown the amount of space available.
Let me provide a quick snapshot of 2024.
The board administered the March 19th presidential primary election
and is finishing conducting the November 5th presidential general election.
The board introduced new poll books with increased
functionality and assistance for poll workers and voters.
The board managed two electoral sessions
with over 100 objections against candidates, including the new
Chicago Elected School Board office.
In conjunction with the US Department of Justice and our
partners at Equip for Equality, the board has continued to improve
accessibility in polling places in Chicago.
The city now has only 30 precinct polling places
that remain low to no accessibility, a new
record as we work to get that number down to
zero.
The board conducted a mail canvas to all registered voters in
Chicago to properly check and clean the voter rolls.
Additionally, we now have over 160,000
Chicagoans registered for the permanent vote-by-mail roster,
and we expect thousands more to continue to sign up for this
program.
These voters are often the first to receive their ballots and the first
to return them back to the board, and we appreciate their
enthusiasm.
Working with our community partners and nonprofits, the board increased the number
of bilingual election judges and early voting officials in
eight languages serving Chicago voters.
In December of 2023, we unveiled our new
chicagoelections.gov website to provide a more user-friendly
and accessible experience for the voters of Chicago, including a new
online vote-by-mail application and voter
information lookup tool, a new search bar function, and
automatic translations in over 72 languages.
Moving into next year, the board will host
a Chicago voter forum on Saturday, April 5th,
2025, at Harold Washington College from 10:00 AM to
3:00 PM, where we will welcome voters and community
organizations from across the city to provide their feedback on the
2024 Chicago elections' new
election laws and proposed legislation, and what resources they
want to see moving forward. This will be an update to our
2012 voter forum, and we will create a report
cataloging this feedback and data that
will be made public and shared directly with
the City Council.
The board is also planning a citywide online survey to be
emailed to all registered voters, welcoming their feedback on multiple
topics.
Looking to next year, the Board of Election Commissioners have recommended a budget
of
$28,507,734.
This spending plan reflects several items, including finish
administering the November 5th, 2024, election and
prepare for the 2026 midterm elections and
adjoining Chicago Electoral Board sessions.
Developing a Chicago Elections mobile app for
smartphones and tablets to reach voters with additional election and
polling place information.
Continue to develop the new chicagoelections.gov website,
including voter turnout mapping and joint vote totals
between Cook County and the City of Chicago.
Lease a new downtown voting super site location for
2026 elections.
Register voters and recruit election judges at events throughout the year
in coordination with community partners.
Create new poll worker and voter training videos centered around new
equipment and digital tools.
Expanding community outreach and voter education via neighborhood events,
hiring fairs, and social media.
Implement additional legislative changes to electus
school board districts. Conduct a 2025
mail canvas to all Chicago registered voters.
Maintain and service all voting equipment, computers, and security
systems. And continue to work with the U.S.
Department of Justice,
Equip for Equality, and city agencies toward achieving
100%
accessible polling places. To all the members of
Chicago City Council, we appreciate your ongoing support for our
mission to administer transparent, impartial, and accurate
elections for the voters of the City of Chicago.
Thank you, and we are happy to answer your questions.
Thank you, Executive Director Holiday.
We're going to start questions with Alderman O'Shea, followed by Alderman Quinn.
Thank you, Chairman.
Morning, Director.
Morning, Ald.
I'd like to start out, Charles, by complimenting you and your staff.
Long before you were the director, you were always the go-to person over at
69 West. I've always appreciated your professionalism
and your communication.
I also like to recognize-
Thank you
... everybody in the box.
But most especially, the folks over at 69 West on the sixth and
eighth floors.
As you know, I stop by frequently, not just during election season.
They're always so kind and patient and helpful,
and they should be recognized for that.
Charles, I wanted to talk,
obviously we're in a budget crisis.
We have the next several budgets,
and in the years to come are going to be
extremely difficult to balance a budget and rein in
spending and identify cuts and efficiencies.
Have there been any discussions
with the county
about
a way that we could ever look at combining efforts
with the county
to save
money? Is that something that's been explored?
Is that something that you feel we should look at?
Is that something you feel we could execute
to save dollars?
It is, but why don't you
expand on your question a little further?
Because when you talk about
combining efforts, our
efforts at this point, we
try to use the same vendors, which gives us
and them some type of discount or
savings.
As far as that,
we perform the same functions, but we are
two separate entities, and
there are things we go about doing different ways.
What's effective for them and what's effective for us.
Sometimes they're the same and sometimes they're not.
But we can explore
any options where we can.
I think it would be
good if City of Chicago
and Cook County leadership got together
with
both
the Board of Elections for us and the County Elections Department
to discuss cost savings, efficiencies of combining
under one roof,
an election operation with the thought being, could there be
cost savings moving forward?
The county
clerks is really not calling the elections,
because the county,
they have an elected official over that office.
There is no elected official over the Chicago Board of Election.
And meaning the county clerk
has authority over that office.
And
should the voters have an elected official over Chicago Board of
Election?
I would say no. I think we have far too many levels of government here in the
city.
Early voting,
obviously we had long lines. It was a presidential election.
But I will say,
my experience, particularly the early voting location in my
community at Mount Greenwood Park,
the staff there did a remarkable job
of keeping those lines moving. It was a lengthy ballot, took a
long time.
When we talk about
election day
and early voting,
I know we've really leaned on the Chicago Public Schools to work and
the MCPA challenge on identifying where we can get students more
engaged.
What is our involvement and is there possibility of getting
more CPS participation from students
moving forward in future elections?
Well,
we will continue the resources that we have
and where we can find more resources to recruit
students,
we will
go to those avenues as well.
Has there ever been engagement with private schools
who might have civics classes or
student engagement?
We will look into that, Alderman.
I'd love to try to work with your staff to identify more schools
to get-
our students involved at the high school level. That's all I have.
Again, thanks for your service. Thanks to your staff.
Thanks, Chairman.
They gave you three beeps.
That's just payback.
Alderman Quinn, you're next.
Thank you,
Madam Chair. Good morning, Executive Director Holiday.
Executive Director, I want to pick up where Alderman O'Shea left off,
specifically on
the idea of merging Chicago Board of Elections with the county
under a redundancy reform. So help
me understand what would be the counterargument to
why not doing that?
Well, Alderman, at this time,
I really can't answer it. But what I would do, I'm unable to provide that,
so
at this time, we will provide to this answer through the Chair.
I just don't think this question's going away, sir.
Well-
I think that we're facing a budget
crisis.
There's clearly redundancy in election authority.
And it makes good sense to explore it.
Okay. So Alderman, I will let my general counsel, Adam Lasker,
follow up with you. Adam?
Thank you, Mr. Holiday. Adam Lasker, general counsel.
I think
a counterargument is that in 1885, the people of the City of Chicago
conducted a referendum and chose to eliminate the
elected official control over
the elections here, and to create an independent commission,
with the three commissioners appointed by the Circuit Court of Cook County.
They're statutorily prohibited from engaging in politics.
They can't make campaign contributions.
They can't support the candidates that are on their ballots.
It's a choice that was made by the voters to immunize local elections from
political influence. Secondly,
there are currently over 1.4 million registered voters in the City of
Chicago.
Those voters need their voting sites, their voting machines, their election
judges. None of that is going to diminish if the two offices are
merged. There have been national studies
on differences between commissions and counties, and
I personally don't see where the cost savings comes from.
You're going to need the same amount of office space, the same amount of staff, the
same amount of warehouse space, the same amount of machines, the same amount of
polling places.
But also, the way things work in the county is much different than in the
city in regards to election schedules,
working with the public agencies to find the polling places.
So the real cost savings, I think, is coming from the ingenuity of the Board
of Elections trying to reduce the number of precincts and replace
them with the accessible early voting sites.
And
there's not a lot of redundancy, really, because every voter needs
to be served countywide. And so I just would ask
you to show us where you think that
cost savings really comes from, when keeping in mind that
the elections are going to be the same size, and the infrastructure needed
is going to be the same size, and the staff needed is going to be the same
size.
I just don't see a cost savings for it.
That's-
Okay. That's helpful. That's helpful to understand.
On the point of
serving voters,
we had talked about this last year, Mr.
Executive Director, about offering
a second early voting location per
ward.
I think you may have said that we have to do something in Springfield to allow
that to happen. Can you-
No
... can we talk a little bit further about those prospects?
Well, two sessions ago, we
gave proposal budget for that.
And once that budget was presented,
this board never heard anything else back.
Right now, we're in the process
of, and will continue in 2025,
to look for
additional places as well as new locations.
But this is something we need to help,
the city council, the alderman, the committee persons, to
identify some locations.
We will send our investigators out to do a survey, and if
there is ADA
accessible and in compliance, then we could think about
having those second locations. But we need to be funded for it.
And if that's what the look is, that funding is not in
our budget for 2025. We would need that moving forward
for 2026 budget.
However, there was bottlenecks throughout the city, but
every ward didn't have this issue.
We are talking about 50
new locations, but if 50 is not a number we can get,
then we can start at 10, where
we know these issue lie, where these issues lie.
Well, I think that makes good sense to continue to work
through that, and maybe it's
as the trend continues, where people are voting early
more so, and that's their new habit,
right-sizing what election day actually looks like
may make good sense. So to the extent I could be helpful, I
stand ready to do so.
Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
Thank you, Alderman Quinn. Chair Dowell.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Good morning, Mr. Holiday.
Morning.
How many voting machines do we have total in the city?
You're speaking of the touchscreen machines?
I'm speaking total first, and then I got other questions.
Well, that's a number I don't have.
I will have to provide that through the Chair for you.
Okay. Can you tell me how many electronic voting
machines do we have?
Well, each precinct has one, so that's 1,291.
We had a reduction in precincts, but those machines
were put in progress.
So let's say
2,069.
And that might-
2,069 electronic voting machines.
Yes. And that's the last count when we had the
2,069 precincts. Some of those
are being used for backup, and then
some are
for
switching out for repair and parts.
Okay. And does every precinct in the city just get one?
Just one.
We need more than one.
We just do. People
don't like the old way of
marking it up, and it just takes a long time.
Electronic is a lot easier for...
We're moving in that direction. So are you thinking about
increasing the numbers per precinct?
We can. It wasn't a thought at this time.
To be honest,
with the resurgence of
vote by mail
and early voting,
considering
more precinct reduction.
So in doing that, if that causes us to
have more touchscreens,
we can do that, but this looks like we're going to need a
budget
to get more touchscreens.
All right. So
do you have the
metrics for
where early voting is occurring the most
by ward, right?
Yes, I do.
Can I get that through the Chair? I'd like to see those numbers through the Chair.
Okay.
And
I would like to...
Okay, so I'm going to take you at your word that every precinct has
one
voting machine.
One electric voting machine. Okay.
What's the criteria for adding a precinct?
For adding a precinct?
Uh-huh.
Well,
there was a statute that allowed us to raise precincts to
1,800.
And we can't do any changes until after
this presidential election. So far as adding a precinct,
we're really not-
But we just had the presidential election-
I, so-
... so we can look at it now? I mean, you-
Yes. Yes, I am.
Okay.
It's just going to be looked at now.
But
we're talking
possibly decreasing, not adding.
We will have to see
what
are the circumstances to try to add a new
precinct. But we're trying to decrease that number, not add numbers.
Well, decreasing the precincts makes sense if
people are early voting or voting by mail,
but I would need to know,
a lot of my, for example, seniors,
they're not going to vote by mail,
and they're not going to go to early voting.
They're going to wait till the day of the election to go vote.
So
in places where I have a great deal of seniors,
I need more than one precinct.
Okay.
So that's why I'm asking you, what's the criteria and
process for adding a precinct?
Just your concern there, and we can look into this and see
what the data shows us,
and we can take it from there.
Okay. I'd like to sit down and look at that data.
And not just for me, but also citywide.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Those are the only questions I have for
this department.
Thank you, Chair Dell. And I'll just sort of echo the calls for a second
location too. I know you and I have discussed the Chinatown Library being
an early voting site because that's something that's shared between our two wards.
I know that we've got a lot of people
who would benefit from a location like that more centrally located.
We're going to go to Alderman Waguespack next.
Thank you, Chairwoman. Good morning, everyone, and executive director.
I just first want to say I thank all the staff for
their assistance during all of our elections.
They do an outstanding job and fill a lot of the gaps, I think,
where we're starting to see
changes,
in our case, in locations that have
become,
I think, squeezed down in terms of where we can find places.
It's getting more and more difficult to maintain locations.
So I just want to-
Say thank you to all the staff that continue to work on those issues for
us.
I just wanted to dovetail on what a couple of my colleagues,
Alderman O'Shea and Quinn, have already touched on.
And
just to reiterate the need for
discussions around a possible merger for the county
and the city
on elections. There was a report done in 2011,
a county-city collaboration report, and there wasn't
a whole lot of detail in there. But it did talk about the potential savings and
how many other cities, not just in Illinois, but around the country,
and you can look at other reports that do this as well
for merging
two such offices to provide savings and this
collaboration.
And I understand Mr. Lasker was saying that the voters
put out,
I think it was a referendum or something to say that they wanted to make that
change. But if you look at what so many others
are doing around Illinois, we are one of the few that actually have
these two separate agencies. So I would just encourage us to
continue to look at this issue of
the responsibilities for executing and recording out these
elections.
I know it takes legislative action in Springfield.
We have different equipment. In some cases, we have different
administration, but
I think a lot of us are not saying we want to see
the Board of Elections completely disappear and people
be shucked aside. That's not what we're saying.
We think that the ability to merge these
two is
not unfounded. It's not just one legal issue that should
hold the whole thing up. But this goes back to
2011 that we've been talking about this, and the need
to start looking at ways to collaborate with the county, whether it's on
election issues, mental health issues, other health issues where we
have,
in some cases, redundant, but in other cases, just
overlapping
authority and overlapping functions that taxpayers as a whole
throughout the city want to see change on.
So something that happened decades ago should not
prevent us from looking at new methods of doing things.
And that when I hear an attorney telling me that something that happened
decades ago is the way that it's going to keep things, that's just not the way
to look at things. We're in budget crises now year after year after year, and every
department, every agency has to start looking at ways to
streamline, to become more productive in
exploring potential savings
in each one of our budgets. So
14 years ago, or I guess 13, 14 years ago, the
estimated savings at the time were $10 million.
And
we're not just looking at it and saying
we want to save $10 million.
We're looking at across the board.
It's not picking on the Board of Elections.
It's not saying, "Hey, this is the only thing we're looking at." We have been
looking at
different,
I think, public functions through the inspector
general
who has weighed in on this, through the Civic Federation that weighed in on
it, through President Preckwinkle, the former mayors,
to say these are areas where we could collaborate on
and potentially provide
the same excellent service that you're doing right now, but at a
level that is more of an umbrella and would allow us
the savings at the city level while still providing those great services that you
and your staff have done. So I don't want to say we're not trying
to undermine the work and the effort that's put in by all the staff,
but times change, and sticking on
one decision that was made by voters decades ago is
something that we need to move away from and say, look,
as
finances change, budgets,
policies change,
so must the legislative and legal changes take place, too.
So
it's a broad scope look of what we're doing here, but I think all of us are
trying to encourage more collaboration and a better way to go about
doing this for future generations.
And I'll let Max jump in because he looks like he's chomping at the bit.
Well, thank you, Alderperson. I think that's a question with our upcoming voter
forum and our citywide online survey.
That's certainly questions and proposals that could be put to the
voters of Chicago, and that feedback we'd be happy to share back with Chicago City
Council, too.
And I'm sorry, Mr. Lasker, what was the date of that, you
mentioned,
was it a referendum?
Adam Lasker. It was done by referendum, and I believe it was 1885.
1885?
Yeah.
'18.
Okay.
I don't think anybody was alive that's here, but
I appreciate that point of information.
It is very helpful to help frame how we look at that.
But Max,
I think as we move forward, if those are questions we can put out to people.
I think we want the same
quality and the same people. If we were to do a
merger, there's no one in this room who wants to see the staff go away.
We would want to see that same quality, effectiveness
be done at a broader level, and I just want to assure you we're not sitting here
trying to just cut out
departments and people on a whim. This is something that's
been on the table for a decade and a half, so it's something we're
starting to get more concerned about. Thank you. Thank you, Chairwoman.
Thank you, Alderman.
Next, we're going to Vice Mayor Burnett, followed by Alderman Lopez.
Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone.
First of all, I want to commend and thank you and all your folks for
everything that you all have been doing.
I know
you guys got a couple of new things in with the school board
elections.
Also,
with early voting really adds a lot more to what you
guys have to do, and probably
a little more expensive. How much more does it cost
to run this school board, for the school board's
elections, and also more so now that we're doing all
this early voting now? How much more money does that
add?
It's not that much more of a cost between
as far as electoral boards, but it's not that big
of a cost.
Mm-hmm.
And
if there's a
big difference, we can provide that through the Chair or what that difference may
be.
Okay. Because I know
for some of us to be able to
campaign for early voting, to get ready for early voting is another
expense, right? Because we have to start campaigning earlier,
and informing people earlier about the elections and all of
those things in order to make them aware that you can vote early
now, right? And we want to let them know ahead of time that you
can vote now instead of just waiting on election day to be able
to do that.
But also, I know my colleague's been asking us questions about putting both the
clerks and the board election together.
I think about the suburban... We just took on
the school board
races, but I know the suburbs,
they have races for everything. Libraries, they have races
for
park district. They have races for school boards.
They have several other
races than we have. I would imagine that that cost them a little more
money to do those things
compared to what we do here. Is their budget
comparable to our budget as far as elections go because they have so
many other races in these small
municipalities?
I couldn't say, but I believe when they have their school
board races, it's not the same election that we
have ours.
So I really couldn't
say
about the county.
Okay, so you don't know anything about their budget.
But I'm just thinking, knowing because people come up to me telling me,
"Yeah, I'm running for library commissioner in such and such
place," or, "I'm running for the park
district
board."
I would imagine those are extra expenses that they
have that I don't know if we want to be connected to those things.
And my general counsel can further elaborate on that.
Thank you. Again, Adam Lasker, general counsel.
Alderman Burnett, you raise a good point, and they have a full cycle
of elections here in 2025 in the suburbs, including the
various offices, townships, and school boards, and villages and so
forth. So
their budget is considerably larger for 2025 because they're running a full round
of elections.
I think if you were to merge it all into one office now, Chicago taxpayers are
going to start
bearing some of the burden of the cost of these suburban elections that happen
at a time like 2025. You've seen we've got a 17%
decrease in our overall budget because we don't have elections in 2025, but the
county does in every
municipality out there.
All right.
Thank you.
Thank you, Vice Mayor Burnett. Alderman Lopez, followed by Alderman Villegas.
Thank you, Chairman, and good morning, members of the committee.
Good morning, Director. Good morning to everybody here.
First off,
allow me to say that
I want to echo what my colleagues have said about
exploring and putting every option on the table.
I
can honestly say you're not the first department that I've suggested
potentially eliminating or restructuring or being
absorbed elsewhere.
A few of them have already heard that from me as well.
But I want to just go back to something that we heard
earlier, which was that this has been in place since 1885.
Prior to 1885,
Chicago only had 35 wards.
We changed again in 1889 to 50 wards,
two aldermen per ward. So at that time, we went from 70
aldermen and 35 wards to 100 aldermen, and we had a
two-ward system until 1923.
And I mention that because this body has shown
a willingness to change
over time.
Simply because it's been in place does not prevent us from moving forward in a new
direction, and the fact is that only 50 chairs here in this room is a
testament to that.
It was 140 years ago
that that statute went into place.
But let me also remind my colleagues and
the department,
and this is true not just to the Board of Elections
But to all the other departments where we share potential synergy
opportunities with the county, such as the health department,
procurement, and other things, that 68%
of our voters
want to see us merge
with the county various levels to improve efficiency.
68%.
So I understand our
human need to say no or to question and to
take it in a certain way, and trust me, we hear it ourselves when they say, "Start
cutting our numbers too." But this is a conversation that people want to
have.
And I would just ask
if we can have
thought put into
the process that we're trying
to explain and to discuss, because we do know that outside of
elections, there are nearly $9 million, or actually I
should take that back, $28 million
in costs associated with what you guys do and do well for the
City of Chicago. We just want to make sure that we're listening as well to
what our voters have to say.
That being said,
I would also like to add to what
Chairman Dall asked for through the Chair, which was how many of our
permanent absentee ballots
are not
returned or not submitted by the voter?
And if you want to get that through the Chair, that is fine, unless you have it
handy.
Were you looking just for permanent roster voters?
Yes.
We will get that number for you through the Chair.
Okay.
But we had a successful
return rate. 86% of all vote-by-mail ballot
applications that were sent out were returned.
So that includes the
occasional-
The vote-by-mail ballot
... absentee as well as the permanent?
Yes.
Okay. So again, if you could get that through the Chair for the permanent,
because I believe that anyone who asks in an election cycle more than likely will
return it, but it's the permanent ones that
are of concern to me.
As well as where are we at with our
passive
purge of our
registered voters? Are we still doing passive
cleaning of the polling numbers?
We did a
canvas-
Yes
... between the elections, and we plan on having one
next year as well.
Are we going to do any kind of active
canvas purge,
or what can we do to assist in that? Because I believe that, to be perfectly
honest, I think we had a much higher voter turnout than what we say,
because I think we have so much dead weight on the polls.
So I'd like to know what we can do to ensure that we are cleaning them up
as much as possible.
I would like my general counsel to answer that.
I got my wire.
I'll answer again. Thank you.
So federal law and state law does require every two years to do the
canvas. We do it every year.
Mm-hmm.
We had reached 1.6 million registered voters in, I believe it
was 2022.
The
canvases since then have reduced it down about 1.4 and a half million.
There was an outside study done this year by an organization that
took our detailed data, identified
a very large list of voters that they thought should be removed.
There is, of course, under the federal law,
once someone's identified as having moved, which is the largest percentage
of cancellations that end up happening, you have to wait for two federal election
cycles before you can remove them.
But they then reported back after we completed our canvas this year that 98% of
the names on their list had been removed.
That's just through the ongoing process.
Of course, we're also receiving the interstate data through
the sharing of data from other states on election.
So when people move, we can cancel automatically when
the data comes in through there. When we receive death certificates through the
county and the state, we can automatically remove.
So we're actually, in terms of a national standard, we
kind of set the bar, particularly because we do it every year instead of the
required every two years.
Thank you. Chairman, I'll take a round two because I want to continue on this
conversation about-
Okay. You got it.
I'm going to get to the others, and we'll come right back to you, sir.
Chair Villegas, followed by Chair Taylor.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Just one quick question.
As we're talking about early voting
30 days out in advance, more polling places, et cetera,
at what point, Director, do you anticipate that
will
people be able to vote electronically?
That's something that
we have heard over and over as
why can't we vote electronically?
Just was curious as to
at what point do you anticipate that becoming a reality?
Well, currently there is no option in Illinois.
All our military overseas and accessible vote-by-mail ballots,
even though they do them online, they still have to
print and mail the ballot.
The Illinois legislators recently created a task force to look into this
issue and changing the election code,
and are expected to present their findings by the end of
2025.
Okay, so right now there's
pending legislation, if I'm hearing you correctly, or is there a working group
that's looking at it? Is that what I'm hearing?
Yeah. There's a task force, a working group looking at it, and they're going to
return with some type of-
resolution at the end of 2025.
Okay. So you anticipate... Okay, cool.
What's your position on this? Is this something that your department would
support or...?
If the legislative pass it, we have to make it work.
Okay. So,
it
would be challenging
and again, it
would raise our budget
to do this. So,
if the legislators pass this, the board, we
find a way to make it work.
Got you.
And then, my final question, as we're talking about voter integrity,
what type of safeguards do we have in place around the
electronic voting that occurs at the polling place where there's no paper involved,
it's just a touch screen? What type of cybersecurity do we have in place,
stuff like that?
As much as you can give without providing a roadmap for
the folks that want to mess with elections.
Alderperson Max Bever with the board. I'm happy to take this question.
It's also in response to your online voting question, which we are an all paper
ballot state at this point, which is one of the safest ways to always have that
paper trail, for any possible recounts, for the necessary
audits that need to take place after election day.
So cybersecurity, that is really the first portion when it comes to our touchscreen
voting machines. The other biggest one is that they're never connected to the
internet. They're never online. That is the number one way that hackers and other
bad faith actors can get access. So it's a very hands-on process.
The transmittal of vote totals is performed once a day at the end of each
day.
And again, the cybersecurity behind
all of these come with the many
days and hours of pre-election logic and accuracy testing.
We have increased firewalls for our servers, our backup
hardware, our computers. Ultimately, the touchscreens
are a very safe way to vote and they're becoming increasingly popular with voters
for that reason.
But that additional safeguard is that paper ballot prints out, that voter
reviews their choices before that's put into the ballot scanner.
Got you. And then so because you're a
closed circuit organization, you don't use any of the cloud then, I
take it?
That's correct. There is no cloud, there is no connection to the internet at any
time. SD cards are used, for ballot
scanners and ultimately for the voting touchscreens as well.
Okay. Do you sub out the server work or do
you guys own the servers, or how does that work?
That's right. There is a secure server at 69 West Washington.
That's ultimately a secret server, so all early
votes, previously counted vote by mail ballots, those
results, no one at the board has access to.
So ultimately those are tabulated when we get to election night past
7:00 PM. But that is a protected room,
in 69 West Washington,
under camera, under security,
and is locked at all times.
Cool. Thank you. Thank you, Director. Keep up the great work.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Chair Vegas. We're going to go to Chair Taylor, followed by Chair
Vasquez.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Can you tell me about how many election judges we have?
By election judge supervisor, Paulino.
Pauline... Can everyone hear me? Good morning.
Pauline Ameshlevich, supervisor of the Election Judge Department.
This past election in November, we had over 7,000 election judges
that served and over 1,200 election coordinators.
Is that out of the 7,000
or is that an additional when you said election supervisors?
It's over 7,000 judges and an
additional 1,200 election coordinators.
Can you tell me how much they make an hour and where is that reflected in this
budget book?
So judges are paid a flat fee of 170 for serving on election day,
$60 for attending a training class prior to election.
And some judges earn additional money for serving as a
cell phone judge, picking up key envelopes before election day for us,
and also returning supplies at the end of the election.
And election coordinators earn 450
for the day. It's a flat fee. Everything is included in
there.
Working on election day, also picking up packets
and
serving as cell phone and things like that.
Where is that reflected in the budget book?
Can you tell me what line that is?
I don't...
Oh, Kimberly?
It's not-
My name's Kimberly Carillo Walker, the finance manager.
Those figures are not in this particular budget book as
Cook County covered those expenses this fiscal year.
How many days of training do election judges do?
One day, four hours class for the training.
And then returning election judges who serve every election, three hours
for the training.
So one day of training for three hours?
Yes. Or four hours, depending if they're a new election judge.
Yeah.
And then coordinators do two classes, which are four hours each.
How close are those to the election?
We start about a month and a half
prior to election day.
And what's the latest date
in relation to the election day? Because I think that's part of your question as
well.
What is the last day for training?
When's the last possible day for training before an election?
The week before election day.
So we got a problem with training because you have folks who...
So I'm in a-- Also, through the Chair, I would like to see the
data that you all use to change the
precincts. Because in the 2019 election,
I had hundreds of people who did not vote because they had a...
Maybe it was not 2019. It might've been 2020, '1 or '2.
Might've been '3.
No, this was just the last one. No, the one before that one. But that was...
Yes, the primary.
You had a lot of my folks who did not go vote because you all merged the
precincts. There was not a conversation with us. We were not even informed.
And so even myself was used to going to one polling place and was sent to another.
You all do know that
lets down the election vote. And so I want to see the numbers from when you all
changed the precincts up to now, and I also want to see, through the Chair, the
data you all used to make that decision, because some of that didn't make
any sense. Because you had folks that went to one polling place,
was told to go to another. They would go to that one, and then they were like,
"Well, you were at the right place." And so that's why I asked about training.
We got a real problem. That's number one.
Number two, there is no space for when you ask
those judges there if they're having an issue with a judge or a
person who's helping with the election, there is no number that they give.
So what they wind up doing, calling my office. I'm not the committee person.
And so
you all don't do a good job at informing the folks who are actually sitting there
who are supposed to help people to be at the right place.
And so
there needs to be a revamp
of the Board of Elections. And we've talked about it
every year during budget. And so I want us to have a
conversation about how do we help each other, because
according to the data that you all put out, more folks voted,
but you also had so many people who just walked away.
And so that's voter suppression, if we all understand it, but it is.
So if I'm told to go one place, and then somebody sends me somewhere else, and then
they send me back, what do you honestly think going to happen?
I'm not going to vote. I'm going home.
And so we need to have a real conversation about, I want a round too-
You got it
... about that. And who looks at the spaces before we decide they're going to be
places where
people actually vote? Because some of the places are not clean, some of the
places are not accessible, some of the places don't even have space for
handicapped folks. And so I'm at an election place where folks got to walk all
the way around because they've got wheelchair accessibility
and cannot get into the regular place, which takes them longer to vote.
And so I want us to look at all of those things.
I've got you down for round two-
Thank you
... Chairwoman. We're going to go to Chair Vasquez, followed by Chair Hadden.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Thank you all for being here.
I would definitely like to echo the sentiments of some of my colleagues as far as
finding ways to kind of consolidate and partner up.
I think
even hearing the counties taking on the payment for some of the election judges
shows there's already opportunity for collaboration in identifying that.
I don't think it's necessarily
wanting to
shrink anything more than figure out a way to make it more effective and efficient
where possible.
So I think any conversations around that front
should be open ones and ones that we're involved in.
I got a question related to vote by mail.
So we know that there's been more people that have been
using vote by mail. We're trying to incentivize it more.
In the 40th Ward, we have the committee person doing a really great job about it,
but the committee person doesn't have budget to actually get the word out and
promote. And so what is the Board of Elections doing to get more people
incentivized to actually get vote by mail and help drive those
numbers up?
Hello, Alderperson. Max Bever with the board.
Happy to talk some of the communications with vote by mail.
We have taken to sending several emails.
Email is one of our best ways to communicate with voters where
we have those email addresses. Ultimately,
that's a way that we can communicate when their ballot's been sent, as well as when
it's been received and when it's been counted. We do have our mailings go out.
We have two mailings, both our annual canvas.
That includes information on the vote by mail and permanent roster.
Actually, that was a state-mandated requirement this time around.
Our canvas went out with information and a web link to our permanent roster
that went out to all registered voters.
As well as the household mailer, which goes out to all households with registered
voters, approximately 1.2 million voters,
households in Chicago with their three options, including voting
early, voting by mail, and voting on Election Day with their closest
locations.
Vote by mail has been increasingly popular.
I think we all know 2020 was a very hard year to
compare this presidential election results with.
But that election, we had over 40% of people vote by mail.
This election, we had just over 22%.
So it is somewhat difficult to predict
who wants to early vote and who wants to vote by mail.
What we do know is increasingly popular is our secure drop boxes, and
that everyone who's waiting in an early voting line often sees the
people get to the top of the line, put their ballot in there, and we often think
that that creates new vote by mail voters every election.
But just over 46% of our vote by mail ballots
for this November 5th election were returned via secure drop box.
Is there any
TV ad or any kind of other advertisement, radio
Yes, we have an advertising budget.
We have that focused mostly on radio and print and
digital. Television tends to get very expensive.
The majority of our focus is in community publications and
non-English publications.
Approximately 80% is community publications or
non-English. That's been consistent for the last few election cycles.
Our thought there is that the English language media covers the election quite
well,
but we do spend a lot of time promoting both early voting and vote by mail
with our advertising budget. It is our main goal.
Okay. If you could, through the Chair, send more detail on the plan on that as far
as what languages, those kind of things.
I think that's helpful for us to figure out how we can improve and help support
those efforts.
Separately,
in the 40th, we've got certain polling locations that happen to be senior
residences, which we think is great for the seniors who
obviously are going to have disability issues, other things, and challenges.
I imagine that's not the case everywhere, right?
There's a number of senior residences that aren't polling locations, right?
Do you guys look at any kind of
tracking to identify how many
senior residences are polling locations, how many gaps might need to be
filled?
My general counsel, Adam Laska, will.
Thank you. Again, Adam Laska. And I'm taking this question because really you're
asking a legal question at this moment.
There are provisions in the Illinois Election Code about the voting at
nursing homes and so forth. So
the way that works is that if you are a licensed nursing care facility,
a part of your licensing requirements is to allow us to allow the election
authority to come in and conduct in-person voting with those residents.
So
every election cycle, the State Board of Elections sends the
updated list of licensed nursing care facilities to each election authority.
Our staff then does conduct that in person.
Now, senior centers and things that are not actually licensed care
facilities, we don't have the same statutory authority to do that same kind
of in-person voting. But what we
do is work with you alderpersons, the committee persons, and anyone else we can,
state representatives, so forth and so on, at identifying locations like
that. And if they're going to be privately funded with private
locations, privately owned, we cannot force ourselves in, but we would certainly,
gladly, happily work with them on creating a precinct there
if that helps their voters in addition.
Okay.
Yeah.
What will be helpful there is if there's any
data or maps showing what coverage and what opportunities there might be.
I think some of us would love to figure out a partner there, because
when you downsize the precincts, we went from 41 to 23.
One, neighbors got confused as to where the polling locations were in some of those
instances, but our seniors then have longer distances to travel to try to
identify. So try to figure out a help there would be great.
I'd also like a round two, if that's okay.
Sure.
If I could just respond briefly.
Go ahead.
It's important to remember that the state legislature amended the
election code for all election authorities and changed the size of the precinct
from 600 to 1,800 voters. And we're not even there yet.
So we're at about 1,000 to 1,100 maybe per precinct.
So we're out of compliance with the state law still.
After every presidential election cycle, we have to reassess our precincts,
and we're going to have to continue to cut.
We save money, we cut, we eliminate the need for machines and judges.
We then want to reinvest that money in the expansion of early voting sites.
They're universal. Anybody can go there.
And again,
our staff that works on identifying the sites want to work with you on
finding... They have to be accessible.
The DOJs
monitoring that. So they have to be accessible.
But we do not have a reputation for turning down a good,
accessible polling place.
The reason why I ask is dovetailing with vote by mail efforts, for example, if
you can't do the coverage, because I get your point.
But figuring out strategies to make it more effective for our seniors to find other
avenues to be able to vote, drive those numbers up.
I think whether it's vote by mail, having people really incentivize that in places
where you can't do polling locations, they're just ways.
And what I'd like to identify is
what the strategy, planning, methodology is, what that looks like, to have a better
understanding of how you accomplish that goal to increase the numbers.
So thank you for that, and thank you, Chair.
Fit you in round two. Thank you. Chair Hadden followed by
Alderman Riley.
Thank you, Chair.
I don't have a ton. Thank you for all that you do.
I appreciate the questions and the information that a lot of my colleagues ask, so
I look forward to those through the chair requests around voting machines,
numbers, details of that sort, so that we can think about what that budget
request needs, because I'll just echo,
especially when we have the big elections, I think we all feel the pain
of getting that great turnout but needing more machines.
I would also just want to say thank you to everyone on your team
who does such a great job, both overall and regionally supporting us.
So thank you all for the work that you do.
I know we give you lots of frantic calls
on election day and all around. And so you guys do a great job of troubleshooting.
To the line of questioning and
this suggestion or thought process that a lot of my colleagues have brought up
on looking at
potential efficiencies or more effectiveness
even of some combined city-county system.
I don't know if I heard this.
What would need to be done? What would it look like for your department to even
evaluate that, right? Because I hear my colleagues saying, "Hey, you should check
it out. Hey, it's been done before." But I know that
implementation of even such a study, I'm assuming, costs money,
right? And I don't know how you would even
begin that. So I'm curious if you guys would speak to what kind
of information, what would that look like, what kind of funding.
And while you may not be able to answer all of that currently,
some of it could come through the chair.
And I say this with a mindset of hearing your
responses so far
I'm not convinced that there would be much savings, honestly.
But even some of the questions would be, if we're looking to
combine this,
we wouldn't really combine it, right?
It would have to live under the city or the county, and that would be a
decision point. So I'm just wondering if you guys could speak to
the high level, how would one in your department and in your
position, and could you even do that kind of evaluation?
That is something we really will have to,
as an agency, sit down and talk about.
Right now,
I
couldn't give you an answer. We can get together and answer
through the Chair, but at this moment,
that just hasn't been a thought of ours.
Our thoughts was only running
transparent and efficient elections.
We never had the thought of
combining with the county.
Alderperson, if I may add one thing, Max Bever with the board.
We can provide those through the Chair, I think.
And I don't know if our general counsel has any additional thoughts, but it would
have to be a legislative. We were created by referendum, so it would
need a legislative change. And if you're looking at the
county, it would have to be something that would either, like you said, house under
one or the other.
Otherwise, it'd be a very similar structure to the way that we're set up now.
But we can quickly
look at some ideas to provide some responses through the Chair.
And
Mr. Lasker,
did you have any additional thoughts?
Thank you. Adam Lasker. Again, just thoughts.
These really come from me, not from the board.
But my personal thought is
there's sort of two options. You dissolve the City Board of Election Commissioners
and put all the elections under the county clerk. That's the old-fashioned way.
Or you create a county election commission, so then you create
another independent commission that continues to handle everything.
I think that in order to figure out--
Your question, what would it look like? How would we make this analysis?
Get an independent auditor company to work with us and the
county jointly.
That, of course, would require cooperation from the county clerk's office in
addition to us. But I think, again, just speaking for me personally,
we have not discussed this as a board, but seems like that would probably be the
way to go. But I don't think we know what that audit would cost at this
point. Yeah.
Thank you for that. And I'll say I look forward to that
through the Chair. And I more ask that because I feel like we're
in this budget season.
Every single one of the alderpeople here has been working pretty hard and
trying to really come up with ideas and cost
savings and efficiencies. And
I bring this up, though, because as this has come up before, it's an idea that gets
kind of floated. Just
from my perspective, a general
exercise, if you will, in thinking about the organization of that based on the
information that you've given us previously
leads me to a conclusion that
we're probably going to have to create more government
, which
I think might be the opposite of what we're trying to do, and that this could be a
case of
trying to fix something that ain't broke,
if you think about it. And so, while we're looking for efficiencies, I think
effectiveness is more important, especially when we
look at the Chicago Board of Elections, the level of importance,
the weight, and
from an aldermanic side, even thinking about the questions that we're asking.
We want to know, as aldermen, right, how many voting machines do you
have? What's happening with our polling places and our precincts?
We know the expectation of what our constituents
have. We're the ones out there buying extra pens or, oh,
God,
what was it? Our 2020 debacle of the Sharpies, right?
We're the ones doing it. And so if I think about colleagues who are thinking
about, "Hey, maybe we could possibly save 10 million." Well, that was
a report from, what, 14 years ago.
Is that savings in turning this over completely to an
additional body of government or sending it over to the county?
What does that actually look like and function?
And even if it could save us a few million dollars, it's not
necessarily saving the City of Chicago a few million dollars.
And then ultimately,
is that efficiency coming at
the cost of effectiveness in functional elections?
So just some thoughts on that to share.
Thank you, Chair, and I don't need a round two.
Thank you guys for the time, and I look forward to the information.
Sounds like something we might need a hearing on at some point.
So,
we're going to go to Alderman Riley, followed by Alderman Napolitano.
Thank you, Madam Chair, and
good afternoon. Is it?
Almost.
Hello, Executive Director. How are you?
I'm fine. How about yourself?
Great.
Wanted to start out by thanking just a couple folks in your office who were
particularly helpful. Kathy Ross, Odell Sterling,
Aaron Parker have all been great resources for my office, so
thank you for them.
I sent you a memo two weeks ago. It's one I send out every year.
It's not a surprise, not an ambush.
Sent it out two weeks ago today, to be precise, and did not
receive a response from your office.
Have you fulfilled that request and sent it somewhere?
Apologies, Alderperson. We thought that that was sent through the chair per the
directions we got. We can get that immediately after this hearing, and we have
the responses here for you.
Okay.
Yeah, well,
it'd be helpful to see those responses.
How many vacancies are you carrying over into 2025,
since you have those handy?
They're looking for the vacancy.
And Madam Chair, since I had requested these before the hearing, maybe we don't
charge me time for them to look up the answers-
You're good
... that should have been provided days ago.
Got you.
We have 14 vacancies.
Sorry?
14.
Through the chair, I'd like the positions and salaries for those.
And how many vacancies are you cutting, proposing to cut in next year's budget?
None.
Zero.
Okay.
How many of your employees are scheduled to receive a salary increase in 2025's
budget proposal? Is it all of them?
All.
All?
Yes.
All. And your budget is 100% corporate, is that correct?
Yes, it is.
Very good.
And
I assume the answer to this question is the same I've received from every
department.
You did not employ zero-based budgeting to come up with
your budget submission for this year?
The standard response we get from OBM and the IGA-edited memo is
no, they did not.
Sure. The additional is we did work with the City of
Chicago to ensure no
statutorily required special elections took place in 2025 for the Chicago Police
District Council, which was a work from our
legal team, and to ensure that there was no special elections in
2025. We felt that was important to do.
Okay, but that's not zero-based budgeting, right?
An attempt at additional cost savings.
I see.
So the $20 million-plus in non-personnel expenses, I assume
the vast majority of that is to maintain
databases and to upkeep technology, et cetera,
and also, I guess, rent, storage, et cetera. Is that about right?
That is correct.
And of that 20-plus million dollars in non-personnel costs, how much of that
is tied up in IT and contracts?
We can provide it through the chair.
We can provide it to you.
Thank you.
And
I'm not going to ask you to rattle these off now, but I hope the response to
my memo requests will provide
all of the
names, positions, and salaries of the employees who hold a supervisory
role in your department and the number of direct reports they supervise.
Did you assemble that data for us?
We did.
Thank you.
I'll look for that through the
budget committee's office.
One thing, I wanted to raise two issues real quick.
And one, you, I think, are aware of my
frustration with the early voting location that is now
chronically sited at Maggie Daley Park, which is of
absolutely zero convenience to my constituents and my voters.
It is literally on the border of my ward.
And there is no available parking,
loading, or standing for folks to avail themselves of that voting location.
And despite my office's best attempts to provide you with alternative
locations, you continue to select this one.
And along with what Alderman Taylor was suggesting, that feels to me a lot like
voter disenfranchisement.
It shouldn't be this difficult for voters to vote downtown.
It is a densely populated area,
and this should not be an inconvenience.
And we patiently abided by
your office's decision to have my constituents vote out of other
wards, and in some cases travel a mile and a half
to vote
when they live in a ward that I think maybe is two miles wide.
So it's unacceptable, and I think downtown voters should have the same
ability to vote as everybody else in the City of Chicago.
So,
we find lots of reasons why you're shooting down alternative locations.
It seems like you've got an excuse for each one. We're done with Maggie Daley Park.
The mayor's constituents are my constituents. They've had it.
So please do better.
And frankly, the availability of polling locations downtown, I know that's hard,
but my office doesn't work for you.
And they dedicate a lot of hours doing your job, trying to find you
locations. That's not my job.
So do better.
To the comments about consolidating the county and the city,
that would not be difficult. The county used to administer all of our elections.
We're talking like this is some untried experiment.
But again, to avoid that, I would say the board needs to step up.
I'm not really pleased with how the 42nd Ward has been
treated when it comes to voting access.
So you have to do better on that front.
That's all I've got today. Thank you, Chairman.
Thank you, Alderman Riley, and if we can make sure that we get
the response back to Alderman Riley's memo
to the committee on budget who's not yet received it,
please make sure that happens.
We'll send it immediately after this meeting.
Thank you. Thank you very much. Alderman Napolitano, followed by
Alderman Anna Hoppenworth.
Napolitano.
Oh, just making sure his mic is on.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Two real quick questions. I actually wasn't going to ask anything, but then
something
just from my own interest kind of popped up, in the spirit of us trying to work
budgets,
and look where we can save in cost effectiveness.
Just a general question. Has your team,
your election team and your budget team, ever looked at working, and I'm
sure you have worked, working with the
city and the state to maybe start consolidating some of our elections,
so that we're putting more elections on one ballot instead
of having so many throughout different seasons?
Is that something that we look at doing?
I know that it'd have to be done
corresponding with the state of
Illinois as well, but
we put a lot of money into elections. Is that something that's possible to do?
This is Max Bever.
Alderperson, that would be a legislative change.
Yeah.
We have the municipal elections, we have the midterm elections, we have the
presidential elections. What would be combined would likely be
looking at the primary.
Yeah.
Or I think the larger conversation in Springfield happening at this
time is around ranked choice voting.
That would also require legislation.
They had a task force
that met and will release a report soon with additional information.
Those pieces on the plate are combining the municipal elections,
possibly the runoff election, or eliminating
the primary by using ranked choice voting.
However, from what we understand from that report,
the report says that substantial funding would have to go into
ranked choice voting for it to be successful and along
a runway to get there as well.
Got you.
But that, I think, is what you are describing-
Yeah
... as possible. Otherwise, these are what are required by law to be run
for our elections.
Well, that's neither here nor there, but that's exactly what I was looking for.
I know that's being talked about downstate.
I think one thing that we can do is, a common theme that comes up in here is
voter suppression.
I think we all see it
across the city, across the state, and I think just city-wise, how we can
fix voter suppression in the city of Chicago is we have our elections in February.
So when we're looking with the state to change things, maybe we put our
elections in March so that people can actually go out and vote instead
of in three or four feet of snow or sleet.
We know why that was done in the past, but this is a new day.
Mm-hmm.
There's a new era of voters that we're hoping to get.
And I do think the most recent example was the June 28th, 2022 primary that
was moved towards the summer out of winter.
Exactly. Yep. Yeah. It's great concepts, great ideas.
I just hope that we can keep pushing forward and maybe looking to make some of
those changes. Those are just my simple questions for my own
benefit. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Thank you for the opportunity.
Thank you, Alderman Napolitano. We're going to go to Alderwoman Manaa
Hoppenworth, and then we'll get into round two.
Thank you, Chair.
Hello. Thank you for being here, Director. Hello, Max.
Nice to see you. Thank you for everybody in the box and others
who are not here, especially those who served in our
polling locations, our election coordinators.
Really, they are the ones
that are upholding our democracy with every election.
And I, in the 48th Ward,
have 31 polling places. I visited 18 of them,
and I got to chat with them during elections, and
they're very pleased with the new poll books.
That helped them so much. And we did have some issues with
some machines.
I'd like to also add that we also had a lot of calls to the
office, so I'd like to see more coordination on how
our offices can help
with those phone calls that have concerns about
voter
integrity. That's the biggest thing, as my colleague said, is that
people are worried about voter suppression and the integrity of
our elections. And I would like to have these hearings, too, about how
we can
just actually see what's the difference between county and city and what we do.
In Illinois, we have, what, 108 election authorities?
And
every single one of them do things differently.
I know that others don't have a website.
Others don't have easy access to somebody who
can help them at the polls. So,
I do
want to have that conversation because we, as others have said, we're
looking for efficiencies. I don't know if combining our
efforts is the way, but I do hope if we do have a hearing, that county is
also involved in the conversations, because in the end, it sounds like
they might be the ones to take over.
I can't imagine that Chicago would want to take over county's elections.
I'm also concerned about
what others have asked about cleaning the voter rolls,
so thank you for
answering that.
We are also concerned about,
in the ward,
accessibility.
We have a lot of polling locations that serve older
adults and actual whole buildings that are precincts in
themselves.
So I would like to talk to you more about that, how we can make it easier for
folks. I hope that
in that conversation, we'll talk about
ways that we can promote vote by mail more, or actually vote at home,
because that's really what it is. It's voting at home.
Because I think that there is a disconnect between people who are used to going to
the polls and voting in person and having paper
versus having paper at home. It's a different process, and being able to drop
it off, it just seems too easy, right?
I voted early.
In my ward, it was four and a half hours
to vote. It was a lot. We got a lot of calls about
that. I actually went downtown to vote at the
early polling place, and it was fast.
I would like to see how we can bring that
efficiency to each of the wards as well, as Chair Dowell mentioned.
I had a question about, you had a
248% increase in graphic services since
last year, and then a 17% decrease in
appropriations for next year compared to this year.
Is that typical?
Under the graphics, that is our request for the Chicago Elections
mobile app, as well as an extended contract to continue
developing our chicagoelections.gov website.
I know we had discussed last budget session, working towards a mobile
app. Our focus went towards the website.
We're also doing more research and initial looking at
what these things cost.
We realized that it costs more. So we do appreciate there is currently a
$400,000
appropriation in this budget for a mobile app.
We plan to release an RFI in December,
looking for vendors who would be able to take this on.
Once we learn more in those initial responses, we would issue an RFP in
spring, ideally by March, to develop that ahead of the
March 2026 primary election.
Great. Can you talk a little bit more about the app? What's its purpose?
Certainly. The goal for a mobile app would be a one-stop shop for a voter.
So rather than visiting a website on a browser or elsewhere, you have a
mobile app that would be allowing to give you push notifications and be centered
around the way that you prefer to vote.
So if you're a vote-by-mail voter, you can use that app to either-
Vote at home
... vote at home. I do like that tagline.
To vote at home, you can use the online application directly through
the mobile app or receive push notifications of when your ballot is sent, when it's
returned, when it's counted. Early voting and precinct polling places, we want to
provide maps that also guide either through Google or through another
directions, but also like you would get in an Uber or through
Google Maps, actual directions to that polling place.
So we want to provide the website experience for people in a personalized
app that you could put in your name, your information, and you'd never need to sign
out again. So you'd get reminders about important upcoming
election deadlines and whatever way you prefer to vote,
personalized information and
directions and information that would help a voter even further.
We know that voters use their smartphones.
We know that 70% of our website traffic is through mobile devices.
So we believe that this would be a good way to meet voters where they're at, as
well as reach younger voters, which we are happy to say that
25 to 34 was our highest voting age bracket for this last November election.
So working on these digital tools is a goal of ours, and that is why you see that
appropriation higher.
That's awesome. So can I ask another question?
So is this app going to be able to allow you to, for instance,
update your voter registration or change to
get on the list for a permanent vote-by-mail or vote at home?
That's right. There would also be a permanent vote-at-home application, as
well as directly connecting to the state board system to
use online to update online your registration information.
That's incredible. When I first started doing voter registration and
talking to both the county and the city,
actually did a lot of
become-a-deputy-voter-registrar trainings in my
ward, and people are very excited about that.
Is that something that you can also be able to do on your phone, is
help people become a deputy voter registrar?
I think that that is a good goal for the app as well, and we'd love to have those
conversations with Chicago City Council.
We're also looking forward to our voter forum on April 5th.
That will help us not just build that tool, but get feedback on how our
city's elections are run, the legislation that we're discussing today, like
ranked-choice voting. And again, we plan to present all of that data
information back to the council once we hold that forum, as well as a
citywide online survey. So we're very keen to get voter feedback, and
we will do in the spring moving forward.
Please share the electronic assets that you have for the upcoming forum with the
council so that we can push that out through our own individual ward channels.
We'd be very glad to.
Thanks very much. Okay.
Thank you.
We're going to start with round two. Are you good? Do you need a round two?
I'm good for now, but I'm glad to have this conversation.
Okay.
Thank you. We're going to start round two. Same five minutes, please.
Alderman Lopez.
My original 10 minutes. That's all right. Thank you.
All right. So getting back to our conversation on
removing our inactive. I appreciate that effort.
The question that I have is, what do we deal specifically with those that have been
deemed inactive,
and how are we
removing them? Because I know all of our voter rolls in all our wards have
not just the ones that are pending part of the canvas, but
those that have been deemed inactive. Are those also included in that?
No.
And I would mind you, keep it under 30 seconds, please.
Okay. So when a voter is flagged as having moved out of the
jurisdiction, they get flagged and put on an inactive status.
They're still a registered voter.
If they still live at the same place, they can show up and vote without having to
redo anything, then they're switched back onto active status.
Under federal law, we're not allowed to cancel them from inactive status to
canceled until they've gone through two federal election cycles without
showing up to vote. So there is that two-cycle delay, but that's a federal law.
There's no way we can get around that.
So understanding that,
but we still have, for example, in my ward, nearly 1,000 people who are
inactive, haven't voted, have no voting history,
and have missed probably that many or more
elections. So how are they still on these voter rolls?
If they were flagged as inactive and the two cycles go by, that's a part of the
passive purge you mentioned.
We send out the two notices required by federal law, we wait the two election
cycles, and if they are flagged as inactive, they'll be removed.
Now, I'm sorry. So if you send out the notice
and it comes back and is returned as is requested on the
notice, does that speed up the process?
Well, so again, this is specified in federal law.
The first notice we send is returnable.
That's how we know that that's what causes them to get flagged inactive.
The second notice is forwardable, required to be forwardable to that new address.
So that's our second notice, and we follow those procedures again because federal
law requires that. After we've sent the second notice,
they'll be canceled automatically after two election cycles.
So if somebody returns it, that's not considered an immediate...
You still have to wait no matter what?
If somebody returns it and says, "We still live at this address"-
No, that's not what your notice says.
So when you get your voter registration card-
Yes
... it says, "Return if it's not you."
Yes.
If somebody
takes the time to actually return it, that doesn't count for any
kind of-
That triggers the second notice.
Okay.
So what happens when nobody returns that?
Then-
Because 95% of the people who live in apartments don't bother to return people's
mail, it's amazing.
So this is the automatic canvas. Now it's going to turn into-
But it's still two cycles
... we don't have any information that the person has moved.
So if they register in another state that participates in the data sharing,
we could identify them through that.
Or if someone contacts us individually about somebody, we can do an investigation.
But obviously if someone-
So that's the part I want to get to. Thank you, Adam.
So how do we do a more active purge
where...
I know in my old precinct captain days, if I gave my committeemen a
list of 50 people who were no longer there, we'd take that to the Board of
Elections, and the
process to remove them would begin. Do we have options like that still?
Because I know the process that Adam is describing,
but waiting for someone to hopefully return someone else's mail or
waiting two and a half election cycles,
waiting to get to the third election cycle
to see if their name is off that voter roll
is arduous at best. So do we have any other options other than what he just
described?
We do. It's expensive, but we've got individual investigators we can send out.
We get over 100,000, Mr. Bever could correct me, but every
canvas, we get about 100,000 returned from the post office.
That's the way it's supposed to work.
If someone's moved away from an address, the post office is supposed to know that
and not deliver it.
But if they do deliver it and someone withholds it-
You ever see the post office?
Well, yes. I understand they're not perfect.
But-
So-
... it gets expensive, though, to take on investigations at a
case-by-case basis.
Well, I think that I would love a discussion on what we can do to purge
these rolls in a more active way. I think if there is an expense,
so be it, but that not only proves that we are voting more correctly and
improves our percentages and our turnout numbers, but also
keeps for a cleaner election process.
As far as accessibility, I still have many concerns when it comes to our polling
places. I know many people have discussed that, and I know we are under
a decree or something to have fully compliant.
But-
Keep going
... many of our wards simply do not have
accessible locations, as you know, Director.
Do we face any penalty when you have no options that are accessible?
Are we given waivers of some variety?
Or what are our options when
achieving accessibility in a precinct is not possible?
So we are in the process of finalizing the DOJ settlement.
It's going to include ongoing monitoring, but there's no
penalty. It's not like there's a money penalty.
But
one of the things we're negotiating is a curbside option.
And another thing that we're negotiating, of course, is
adding to the accessible early voting sites, which now we're allowed to keep open
on election day as vote centers.
The DOJ is currently
assessing, so we've already got one in every ward, and that might actually
qualify for their requirements, but maybe not.
We already have statutory pre-existing
in-person voting for people with physical disabilities who cannot enter the
building,
but it's slightly different than what the Department of Justice is talking
about. So we're nailing that down as we speak.
So there's no waiver option?
Well, no. The DOJ will not waive the Americans with
Disabilities Act. So-
If you have no...
So forgive me, Chairman, but
if you have a precinct
and there's not a single place that is accessible for a polling place,
that impacts this,
correct?
They've made it clear that they're not going to tell us we just can't vote in that
precinct, but they are going to require, perhaps it's going
to be a more robust curbside voting system.
Perhaps it will be,
I suppose one waiver could be
putting that precinct into one of the vote centers,
early voting sites.
I understand not waiving the ADA, but I think that reality has to set in at some
point because these precincts in many neighborhoods simply do not
have any accessible options. And we've looked, we've tried-
Yeah
... and as you all know. So I think that that has to be something that we take into
account
in order to get out from under this decree. Thank you.
Are you good?
I mean, if you've got another way.
Sure. I'll put you on the list for a follow-up.
Chair Taylor, then
Alderman Vasquez, and Alderman Quinn.
Taylor?
Can you tell me how you all coordinate with committeemen?
Committeemen are coordinated through
emails, phone,
through our judges' department,
recall,
and some office visits as well.
So you all are actually talking to committeemen about all of the issues that
they're having
in their polling places?
No. If it's not brought to our attention, we're not.
But you're just talking about communicating with the committee persons,
that's the way we communicate with them.
If they have certain issues,
they bring them to our attention, and if it's brought to our attention,
we
work on it. We try to solve whatever that issue is.
How many super polling places do we have?
Say super polling places?
Places where you can early vote and register.
Well, all.
All the-
Polling places.
Pardon me?
I'm talking about for early voting.
All.
Every early voting site,
you can register on-site.
How many early voting sites do we have?
We have 52.
Who is responsible for feeding judges?
The board is not.
The board is not responsible for feeding judges.
One of the responsibilities of the committee persons are to help
us get judges.
Okay?
Sometimes we're successful, and there's a lot of times we're not.
Thank you, Chair. I'll send the rest of my questions to you.
Okay. We'll get the rest to the Chair. Thank you, Chair Taylor. Alderman Vasquez.
Thank you very much. I appreciate the love for our committee folks, because I share
the same. We got folks out here that are doing a whole bunch of work.
They don't have any budget at all. And so trying to figure out how we get more
people engaged and to know what's going on
would be immensely helpful.
Along the same line, I'm not asking for food money here, so we're okay.
When does precincts change, when there's new polling locations?
We've had situations where a lot of our constituents have no idea it's
been changed. They go to one, they get moved to another.
And to rely on one person in a ward to help to get the word out through
volunteers is going to be a bit imprecise.
So I'm curious what other communications the board does in
instances where the actual polling location has changed, to make sure
folks know that it's changed well in advance and can plan.
If a polling place has changed in advance of the election,
we
send something through the mail or we post at
the old polling place letting the voters know where the new polling place
is.
So the challenge there, I'd say, is then they don't find
out until they actually go vote, right?
So you're leaving work or you're coming back from work, you go to the place, you
find out you can't go there. You go to the new place that has a line.
And so I think that
isn't necessarily the most effective way. I do appreciate that there's mailing.
But is there any
part in the budget for door hangers or anything that's similar, you can just let
folks know?
Max Bever with the board.
We do have multiple mailings, and we will email where possible, especially
if it is a last-minute polling place change.
That was something that happened for the primary election where there was a fire in
one location that had to be changed
just the
hours before, day before.
I think we struggle, like any other government agency, with amount of
staff to serve 1.5 million registered voters.
I think if this is something that we could work on in coordination with both
aldermanic and community people's offices, especially providing
what a door hanger would look like or additional information, that is something
we'd be open to collaborate on. We could use help in
communicating these polling place changes.
Wherever possible, we do try to drive people to our website to always double-check
their polling place information beforehand.
And there is that household mailer that generally reaches voters' mailboxes
three to two weeks that has their polling place information, their closest early
voting sites.
And I think what has been successful, and we see this raise year after year, and we
saw over 31,000 people use the vote centers, our early voting sites that are
open on election day. So we've been able to continue to
work to decrease provisional ballots or confused voters by sending
them to the vote centers on election day. Increasingly popular option.
Okay. Yeah, I would love that because I think headcount's obviously a thing that's
I imagine it's not going to be feasible to help out as far as that, but we have
people, we have staff in our offices, we have volunteers, that if we had the door
hangers and stuff like that, we would work extra to get that out.
So I think if we could follow up to maybe have some of that conversation, that'd be
great. And then lastly,
one, I appreciate the shout-out to ranked choice voting, as far as what's happening
legislatively. I know we talk a lot about logistics here, but part of the question
I've got related to vision, right?
We've got a number of colleagues who are in support of fair elections, which are
publicly financed campaigns. We know the Department of Finance would be the
one to talk through some of that, but they're not going to necessarily focus on the
election part. And I think when we have a Board of Elections, people to speak to
how these other models could- ... do where they have been successful.
Do you all do any of that work to communicate to members of the council to say,
"Hey, we recognize in other cities, here's what's being done with these other
ways to vote that Chicago would benefit from"?
So it's more of a policy question. Does the Board of Elections get involved and
communicate
often to us about that kind of stuff?
We can certainly do more. This is Max Bever again.
We do this work in Springfield, and we're often invited to give
testimony. The executive director gave testimony for the Ranked Choice Voting
Task Force. I think a lot of the different voting styles,
online, ranked-choice voting, are being looked at by those task forces in
Springfield right now. Ultimately, the message that we want to share is
that there are a lot of upfront costs, especially with
that big of a change. And it wouldn't just be us, because this would be a statewide
change. They heard a lot of feedback from smaller jurisdictions and other
clerks recorders about what that change would undertake.
Sure.
A lot of what we would focus on is Chicago's non-English language
communities, voters with disabilities,
different ethnicities across the city, make sure that we're doing that direct
outreach and education if there was a change to a voting style.
So along that front, if you
don't already, if you could provide ways that we could optimize things.
To your point, how to make it better for accessibility, better for language as
well, but then also
when you're testifying over to the state,
we don't really get a sense of this stuff until once a year when we're asking the
questions. But maybe some kind of one-pager or something to us to let us know,
"Hey, here's what they asked in Springfield, here's what we responded, here's what
we think works," would be really helpful to understand the value.
Because I think part of the reason why you're seeing so much about consolidation is
it appears to us to be only logistics and not necessarily these other pieces.
That if we understood more what the benefit and value is, we might view it
differently. So, that's all I've got, and thank you, Chairwoman.
Thank you. Alderman Quinn.
Chair.
It's been noted a couple of times today about
raising the population by precinct was a Springfield
bill.
And the question I have for the board is, did the board take an official position
on that bill?
Our position was to follow what the bill-
How did the board testify? Did the board fill out a witness slip?
No.
We didn't.
Okay. And so just so I'm clear, there's a piece of legislation in
Springfield that said
the legislature was going to elevate the number
of
residents per precinct by as many as 1,800, and the board didn't offer any
opinions.
So if I pull the witness slip on that bill, the
Chicago Board of Elections will not be on it.
That is correct.
Much of the-- So frequently with the state legislation, this is Adam Lasker.
Frequently, the legislature does election legislation through omnibus bills, that
it happens very quickly. And I believe that this change was one of those, where
there was no advance notice of it. They have a bill pending that's a
shell bill, and they can sometimes literally within 24 to 48 hours, it
just-
I'm aware. That's not the question, Adam.
The question is, did the Chicago Board of Elections offer an opinion one way or the
other?
No, I think the answer to that is a no.
The answer is no.
Moving forward, I don't think it's unreasonable that when
situations like that occur or opinions are
developing in Springfield, that this body is notified,
sort of building on what Alderman Vasquez was saying.
Because those changes have impacts, and they have blind spots.
So that's the point I'm making.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Alderman Quinn. Alderwoman Hadden.
Thank you, Chair.
Is there for places that volunteer as polling places,
so for locations, whether they be public or private, that act as
polling locations on election day, are they compensated for
being
polling places?
Yes, they are.
What is that compensation?
Or how much?
Brandon Pickens here.
For our private locations, we pay $250 for the first
precinct, and for every additional precinct, it's $150.
Okay, and the public locations don't receive any compensation?
Just private locations. And for public,
per the election code, we have the right to use those facilities at no
pay, no cost.
If you guys can, through the chair, could you give us a list of
every, let's say for the last election.
So for this last election, every private
polling place that is not accessible,
right? And this gets to the questions from my colleague there.
We need accessible polling locations.
Alderman Lopez is right. There are a lot of communities that don't have accessible
locations. I mean, hell, a lot of our aldermanic offices
have a difficult time finding locations that are accessible.
But I think for our elections, what I'd like to see is the list of these
locations. And maybe you can provide them if they've changed, maybe for the
most previous election cycle as well.
Only if they've changed, right? So hey, what are the polling places
by ward, by precinct that are currently
not meeting accessibility
by the Americans with Disabilities Act?
And I think what we should be doing, and this is something that
maybe we can bring to our Department of Development as well, is to assess
how much it would cost to make them accessible.
And on private spaces, perhaps this is a bond project.
Our citizens deserve Accessible voting
locations. $250 is not a lot of
compensation. Our elections rely on
access to these spaces, and as we think about the way we want to use
our bond funds to make private investments and
improve our neighborhoods, I think about some of the restaurants and places
that act as polling locations.
I think it would be beneficial for that business, and a great thank you
and incentive,
but also, of course, making our elections accessible.
So if you guys can provide us with the information on locations, perhaps we can
continue a conversation with our other departments about what it would
take to assess
what the accessibility is. So if you have that information, I know you don't have
costs, but
hey, is it the doorway? Is it one doorway?
But that type of information could go a long way in helping us to maybe
do something different.
Max Bever.
We do have our full accessibility tier list on our website.
We will provide that through the chair.
That is something that we are providing ahead of every election.
Currently, our accessibility tiers are high, which is fully ADA
accessible, medium, where a temporary fix happens on election day,
such as a ramp or a cone, and then low to no.
Thankfully, looking at the numbers, we have zero private locations
that are low to no.
Where we do have
that is our public buildings. And so we will provide those
numbers through the chair.
Fantastic. Thank you. Thanks, Chair. Thank you.
And one final question from Chair Viegas.
He's not here right now, but can you tell me if
the Chicago Board of Elections falls under the city's MBE
ordinance,
Minority Business Enterprise.
Can somebody tell us that?
Abide by it, but do we fall under it?
We abide by it.
Do we fall up under it?
I have to look into that. But we abide by it, and we try to abide by that.
Okay.
So Adam Lasser again.
Oh, I-
Executive Director Holiday said that they abide by it,
but I think someone else is going to try to answer whether or not they fall under
the ordinance, because that's-
Right. So technically, as a non-city agency, as an extension of the circuit court,
we're not bound by the ordinance, but we do everything we can to
abide with it.
To follow it.
And it's expressly written into our RFP requests
and so forth and so on. It's a part of our procurement-
Okay
... process.
Thank you.
And as we're winding down, because I didn't really ask very many questions, I
wanted to say personal thanks to all of you and all of the
folks that work the elections as well.
In particular, Jane Lau always does a phenomenal job for us
with the really large group of
non-native English speakers. She's worked very hard in our
community, and is always available to us when we're looking for
assistance. And we continue to see increases in Cantonese and
Mandarin speakers
in our polling places, so I really want to applaud the efforts, as I'm sure there's
the same efforts that are being put into other precincts across the city where
there are non-native English speakers.
So I do appreciate all of the work that's being done to ensure that those issues
are being addressed. So we'll look forward to a maybe
future hearing about a couple of the issues that we talked about here today.
But with that, I want to thank you all for being here today.
And the committee's going to stand at ease while we transition to our next
department. Oh, sorry. Oh, we're breaking for lunch. Okay.
We will return at 1:00.
Oh, sorry. Alderman Rodriguez, who's at Alderman Vasquez's seat, can you turn
his mic on, please?
Yeah, I just want to say, we've got tamales over there, and it's
from
Tamales de la Tía. They were the ones robbed at gunpoint
six weeks ago at 3:30 in the morning, a wife and husband.
They couldn't make it, but their menus are there, so feel free to enjoy and
feel free to order from them afterwards.
Thank you.
Again,
our next department's going to be Human Resources, starting promptly at 1:00.
Thanks,
everybody.
No, I know. I just want to make sure that it's the same.
It's that one.
Because the master was turned on?
I just want to make sure.
One, two. One, two. One, two. Test, test. One, two. One, two.
Test, test.
Make sure.
Okay.
Yeah, make sure.
I'm going to send you an email.
The resolution or whatever it is, and then we'll make sure to get back.
Yeah, all right.
Good afternoon. Committee on Budget and Government
Operations will come back to order.
We're here
now with the Department of Human Resources.
We've been joined by Commissioner Blakemore and her
team. We're going to have a brief
overview by
COFA, followed by introductions from Commissioner
Blakemore and the rest of her
team that is here in the well, and as well as those that are in the
box. And then
she'll give her opening statement, and then we'll go into questions.
We have Dan Fristrom from
Council Office of Financial Analysis. Please proceed.
Thank you, Chairman. My name is Daniel Fristrom with the Council Office
of Financial Analysis. And next up we have department
033, that is the Department of Human Resources.
The FY25 recommended proposed budget is
13.49 million, or
0.48% higher than FY24 at
13.43 million. The FY25
recommended FTEs is 123 compared to
134 for FY24 revised,
a reduction of 11 FTEs in FY
2025.
The department is 85.4% corporate funded,
and the personnel costs are 12.53 million, and
non-personnel costs are
968,600. Thank you.
Commissioner.
Good afternoon. My name is Sandra Blakemore.
I'm the Commissioner of the Department of Human Resources.
With me today is my First Deputy, Katie Doyle.
Also on the dais with me is my Managing Deputy of Strategic
Planning and Administration, Raquel Rodriguez-Northern.
And in the box from the right is Carmen Rocha,
Deputy of Finance & Administration,
Jill May, Director of Testing and Selection
Methodology,
Kelly Steptoe Royston, Director of Workforce
Development,
Judith Marrs, Deputy of Compliance,
Judith Martinez, Deputy of Employment Services,
and Alex Meza, Deputy of Information Services.
Good afternoon, Chairman Irvin, Vice Chair Lee, and members of the City
Council.
I'm Sandra Blakemore, I'm the Commissioner of the Department of Human Resources.
Thank you for allowing me to join you today to present and discuss the
2025 budget requests for the Department of Human Resources.
The mission for the Department of Human Resources is to provide an inclusive
and equitable employment process and work environment for
our over 31,000 city employees.
DHR collaborates with 44 local unions who represent
90% of our employees. DHR is a partner to the city's
operating departments in hiring, labor relations,
training, and employment policies.
The Department of Human Resources is composed of four divisions,
employment services, compliance, strategic planning
and administration, and policy and labor relations.
We have a diverse staff composed of 52% Black,
20% Hispanic, 24% white, and
4% Asian employees.
DHR's Employment Services division works together with departments
in hiring talent for city's operations.
The Department of Human Resources recruiters promote city employment at
community job fairs, screen applications, and
create referral lists for departments.
DHR's Employment Services division has screened and processed
162,394 applications
year to date through October.
In partnership with operating departments, DHR hired
4,424 employees
2004 year to date October.
Our compliance division oversees the Disability Office and the
Equal Employment Opportunity office.
We have strengthened our capabilities in the Disability Office with a new
disability officer and increased staffing.
The Disability Office has managed 1,037 accommodation
requests this year.
Our EEO division investigated 147
complaints in
2004 year to date through October.
In 2024, DHR instituted
mandatory EEO training to For
all city employees. By November 15th,
all city employees would've had this EEO training.
Our strategic planning and administration division oversees the
department's budget, information services, workforce
development, and training.
The workforce development section partners with city departments to create
new on-ramps for city employment.
In partnership with the Department of Streets and Sanitation, La Juna
1001,
CPS, and DHR, the city launched the Laborers
Training Program this summer.
This 12-week program gave 70 recent CPS
graduates work experience and union bidder rights as a
laborer.
55 went on to become full-time laborers for the City of
Chicago.
Our training section launched the first citywide
employee performance management program, which provides
departments with the tools and support for employee performance
reviews. We also developed a new onboarding training to provide
a stronger new employee orientation.
The Policy and Labor Relations division provides guidance to departments on
labor issues, the city's personnel rules, and operating
policy. This year, our labor relations division worked with
AFSCME to consolidate 22 administrative titles into
nine titles. This effort enables DHR to hire
titles faster through universal postings.
DHR focused on four key strategies for 2024:
fix the DHR foundation, attack vacancies,
elevate external communications, and drive workforce development.
In fixing DHR's foundation, we fill key
vacancies with a particular focus on critical positions in
employment services, the EEO office, and disability office.
Our strategy of having recruiters work across multiple departments
resulted in a doubling of capacity.
In January 2024, our capacity was 111
titles per month, and for 2025, we will be at the
capacity of 296 titles per month.
In partnership with departments, we reduced unnecessary employment
testing. In 2024, we cut 20% of tests.
DHR also moved key job titles to end interview
assessments to reduce the time to hire.
Our 2025 testing reduction target is 30%.
DHR elevated our external communications this year with the
launch of the weekly City Jobs Flash.
This compilation of job postings was sent out to every ward office
and other key stakeholders. The Job Flash had direct links
to making applying to jobs easier.
Our DHR recruiters attended over 35 job fairs and community
events to raise the awareness of city employment.
DHR's 2025 budget proposal is 13.5 million.
The majority of the budget is in personnel costs for employment services and
compliance. Our non-personnel spending has funds targeted
for administrative operations, testing expenses, and the
human resource board.
DHR is committed to delivering the highest quality of services to city
departments and the citizens of Chicago.
I would like to thank the city council and city departments for their ongoing
partnership in these efforts. I would also like to thank our employees
for being diligent partners for city departments.
Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement.
My staff and I are pleased to answer any questions that you or the members of the
city council may have on our presented budget.
Thank you, Commissioner. I want to open, there's been a lot
in the news as of recent in relation to the department, a couple of items.
One is on a Do Not Hire list. You could walk us through your
process there and how does one make it there, how does one make it off,
or
what mechanisms are utilized in that?
And then there's also, more recently, cases relates
to
sexual harassment and processes there, too, on how
those matters are handled by the department.
So if you can elaborate on those two things, and afterwards we'll go to
Chairman O'Shea for first questions.
Yes. I'll start first with your question on the Do Not Hire list.
One of the first things that I did when I got into the seat as the DHR
commissioner this year was to rewrite the
ineligible for rehire policy.
I put in place a requirement that department
heads must write a memo that details the
personnel rule violation that got the person
terminated and put on the Do Not Hire list.
By having this documentation, it should reduce any
capricious use of the Do Not Hire list.
And department commissioners make the decision
to put their employees on the Do Not Hire list.
DHR administers the list in terms of being
responsible for the information system that holds this
data.
So you all don't make a determination as to who is
or is not placed on that list?
Correct.
Okay.
That is the responsibility and accountability of the department
head to make that decision. Therefore, I
require from every department head, when someone is
terminated, a memo detailing the personnel
rule infraction
that
resulted in the former employee being placed on the Do Not
Hire list. I do not have the authority to change
the recommendation of the department commissioner.
But there's also a method by which one can
appeal
the decision by whomever the, as you state, the department head
that makes that decision. How does that process play out,
and who actually makes that determination if one is to be
removed from the list, if they are, in fact, appealing that
decision by the department head?
Yes. For the appeals process, a former employee
would write a memo to me as the DHR
commissioner stating
their request for an appeal and what has
changed in terms of correcting the
violation that got them terminated from the City of Chicago.
And then is that in your sole discretion, the ability to
remove a person from the Do Not Hire list, or is that something that goes to the
human resources board, or who makes that determination?
It's at the sole discretion of the Department of Human Resources commissioner.
Okay.
And the other point was in relation to sexual
harassment and
processes
thereto. Ironically, I was in
training over at ethics this morning, was why I wasn't here, and
that issue continues to pop up in, I guess, the
trainings that we've done,
everyone, I believe, has done.
What enhancements or what
other things you think need to be put in place to, I guess,
effectively root out or effectively discipline
individuals who engage in those practices?
Yes. For sexual harassment, which is covered under the Equal
Employment Opportunity policy,
the city actually requires all employees to take three
training courses on sexual harassment.
We have the required state of Illinois sexual harassment training course,
as well as two City of Chicago training courses, one for
general employees and an additional training course for
city supervisors.
And in terms of additional work that was done this year,
again, I made EEO training a
requirement for all 32,000 city employees.
Prior to that, it was up to departments to decide if they
wanted their teams trained on EEO.
Seeing this as an opportunity to build a better culture, I made the
training mandatory.
All right, thank you. Are you responsible also for that two-and-a-half-hour
cyber
course?
No, I am not responsible for... That's the Department of
Technology and Innovation.
Okay. All right.
Okay.
We'll leave you alone then because that one was-
Thank you
... that was like 30 modules of- ... trying to figure that one out.
All right, Alderman O'Shea, followed by Alderman Lopez.
Thank you, Chairman.
Good afternoon, Commissioner.
Good afternoon.
I'd like to start out by
saying that I'm a big fan of yours and the work you've done in your leadership
positions in city government,
and I'm happy that you're where you're at.
Thank you.
I'd like to kind of follow the
line of questions my colleague, Chairman Ervin, started with
pertaining to our policies,
and I just want to get it out there.
The history of the former communications director
during his 17-month tenure here
is extremely disturbing to me.
As a father having two daughters,
to know that in a professional workplace, they would've
experienced anything of what these three documented
cases of young staffers, dedicated city employees
experienced when we talk about things like sexual harassment,
misogyny, racism, homophobia,
antisemitism.
In that particular case,
where did we fail as a city?
Alderman O'Shea,
I legally cannot talk about any specific
employee case. I'm happy to talk to you about
this Department of Human Resources policies and practices if that's
helpful.
Do we believe
that
the proper channels
could've been skirted by any respective department?
I can start and
walk you through how a complaint would be handled at the city's human resource
department.
Please. Thank you.
Sure.
If an employee comes to
our EEO office with a complaint,
the EEO investigator would review the case
and perform an investigation.
The EEO investigator, and our investigators are attorneys,
would put together a summary and a report and
provide that information to the operating
department's head.
With that information is included a recommendation
from the EEO office on discipline.
And also, a timeline is in this
information, which requires the operating
department to get back to EEO on what
action was done.
And I just want to make it clear that from Personnel Rule
18, Section 1 Department heads are
responsible for the discipline in their departments.
We have a decentralized model of government which
creates
power in each department through that department head.
I don't have the authority to discipline employees
who are not in the Department of Human Resources.
What we do is provide... We have the
EEO office, which provides the investigations, makes a
disciplinary recommendation, and then looks at the
follow-up from the departments. But we have no authority to
overturn what departments do in terms of their discipline.
I think moving forward, I would like to see a situation where yourself,
possibly the inspector general,
my colleague,
Chairman Martin,
could put together a group to sit down to identify
what can we do
to make sure that
a
situation like that never, ever happens again.
The media's reported that the individuals involved, the victims here,
have all had their names removed from the Do Not Hire list.
Is that correct?
Again, I
don't really want to speak to specific cases.
But
I'll have to leave it at that. I can't speak to specific cases.
In closing, I think that Ronnie Reese
should be on the Do Not Hire list, and I think our city owes those
victims a big apology.
I appreciate your leadership. Thank you.
Thank you, Chairman O'Shea.
Alderman Lopez,
followed by Vice Chair Lee.
Thank you, Chairman, and good afternoon, members of the
committee. Good afternoon, Commissioner, and everyone that's here.
Good afternoon.
A lot of our departments have been asked to tighten the belt.
Was yours asked by this administration to tighten up?
Absolutely. As with any other city department,
everyone has to work to solve this budget
deficit.
So when I look at the personnel services for your department from the corporate
fund, we actually see it going up by $200,000 roughly.
Where was the tightening in this department?
I cut 11 positions, and that was 9% of the
positions, and this is a small department.
We had 134 positions in 2024. I made
the necessary cuts to help fill the budget gap.
And were those positions vacant, or were they occupied positions?
They were vacant. No one has lost their jobs.
So when we see that, as
COFA says that there's a 25% vacancy rate,
is that the entirety of those positions that you eliminated, or is that
vacancy on top of those that were eliminated?
We have additional vacancies-
Okay
... in addition to the cuts that were made.
And those positions, when we look at those cuts,
despite those cuts, we still have $200,000
above last year, with an additional $160,000
in raises and salary adjustments for this year. Correct?
Yes, our budget has-
Okay
... gone up slightly.
Okay. And
by slightly-
But again,
if I may-
Excuse me, Commissioner. I only have five minutes, so.
Okay.
As we look at some of the adjustments with respect to your
position
and some of the issues that we've been hearing about,
and
your raise accounts for 18% of that adjustment.
If I may clarify,
I did not get a raise. I want to make sure everybody in this
room and outside know that that 2024
number was a placeholder. That was for a former...
They didn't know I was even going to be commissioner in 2024.
My salary that I earned came over with me from
2FM. There's no way I got a... I did not get a raise of
$30,000. Please understand that I would not be getting that.
So
in 2025, your salary is
$201,000, correct?
Yes.
Okay.
But that number in 2024 was not my salary, and I
did not get a $30,000 raise. So please understand that.
That was the cost of the
commissioner previous to you.
That was a placeholder that OBM put in.
Well, no. That was the pay of the commissioner before you. Okay.
I'm just trying to understand that part of it.
With regards to the Do Not Hire list,
understanding that you don't want to talk about specifics, let's talk in
generalities. When individuals are let go from the City of Chicago, are you putting
individuals on the Do Not Hire list?
I, as the commissioner of the Department of Human Resources, do not put
individuals on the list. The head of operating departments
makes that decision.
Well, actually, they make a recommendation, and you are the-
I'm sorry, I couldn't hear that.
They make recommendations, and you have the final say, correct?
No, that's not correct.
Are you sure?
Yes, I am.
Okay. I just want to make sure that we're-
I rewrote the policy, so I'm sure of the policy.
Well, I know the law, and it's against the city law to misrepresent or
lie to the city council, which is why I'm asking this question very specifically.
Oh, come on. Come on.
I-
Let's not go there, please. Please.
Well-
Let's keep it
saying.
I am.
Okay.
And if the commissioner wants to get combative on the issue, so be it, but I'm just
having a very con-
Look, the questions have been asked and answered as it relates to-
No, they were very specific questions.
I heard them
... the question-
I'm talking in generalities
... the question related to who puts
individuals on the Do Not Hire list has been asked and answered, as well
as who has the ability to hear appeals on
those items. So let's please move on to something else.
Okay.
Who's responsible for background checks for our
employment applications, Commissioner?
DHR staff does background checks for city
employment candidates, with the exception of public safety.
They perform their own background checks, and Shackman
Exempt background checks are performed by the mayor's office.
So
is that through a contracted entity, through employees who are specific to
that service, or how is that accomplished?
DHR employees.
And where is that in the
budget?
It's the onboarding specialist.
So one individual?
No, we have several.
So in the budget-
13.
I'm sorry?
There are 13 onboarding specialists
across multiple funds.
So when we have issues where we have
employment opportunities that take six to eight months to clear background,
who's responsible for that inability to clear them in a prompt manner?
I'm not aware of that number that you're quoting.
You're not aware that it takes six to eight months to onboard someone if a position
is posted?
I think you have to give me more information to answer the question correctly.
Okay. Round two, please.
So,
to the alderman's point,
there does seem to be an extremely long time period
for people to make it through the employment process.
So maybe if you could help us to understand where
the time lapses occur, because we have historically
heard that, well, it's DHR that
is kind of dragging the process on bringing new people in.
So are there specific choke points in the process
where we're experiencing a longer amount of time
in getting someone through the hiring process?
Because we've heard this from multiple departments that it just takes a long time
to hire people. And that's...
Go ahead.
Just a clarification-
Go ahead
... and the commissioner can tell me if I'm wrong or not.
Many a times it's not the commissioner's fault.
For example, they may be reaching out to employer to get some background check
on somebody. If that employer takes two months to respond back with
information, they can't clear them right away.
So that's just one example of many a times it's not HR's fault.
In their background checks, they count on information from other
jobs, other agencies, or whatever.
Well, if that's a choke point in the process, then I think that it's fair
for that to be known that it's not necessarily a DHR issue-
Right
... and maybe an external issue, which is why
we asked the question.
If John Smith applies for a job and he worked at UPS-
Let her-
... and UPS takes two months to give him the information, then he's in limbo for
two months.
Still, let her answer that then. Okay, go ahead.
Thank you. When we looked at the time to hire from
job posting to getting a candidate in a seat for
2024, on average it was 103 days.
And the way we calculated this was looking at every hiring sequence
requisition and calculating the time.
And just so you know, we have to do this all via spreadsheets
and
tracking down people because there's not a system to do this for us.
And hopefully in the future, we will have an information system that can
slice and dice and give this information
at the drop of a hand. When we compared the
2023 time to hire, it was 155 days. So
we are seeing improvements. We always want to do better,
but we are seeing good improvements this year.
And if I may, I'd like to talk about some of the improvements that we've put in
place to accelerate hiring. First, as I said in my opening,
we've reduced testing. Testing was a choke hold.
It takes six to eight weeks to do a test.
Now we're doing more in-interview assessments, as well
as helping departments formulate better interview
questions so they aren't dependent on a test.
Second, we are partnering with departments to do universal job
postings
for hoisting engineers, electrical mechanics, painters.
We worked very hard with the infrastructure departments because they share a lot of
the same titles. And so by having those, being able
to post one painter position that could be used by five
departments, again, that speeds up the process.
And then within DHR, by not having our recruiters
tied to a specific department, we can flex
capacity. We have recruiters working across multiple departments
rather than tied to a specific department.
The point that Alderman Sposato brings about background
checks,
has that been a hold-up in your process and time to
hire or is that even included in your time to hire process?
No, that's included in the time to hire because we're measuring from the date the
job posting went up, and we can see that in Taleo, to the time that
person is coming into the door.
Okay. So from 155 days to 103 days.
Yes.
Okay. All right.
Round two for
Lopez, Vice Chair Lee, followed by Alderman
Dowell.
Thank you, Chairman, and good afternoon, Commissioner.
Good afternoon.
Just to go back to something you said earlier about the
background checks that are done.
I think you mentioned three different sort of lanes, right?
So you do some in HR, the police department does their own, and did you say that
the mayor's office does their own?
The Shackman Exempt.
The Shackman Exempt ones. Are there standards for vetting
that are consistent throughout, even if you're not the one that is executing on the
vet itself?
For the background checks that DHR does, we follow
the background check policy that was implemented in February of
2023, in which
upon a conditional job offer, we
look at any prior convictions only back five
years, because we want to be a fair chance hire
to return citizens. So we only check convictions back
five years. We do not check any type of arrests.
We also check your standard
employment verifications as well as your educational
credential verifications.
Is there any social media that is checked as well?
Do we do any of that from the general vetting perspective
for any
posts that are inappropriate for conduct on becoming a city worker, if you will,
or anything that would have violated an existing-
Not at this time, and that's something that we'd have to really understand the
legalities and
with social media, it's so fraught with
just the veracity of what you're seeing online.
Oh, I get that. Okay. So with the Shakman exempt
positions, there's not currently
a similar sort of
rubric, if you will, that is extended to that.
You're not the one doing the vet, so do you have any line of sight into what that
vetting looks like at all?
We're not responsible for that vetting, so I would let that office
discuss that.
Do you think that we should have consistent vetting practices across the city?
I think, and again, they might be different for public
safety. But again, I think the foundation should be
consistent.
Okay. Thank you for that.
I'm going to ask a quick question. I don't know if you have this information or if
you can provide it through the chair.
Does DHR track at all
the number of times we lose hires in the process?
If an offer was extended and through the process of whatever the
final vetting piece of it or getting everybody cleared through
HR is, how many people do we lose in that process?
Because I'd love to understand how many people we lose and what job categories do
they generally fall in.
We have to rely on departments for that information, and again, we
don't have an information system that readily tracks that.
Someone would have to be keeping it on an Excel sheet.
Is DHR looking to improve technology on that front?
Yes. We're working with Department of Technology and Innovation and other
departments on
looking at the enterprise resource planning systems.
Got you. Okay.
You started to walk us through earlier just what
the process is for a city worker who
is reporting workplace harassment.
I think you said they come into your office, it's investigated.
I'm interested in post that piece of it.
What should they do if they experience retaliation?
They can come back to the Department of Human Resources because, again,
we want every employee to feel
secure in reporting any type of harassment or discrimination
at the city.
Got it.
I know you said you rewrote some of the processes and policies.
Just because I'm not clear on the timing of everything, have any of those
process changes taken place
since the incident that's been reported
with the former communications director?
Have we made any policy changes since then?
I'm not asking specifically about his case.
I'm asking, have we made any changes since then?
I can tell you with the
ineligible for rehire update that I did, that was May
5th this year, 2024.
You also mentioned that-- I'm going to finish this, and I don't think that I'm
going to need a round two, but I'm going to hold that.
Department heads are responsible for their own discipline.
Do you feel like this decentralized model is an effective one?
I won't make an off-the-cuff answer on something that would require
deeper strategic-
Sure
... thought and collaboration between DHR and
departments. So,
I think it warrants a deeper discussion.
I'll agree with you that I think it warrants a much deeper discussion.
Just learning that we don't have a more centralized model leads me to believe
that depending on what department you work in, certain things are tolerated and
others are not. And I think that's very problematic, because every city worker
deserves to be treated the same and equally in terms of the protections that
they're afforded and the consequences that people are held to.
So I would love to participate in that conversation, or I want to make
sure that we are actually having that conversation because the fact that we don't
have more consistent policies on consequences for these actions,
I think does an injustice to everybody at the end of the day.
I'll take a round two, sure.
Very well. Thank you. Sure, go ahead.
I just wanted to let you know that as a part of the 2025 budget,
I have put in for a policy deputy. We
did not have that at DHR to have someone focused on
being able to just update our personnel rules, hiring plan,
other employment policies. So I have that funded in the
2025 budget.
I think that's a very important role. Thank you.
And to your point, I think that between
if you would like to, I think it might make sense to
introduce some piece of legislation into Chairman Rodriguez's
committee. It is kind of unusual for an organization our
size that we don't have consistent discipline, which has been something that we've
talked about not only in public safety, but I think across the board because it not
only represents a
... a employment risk, but it also represents a financial risk that we continue
to deal with, and a reputational risk as it relates to
how employees feel that they're being treated or not being treated in a fair
manner. So that may be a subject for a
conversation in the Committee on Workforce Development. So, okay.
We'll have Chairman Dowell followed by Alderman Ramirez.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good afternoon, Commissioner.
Good afternoon.
I just wanted to say that you're a breath of fresh
air in that seat, and I know that you're a hard
worker, so I appreciate all the changes that
you're trying to implement
in the department.
I wanted to follow up on the questions regarding the slow
hiring process, and one of the first steps, I think, are
when people have to use the Taleo
online
portal.
And that portal, to me, seems to be very
complicated. It's opaque. It doesn't connect to
Google. It's
not user-friendly. So I'm wondering
what you think it would take, and how much do you think it would cost to improve
that system?
I really think that we would need a new system.
Taleo is probably about 15 years
old and Oracle-based system, and that's why with the work
with DTI and the enterprise resource system,
that could be a better opportunity.
I don't think putting more money into Taleo...
With IT, 15 years can be ancient.
So this is already something that's on your priority list.
Okay, cool.
Through this budget hearing, I've
learned a lot about the PSA.
And I was wondering, I don't expect an answer here, but
I would like to get, through the chair,
a high level analysis of what it would take
for HR to take over the
responsibilities of PSA
through the chair.
So I'll make that request.
Yes, Alderman, we'll get you that through the chair.
Great.
Okay. Third question
I have is that we have a population that's
shrinking
in the city, and I think that our government needs to
shrink as well. And have you done any kind
of
citywide staffing analysis? Is that something that
could be on your agenda?
I think it's something... We don't have any, and I have not
seen any history of prior staffing
efficiency analyses, but I think that for any organization,
you have to look at your staffing models to
understand how they relate to your organization's needs.
Are you thinking about asking for funding to do
that, or is this something that's on your radar?
It's on my radar. I would have to work with the departments,
because the departments,
those are their positions, and they know
what they need in order to achieve their
objectives. But I think I would recommend starting with
a few departments as opposed to trying to do it across every
department and 32,000 staff.
Do you have recommendations on departments that you would
select first?
I think, again,
I defer to the commissioners to
really be
the owners of their departments. But I think there's an opportunity for
the city to look at how we're staffing the public health
department, because it has been a challenge with grant-funded
positions.
And I think we need to look at,
okay, we've created some
new departments.
Are they performing as needed, or do we need to look at
changing it back to what it was before?
I
was the commissioner of AIS when we had 2FM and
DTI, and I think both departments are in a better place now
with being separated back.
All right.
Are you involved at all with the
staffing analysis that the police
department's about to do?
I'm not directly involved, but I know that they would be working with my employment
services team, and we've worked with
police on both their sworn hiring and their civilian
hiring.
Do you have someone from your employment services team that could confirm
for me that
your department is involved in that
CPD study?
Katie Doyle, first deputy.
We are not currently involved in an outside
process with the Department of Police that I'm aware of.
We are not currently a part of any-
Well, I know it's being done by a
company outside of the department, but-
Are you speaking in regard to
they had a third party that they were going to be working with
AgileOne who was going to be doing some of their hiring for them?
Is that-
No, it's not AgileOne. I can't remember the name of the
company. Maybe somebody else here can remember.
Alderman O'Shea, do you remember?
No, that was Matt Martin was working on that.
Yeah.
It was a quasi-public private effort that was happening.
So we'll get that-
Yeah, I just want to know through the chair, I'd like to make sure that the
connections are made between HR and
CPD and PSA so that the information
that finally comes out of that report is
the best that we can get for the money that we're paying.
Lastly, do you have a lawyer on your...
Do you have a lawyer?
No, I don't have anyone that functions as a attorney for the department.
Do you find that
HR departments in corporations, do they have
their own lawyer?
Yes, and I think it's helpful to have that
resource.
Okay.
Thank you very much, Ms. Chair.
Thank you.
Thank you, Chair.
Sounds like I'm going to create some more work for Chairman Rodriguez here
in relation to PSA.
No, and I know you were going there, so like I said,
expect some
legislation along those lines for
PSA's effectiveness or how we want to
look at that, as it's ironic we've got
public safety was what, half the positions of the
city, and theoretically you don't touch half the positions in the
city.
They're managed
internally,
which therefore we have all these inconsistencies in policies and
applications.
But again, it sounds like Chairman Dowell wants to address that, so
I'm assuming that there'll be a piece of legislation headed to
Chairman Rodriguez's committee on that. So, all right.
Next up we have Alderman Ramirez, followed by Alderman Hatton.
Hello. Good afternoon, Commissioner-
Good afternoon
... and everybody in the box.
I wanted to ask first about the hiring freeze and what that looked like moving
forward for your department.
Well, OBM is the lead for
instituting the hiring freeze. We execute by removing
hiring posts and stopping hiring frequencies.
Okay. Because I had read recently that many hundreds
were hired since the hiring freeze. Is that the case?
Well, the hiring freeze, remember, was only on Fund 100 and
excluded public safety positions as well as
revenue-generating positions, and it also included the Board of
Election positions that were needed for the election.
Got it.
So as it stands right now, there still is no date in the
future to lift-
That would be OBM to answer that question because that's
overseeing the budget.
Okay, perfect.
So now I wanted to ask about the vacancies and our
competitiveness.
As
Chairwoman Dowell mentioned about Taleo, it's kind of always hard to see
what's out there. What are the communications that you guys are building,
whether it be with our office or even other
organizations, schools, et cetera?
Yes. As I mentioned earlier, we instituted the weekly
job flash that went out to all aldermanic offices.
I don't believe it's going to your chief of staff, so let me know if you're not
getting it. We'll be restarting it once the freeze is over, of course.
And we also doubled the number of job fairs and community events
that our recruiters attended, and I personally attended all the Take
Back the Block events this summer, talking to residents about
employment opportunities at the City of Chicago.
We had prepared posters for every aldermanic
ward office, but we put the brakes on that given the hiring freeze.
And the posters would have QR codes that would take you to
easily apply to jobs because everybody's on their phones.
So QR codes, we felt, was a way to really
have
ease of interaction to apply for city positions.
We had a bus transit advertising campaign
that we had to put on hold due to the hiring freeze.
And then we have a college recruitment strategy, but we also
have that on pause until we can
be off of the freeze. So we have a lot of good things in place to continue
to advertise city jobs.
In addition, we use a diversity advertising
platform to reach affinity groups for all
different demographics. It could be the
Asian American Accounting Association, Black MBA or
Engineers Society,
Hispanic Lawyers Association. So we have a
diversity platform that we can use to post all our jobs as well.
Awesome. Thank you for sharing all of that, and I'd love to learn more.
We do get a lot of folks coming into my ward, typically
always asking for work and for other opportunities.
I'm wondering, do you have any analysis around the opportunities that we
give based off of ward, or
if there are gaps in
city opportunities and
people in specific neighborhoods or areas?
I just wanted to clarify the question to make sure, did you want to see
by ward the-
The number of people, yeah
... number of city employees-
Working for the cities by ward?
Yeah. Okay, we can get that through the chair.
Yeah, just curious if there's
maybe a lack of opportunity or people who may
not be subject to knowing the system, and whether we can better that,
whether it be in my ward or in other parts of the city.
And next question related to sort of
the way in which our staff is composed.
So I know we have the numbers that you gave us on this sheet.
Just curious, are there goals that you guys are setting specific to
different departments in creating more diversity, or how do you look at diversity
because there's so many different departments?
Again,
the
department head would be
managing their own workforce, and we
can't put quotas on by demographics.
That's illegal.
So,
again, we work to have outreach to all
demographics. The city is a welcoming employee for all
people, and we're working to break down barriers of employment to make it
easier to apply and get a position at the city.
Yeah. I guess my question was more leading towards if there
are areas that we want to make sure that we are,
like you're saying, making sure that we're reaching those demographics or
opening up an opportunity, whether it be through a job fair or
making sure that the people representing the city are getting to
those people if there seems to be an imbalance in sort
of the demographics-
And we're-
... different departments
... we'll send our recruiters to, if you're having an event in your
ward, we're happy to send our recruiters.
So we tell everyone that we can send our staff out to your ward and
community events.
Awesome. Thank you so much, Commissioner.
You're welcome.
Thank you, Alderman. My apologies, Alderman Hadden.
I omitted to go to Chairman Rodriguez.
This subject matter is in his
committee. So, Chairman, my apologies. Go ahead.
It's quite all right. You're giving me a lot of work there, so I figured I'd jump
in.
I concur with
my colleague from the Third Ward as far as you being a breath of fresh air,
Commissioner. We did a lot of work in your appointment process,
had significant conversations. Your resume, your breadth of
experience, both in government and the private sector, actually, are
what we need to be looking for in government.
Bringing best practices and merging them to
create efficiencies here,
I concur on that statement.
With that said, we do have a lot of work to do, and I am
heartened by the one
year turnaround, if you will, turnaround's the
right word,
155 days to 103 days in a year.
And you're stating that that's from posting on average
to first day on the job.
Correct.
What would you attribute
to that success? What are some of the key
things that happened there? Because my impression is that it's still probably too
long, and we need to figure out how to even cut it down even more.
Yes. And again, I talked about how we decreased testing,
because that takes six to eight weeks for formal testing.
Moving that to more of the in-interview
assessments or better interview questions to get at
what the department may need in the position.
And then doing universal postings.
A painter is a painter.
We post once, CDOT, 2FM, Water,
Aviation can all use the same list of painters.
They don't have to keep going out again and again separately.
So that saves a lot of time. And then, it's really about better
connectivity. We provide reports
to... I send out vacancy reports to commissioners.
I make phone calls
because our goal is to work together to fill
vacancies. And it's all about keeping it top of mind
within DHR and
the operating departments.
One of the things that I was looking at is something that I've, in
my time in working as a bureaucrat in the county government, was very
difficult,
but proved the most fruitful
to my efforts at
achieving efficiencies in government operations, and
that's working with our labor partners.
Working with them to try to resolve some of our issues.
I don't think it's a small
task to take 22 titles and bring
them down to nine.
We have a number of represented individuals who may have
hesitancy towards those changes, may be thinking that they may be on the
outs because of those types of changes, but having proactive
conversations with labor and getting to some efficiencies
like consolidating these titles is important.
I remember
at the Cook County Morgue, we had an intake specialist.
Well, we were getting a bunch of applicants that thought it was a clerical job.
No, you're bringing bodies into the morgue, right?
So we reclassed that position, or forgive me, not reclassed it, but
renamed it and made it more accurate to reflect the
actual work.
And that had been going on for years, and we were wasting our time interviewing
people who wanted clerical positions versus were
experienced in dealing with- Their bodies.
So to the extent that
we've got to be more proactive in working with labor, I think that's extremely
important, particularly with our brothers and sisters at AFSCME, who I think are
an incredible institution that need to be respected and
be brought to the table to make these types of changes.
How was that process with these 22 to nine roles?
How long did that take
to get done?
Because it was probably over a year.
Over a year, but it was
a very good process on all sides because we took a lot of
titles that were
personal computer operator. That title
doesn't really
demonstrate what someone is doing in
2024. That was a legacy title
from probably the '70s and '80s. So it's getting these
titles that may not reflect what people do, and then working with
AFSCME to
have titles that better reflect the current
job descriptions.
And the departments were also partners as well.
Yeah, and I've got a tick off, or else I tick around too, Chair, but I'd say the
following.
Keep going.
We've got a lot of work to do.
I think a number of my colleagues have brought up some of that work.
We've got to get this time down in filling these positions.
It has a snowballing effect on government when we're not able
to provide the services that we're budgeting for.
The fact is we do need to create efficiencies where they're possible.
And I'm certainly interested in working with my colleagues on making those things
happen.
So we've got a lot of work ahead of us. I'm looking forward to that work.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. And sorry, Alder Hadden.
No. Did you have other questions?
No, we're good.
You're good? Okay, very well. Oh, Hadden left.
Alderman Nugent? Oh, she left.
Alderman Sposato, you have anything?
I know I got you on the list, man. I'm just going down what the vice chair put
in before I got here, so it's not me.
Alderman Manar Hoppenworth?
Thank you, Chair.
Hi, Commissioner.
Good morning. I mean, good afternoon.
Good afternoon.
I had a question about, maybe this is the same line of questioning
that Chair Dowell was talking about, the systems that we are
using right now to
take care of time sheets. Is that the same system that
Chair Dowell was talking about?
Alderman Dowell was talking about the applicant system.
Oh, I see.
Taleo.
Okay. Because
I have some questions.
I don't think that they're all going to be addressed today, right now in 10
minutes, but I'm glad to know that you're upgrading your systems.
I did bring it up with the
technology department as well on how we could make it easier for
ward offices to keep track of time and to submit their
time sheets to the city.
I think that right now we're just doing that on spreadsheets.
Is that right?
That would be more of a Department of Finance payroll,
versus DHR.
Okay.
I had a
question about
along the lines of the decentralized model that you mentioned,
and just related, again, to ward offices,
because
we start out with nothing, basically, including
employment manuals.
And what happens
to us at the ward level
should also be reflected in what we do as a city,
I feel.
And I would like to see more
coordination on that end. Because when we're talking about
how departments deal with--
We need to protect our women, and all the protected classes like
those with disabilities, and I appreciate all the trainings that you're providing.
These are very helpful.
But again, what happens
in one place can happen in another place.
And I feel like we need more leadership
from all of us working together on the kinds of standards that
we need to put forward. So I hope that we can work together towards that end.
Thank you.
I don't have any other questions at this time.
Let me just check real quick.
You don't have to check.
I just need to check. Just one minute.
Oh, yes. I would like to have conversation about
part-time benefits for ward employees
that
have not been put into the system yet.
I think it's a little confusing for
us to understand how they can get those benefits.
And I will talk to you offline about that more.
Again, benefits.
It's interesting, at the City of Chicago, benefits go through the Department of
Finance and not through the Department of HR.
But I could assist you in finding the right person in Finance.
Thank you. I appreciate that.
Regarding training, again, I do appreciate all the training that you're
providing for us,
especially as we're going into the next four years with
a new federal administration, and
I represent a ward that has maybe the highest population of
LGBTQ+ people.
And I understand that-
There was training provided through DHR for
departments to learn more about trans inclusivity.
So I would like to talk to you more about how that's going.
Can you talk about that now a little bit?
Yes. We recently completed a year-long engagement with the
Chicago Therapy Collective.
Their role was to look at the city's hiring
practices
to become a more inclusive employer for
transgender employment candidates.
And we recently trained nine departments.
And we specifically trained their hiring personnel so
that we could have a more inclusive
process and welcoming process for transgender
employment candidates. They will be providing us a final report in
January that I'd be happy to share out with you.
Thanks. How many departments do we have in the city?
There are 37 units, but we
piloted it with nine.
Do we have plans to expand the pilot or to continue the pilot?
Once we get the information back from Chicago Therapy Collective, then
DHR would take over training for the rest of the city.
Thank you. I appreciate that.
That's it for now. Thanks, Chair.
That was a nice non-question,
but it's okay.
We're going to go to Alderman Taylor, followed by Alderman Napolitano.
I got you guys down. Nick, you didn't have anything?
You do?
Yes, no, maybe?
Oh, at the end. Okay. All right. Cleanup man. All right, go ahead.
Thank you, Chair.
All right, go ahead, Alderman Taylor.
Hi, Commissioner. How are you?
I'm fine. How are you?
Work for the city like you.
It is truly amazing to have you in this space.
What y'all thinking, I'll just say it.
It's true.
To have you in this space. I've appreciated you coming
out yourself to the hiring fairs that we've chosen to have in
the community, and I just appreciate that work.
I want you to go ahead and build a dashboard.
If you're waiting on the
Office of Technology to do it, you're going to be waiting a long time.
And so some of those conversations or some of those things,
you're probably going to have to take the lead on because we're used to doing it
the old way for too long and it's not working.
I can't begin to tell folks where to go other than the city
clerk's website to look up where jobs are.
And we need a centralized place so that we could send people.
You'll be okay. We could send people
a direct place to send folks to actually fill out for these
jobs. Because we've had, sitting in these meetings for five
years,
every year we come and there are loads
of vacancies. And on our end in the
ward office, we don't even know that those vacancies kind of
exist. And so we got a problem. That it's silo work, and so I
don't want to continue to do silo work.
I've appreciated you and your staff, being able to get you on the phone and
get directly because that wasn't happening before you got here.
So I'll call a spade a spade. And my team told me
to shout out Jennifer Scott,
of course, because that's the person that they always work with.
But I've appreciated the work you've done because there were no trainings
of our staff.
Staff have been talking about wanting to unionize.
And I'm not going to ask you in public to give me your thoughts about it now, but I
want you to think about it because we do have an issue.
The whole thing
that happened in the mayor's office is because those things have been happening in
our ward offices and in City Hall for years.
Let's act like what happened with him is not anything new.
I've been called a bunch of names since I've been here and talked to in a way
that's very disrespectful, and kind of nothing has happened, and so I've
appreciated. I did not like the nine hours of cybersecurity
because
I feel like we have a system that filters those emails, but I
do appreciate having those trainings.
What I will ask is, are you talking about having those same trainings
for aldermen as well? Because I haven't seen, or at
least when I got in office, it was, "Here your budget, here your book, figure it
out." I literally had to talk to my other coworkers because we have nothing written
down. And so I want to see, to Alderman Dowell's point, you get a policy
person or an attorney that works with you on nothing but legislation.
Because we're really loose
on things that happen in the automatic offices and in some of these committees.
It's way too loose.
Okay.
And there's really, I feel like, no real accountability.
So where is the system where if I got an employee who continues to call
off and I fired that person for that very reason, there is nothing
in the system that I can document and say, "They called off this day." And so
those are the type of things that I want you-
Okay
... to think about in this space. That's all I really got, because I could
call you. So thank you, Chairman.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Good afternoon, madam. Or good afternoon-
Good afternoon
... chair.
Yesterday in the Chicago Tribune, the mayor had talked
about, in describing the Ronnie Reese situation,
flawed disciplinary process he inherited at City Hall.
Can you comment about what that is, flawed
disciplinary process? What does that mean?
I can't really comment on a specific case,
and I can't comment on what someone else may
be thinking in terms of
a system.
Okay.
I'm happy to talk to you about
DHR's policies and procedures.
If there's something that needs to be changed because it's flawed, we stand ready
to do it. It would just be helpful to understand what that actually
means.
But I understand if you can't comment.
No, I can't comment. I
can't comment on what the mayor was alluding to.
Okay.
And just one final question. Is peace
circles part of the process?
I don't know what a peace circle is.
Okay.
No further questions, Mr. Chair. Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman Quinn.
Peace circle.
We'll reserve comment on that one.
But again, I
think it goes back to the point that was made earlier on
some level of universal discipline
across departments for individuals, so that there's some
clarity in the process and what transpires there too.
Alderman, are you back? Okay. We'll go to
Alderman Nugent. I was going to call you Alderman
Steele, but I won't do that today.
Alderman Nugent, followed by-
Thanks
...
we were having this conversation yesterday. Followed by Alderman Waukaspek.
Thank you, Chairman. Good afternoon, and nice to see you.
And
thank you for your help throughout the years in your multiple
capacities for the city.
I know you mentioned earlier
you had rewritten some policy. I was curious, before you rewrote
some policy,
did your department have oversight over Do Not Hire
recommendations before the policy was rewritten?
No, the operating department commissioner,
say if
Department X wants to put an employee on the IFR list,
that department head would be putting that employee on the
list. DHR just is the keeper of that
information-
Sure
... in our information systems.
And then when you had indicated earlier you had rewritten some
policy, can you talk me through what policy you rewrote recently and what that is?
One of the policies was the update to the Ineligible for Rehire List
policy, and the key change was to require
department heads to write a memo
detailing the personnel rule infraction that got the
person terminated and put on the list, so that we
have a clear record of why this person is going on
the Do Not Hire list.
Okay. I appreciate that. And just for clarification, who is the
reporting officer in the mayor's office?
I'm sorry, the reporting officer?
So for example, if I'm a commissioner of a department, I would
give a report to you if I had somebody on the Do Not Hire list.
But
is the mayor the commissioner of the office of the mayor?
I guess, who is the responsible reporting agent in the office of the mayor?
I don't want to speak for the office of the mayor, so I would reserve that question
for the chief of staff.
Okay.
Okay, and it's not like you have a list by department in office?
No, I don't.
Interesting.
Would you accept a recommendation
for Do Not Hire from someone that isn't the chief of staff in the office of the
mayor?
I think if the mayor submitted it, we would accept it.
Okay.
I appreciate that. I
know Chairman Dowell had touched a moment about
potentially you having your own counsel in the office.
I think that would be very important.
Help me here. I thought you had mentioned earlier your investigators are counsel
though, aren't they?
The investigators are attorneys, but they're not a counsel to me.
EEO is
its separate office
within the department, but they don't counsel me on any
employment litigation.
Understood. Thank you for that. I do think that would be very important for you to
have counsel in your department, since you deal with such
sensitive
information in cases.
Thank you.
Thank you for your work. I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman.
Thank you.
Do you interact, then, with the Department of Law on
various questions or concerns that you all may have
related to legal matters then?
Yes, there's an employment
services section within the Department of Law that we have interactions
with.
Well, they are corporation counsel, but they don't necessarily act as your
departmental counsel. Is that-
Correct.
Okay.
And I think for the record, the department head is the
chief of staff on a lot of forms and things that you would see.
So
that would be the person.
Chairman?
Yeah, I just wanted to say that some departments have
their own legal-
Oh, no
... lawyer.
Again, I was just trying to figure if there was-- I hope there was some
legal
conversations happening, because again, we go back to
risk. That would be a risk if there was no
advice being given to the department, and if they had to do these things on their
own. So I totally understand both of your
points as it relates to having someone in a role that could give
advice to them as needed or be on their staff directly.
So
Which I think is important. So I just want to make sure we're just not operating in
the blind. So,
go, Alderman Waguespack.
Thanks, Chairman.
Commissioner, welcome to you and your staff today.
The last few minutes of talking about the Do Not Hire list are
pretty fascinating,
and actually problematic for us at the same time.
So,
we're going to experience, most likely, some liability
issues here, some
possible lawsuits based on some things that have
transpired on the fifth floor over the last year and a half.
And I had a list of about 25 questions to walk you through, but I think you kind of
answered some of them already.
We don't want to talk about what Mr.
Reese did, because obviously that could be in litigation.
But
hypothetically,
if someone is harassed,
if someone
is experiencing these racist,
misogynistic, sexual harassment,
and then they're put on
a Do Not Hire list,
what are the steps
for that person to get on the Do Not Hire list in
the first place? You just said that it would be a department head or
somebody in there, a reporting officer,
but you don't have that list.
So
your job as HR is to have the personnel
handbook
up to date for us. It seems that's not quite the case.
So this is all very confusing.
No, the department commissioners would write a memo.
Okay.
Let me take a step back then. When you rewrote the May
2024
Ineligible for Hire policy, who was involved in the
rewrite?
I worked with Department of Law.
So just the Department of Law?
Yes.
Okay. And then you just mentioned that
the main purpose of that was to...
I'm sorry.
For the role of infractions that employees did for the
record, that's kind of what you said there.
But there was another part in there that says that employees would not be able
to
request being removed from that Do Not Hire list for one year.
What was the purpose of that?
Well, actually, there's another section in there that if someone feels they
have been wrongly put on the list, they can apply at any
time for an appeal.
But that only applies to someone who felt that it was an
error that they were put on the list.
Yes.
And what does error mean?
That's subjective to the former employee.
That's subject to the employee or the-
If they feel that they have been incorrectly put on the list, they can
reach out for an appeal.
And then if they appeal, they can only do so every two years.
Correct.
Okay.
So,
going on,
we heard that there was an outdated HR process, but it sounds like you're pretty
much up to date on the HR process. In the last term,
I think you might have been, and I know your staff here were helpful in passing the
sexual harassment policy for the entire city.
I think that was very important. You made policy changes to the personnel
manual, which were very important.
So I guess I was having a hard time figuring out
why we needed to change some of those things, and
why we needed to
make changes to that DNR policy that
prevented a good work environment.
I think we should always be looking at our policies and
procedures in an effort to make them better.
And I feel that by requiring that memo,
it made the policy better.
I'm asking all department heads to put the exact personnel
rule violation on a memo that
reduces any
capricious behavior. It's not like, "Oh, I'm going to put
Sandra on the list." No, "Sandra did this
violation of personnel Rule X, and that's why she's
terminated and put it on the list."
Okay. But that's only post-May 2024.
Yes.
Because I came into this seat, I was confirmed in March and started working on the
policy.
Okay.
So
when we're looking at this, does the EEO liaison
officer play any part in
handling any of these Not Eligible for Rehire
questions?
The EEO officer covers EEO
issues.
Which could be part of...
It covers any EEO issue of sexual, racial,
gender, religious discrimination, and harassment.
Okay.
All right, Chairman, I'll end there. I might have questions later.
This is all
not confusing,
but it seems to be pretty clear what happened in at least this
one situation.
And I hope that
the changes that you made
would prevent this kind of behavior in the future, and from
our taxpayers having to foot the bill for any untoward behavior
for any employee in the city. Thank you
Thank you. For the record,
IFR and DNR are the same, right?
And I call it Ineligible For Rehire, but I think someone
referred to it also as Do Not Hire list.
Do Not... Okay, same thing.
But the formal name is Ineligible For Rehire.
Okay.
Your statement that requiring the commissioner of the
department to send a memo documenting
the reason for termination,
in theory, that would mean that
anyone terminated theoretically would be ineligible for rehire.
Because my assumption is that there would be some level of
documentation as to why an individual was terminated.
Are there instances where people are terminated but not placed on
the Ineligible For Rehire list?
Yes, because sometimes an employee may be
terminated from a position because their strengths are
not in that area. For example, they may be
not as proficient in being an accountant, but
it's not necessary to put them on the Do Not Hire list because they could
very well be a successful librarian.
Should there be criteria or certain rule violations that
automatically make a person ineligible for
rehire? And you do raise a good point that someone may not be proficient, but
when it comes to issues of integrity, are
those automatic
placements for Ineligible For Rehire?
We don't have it in terms of... Again, it's up to the
department head to make that decision.
Okay.
Sounds like more work for Mike, but I'll leave that as it is.
Who did I have next? I had
Alderman Riley, you're next.
Thank you, Chairman,
and good afternoon, Commissioner.
Good afternoon.
Like a lot of folks here, I have nothing but compliments for you.
I think you and your team do a great job.
I've got a few questions I have to ask,
and I want to thank you for returning your budget memo to us in
a timely fashion, unlike many other departments.
I want to go back to EEO, and Do Not Hire, and all the
fun stuff we've been talking about here today,
and I just want to clarify a few things.
The mayor's office is required to complete your multiple online
sexual harassment training seminars, correct?
Correct. All city employees must complete the
three sexual harassment modules.
So that includes the mayor's chief of staff?
Absolutely.
And the mayor himself?
Every city employee.
Excellent. And could you refresh my memory, does city
policy impose penalties or discipline on
supervisors who fail to timely report
incidents of sexual harassment in their respective departments?
Yes, supervisors are required to report
any type of EEO violation.
As soon as they're aware of it.
Yes, absolutely.
And what are the consequences if they fail to do that?
It could be a range of disciplinary consequences, depending on the
situation.
So hypothetically,
say
the head of a department,
the person ultimately responsible for personnel issues, fails to
timely report.
Who imposes discipline upon that person, given the fact that that person is
the boss in their department? Would that be
your department that would step in? Is it the inspector general?
Is it the law department? Who imposes the discipline on the
leader of that organization who fails to report?
DHR does not have the authority. I don't have the authority to
discipline another department commissioner.
I think the commissioners are at the appointment of the
mayor.
So ultimately,
the mayor
would be the final determining
actor in this pyramid.
If it's a commissioner,
the commissioners serve at the will of the mayor.
Okay. That's helpful to understand.
And
earlier, you described for us the
investigative process that you administer by assigning an
attorney, I believe, from the law department to investigate.
Actually, if I can clarify, I just said that our EEO
investigators have backgrounds as attorneys,
but they are EEO investigators and employees of the Department
of Human Resources.
Okay. But they hold law degrees.
Yes.
Very good.
But to be clear, that investigator investigates
these alleged incidents and then prepares a
report, which is then delivered back to the department head for action,
correct? And I want to make sure I heard you correctly.
In that investigative report,
is a level of discipline recommended?
Yes.
It is. And as you mentioned, it's entirely up to the
department head whether or not to administer the recommendation that you've
delivered to them or take some other course of action.
Yes.
Very good. And
ultimately,
the department head will determine what the discipline is.
You can't do anything to intervene in what decision
is made there. Ultimately, that decision is essentially final.
Is that correct?
That's the department head's decision.
And in EEO issues, we do request that the department head
informs us of his or her decision by a certain date,
so we have awareness of how the situation was handled.
And-
But we can't change the department head's
Recommendation.
So hypothetically, if you were to get back a memo from that department head
and they say, "Hey, you recommended we terminate this person,
but we're going to keep this person and give them a raise."
There's nothing you can do about that?
I don't have authority.
Hmm.
I want to go back to a question that Alderman Quinn got at.
Where can I find in our employee handbook the role of peace circles?
I don't know what a peace circle is.
Okay. And as far as you know, we don't use peace circles to handle
claims of sexual harassment, do we?
Again, I don't know-
Because you're not aware of what they are.
Right. I don't know what a peace circle is.
So then it's a fair-- I think I can answer my next question.
Your department did not administer any peace circles in 2024.
I've never seen any peace circles at DHR.
Yeah, I've never seen them either.
And I assume that means you didn't administer any last year either.
Correct.
Do you believe that HR should have a greater role overseeing disciplinary
actions rather than simply handing off the recommendation to a
department head?
I think that warrants further discussion.
Again, I want to collaborate with
operating departments, but I think this situation really
warrants further discussion.
Hmm. Well, I agree. I think you should have a role.
And on the Do Not Hire process,
I know it now requires a memo.
To make sure I understood your testimony earlier,
again,
HR
can't determine
that's insufficient or reject the reasoning
contained within that memo to justify being placed on a Do Not Hire
list? You simply file that memo? You can't react to
it or push back?
The memo should include the personnel rule violation.
I'm sorry.
The memo should include what was the personnel rule
violation the employee
did to get put onto the list.
That's what I wanted to see. What was the personnel rule violation?
The reason I'm asking is I'm trying to determine
who applies what standard
to the memo you receive to determine whether or not
that's a good enough reason to put someone on that list.
That list is a career-ender for a lot of folks-
Mm-hmm
... who've chosen public service.
You don't have the ability to
reject-
I can't
... that memo as insufficient or...?
If the department head has a personnel rule,
I can't override
what the department head is doing and putting someone on an ineligible for
rehire list. We put it into our systems,
but I don't have authority to change it.
Fair enough.
Chairman, I have two questions, then I'm done. Is that all right?
Go ahead. Along the same lines
as President Pro Tem Nugent,
why don't you have a centralized list of the department heads who are
ultimately responsible for HR within their respective agencies?
The commissioners are responsible for HR.
Commissioners are.
They should be sending the memo to me.
I get the memo from, which I said, department heads.
So I guess in a way, you do know who should be reporting these-
Right. If it's a issue with--
I don't want to pick on any department, but if it's a water department issue,
Commissioner Connor would send me an email.
Right.
If it's
2FM, Commissioner Tomlin would send me-
Sure
... an email.
And what about the mayor's office?
I have the emails would come from the chief of staff, or it could come from the
mayor himself, if he wants to send an email.
So in the mayor's office, the head of HR-related issues is either the
mayor
and/or the chief of staff? Is that how your department handles that office?
That's how the communication is flowing.
I would get that information from either of those folks.
And have you received
a memo or communication from the mayor directly ever?
From the mayor?
Related to Do Not Hire, related to-
Absolutely not
... discipline or a sexual harassment allegation?
Not a memo related to a specific case, no.
And not to get into details, because I know you can't do that.
Mm-hmm.
Have you received such memos from the mayor's chief of staff
during your tenure?
Yes.
You have? Okay. How many?
I think one.
One. Hmm.
My final question is one I was actually chatting with a few of my colleagues
about and just wanted to kind of understand this so we're all
on the same page.
You don't have a lawyer
in your department who reports directly to you, an attorney, not one of your
investigators who also has a law degree?
Correct. I don't have that.
And so instead, for legal
issues and advice on these sorts of things, you would
then go and visit with the corp counsel's office and consult with a member of the
Department of Law on those types of issues?
Is that-
Yes, if I have an employment
question, I would ask an attorney in
employment services.
And perhaps that might include disciplinary cases
or sexual harassment claims?
Well, again,
if it were something within DH--
Say it was something highly sensitive, and you're
concerned it may have a policy implication down the road-
Mm-hmm
...
or have an impact on how you run your department moving forward.
You'd consult with a member of the corp counsel's office.
That would be my only legal resource.
Sure. And the reason I'm asking this is because we look to you to guide the city
on all things HR.
And
You have a sensitive job because you're processing lots of
allegations and claims,
and all of them are related to an incumbent administration,
meaning these folks work for the current mayor.
You get a claim today, ultimately the big boss is the guy sitting up on the
fifth floor right now.
The corp counsel serves at the pleasure of the mayor.
Does not work for the city council,
works for the mayor, and the mayor can decide tomorrow to replace that
person.
And all the lawyers in the law department report to the corp counsel.
Do you feel that you are getting completely objective
advice
from the law department that reports to the corp counsel, who serves solely at the
pleasure of the mayor, when you're processing allegations
within city departments that ultimately report to the mayor?
Do you see any-
That's not a-
This is a question for-
That's not a fair question to her because she too works for the mayor, and
that's not a fair question to ask her.
I understand-
No, actually-
You put your point on the record.
Chairman.
I-
Honestly, I think I'm allowed to ask any question I'd like in this committee
because I'm a member of-
You can ask the question. I'm going to direct the witness not to answer.
Chairman, that makes absolutely no sense.
Again, that's not fair to her.
You don't want the public to understand how accountability works in city
government, Chairman?
It is. You've made your point.
No, I have not made my point.
Yes, you have.
I'd asked a question I'd like an answer to.
Okay.
Is there not an inherent conflict of interest if we're asking the law
department for advice on personnel issues that
involve the corp counsel's boss?
That's, I think, a very fair question the Chicago taxpayer deserves an answer
to.
Very well. Your question's been stated.
Alderman Sposato.
Thank you, Chairman.
Good afternoon, Commissioner and First Deputy.
Good afternoon.
I certainly was wrong about the direction of this meeting, let me tell you.
Thank you.
But, hey.
Lot of stuff about the Do Not Hire list, but there's been a lot of questions
asked,
and I don't have any budget questions, so I'm just going to say a few things.
They're just basically points of information.
So
people do get taken off, everybody. People do get taken off the Do Not Hire list.
It used to be one year, but now it's forever. Correct, Commissioner?
Yes.
Okay.
So everybody, you don't get just taken off the list just because.
You have to petition, send a letter to the commissioner, and state your
case. I don't know how often there's piddly things and people get
off. I don't know how many things are serious.
But I know for a fact you and your predecessors have taken people off the Do Not
Hire list, correct?
Correct. I've taken people off the list.
Right. So that's a good thing. I know I just worked with you recently on a kid who
I, although I don't know him, he seemed like a really good kid, who's going to be a
cop now next week, and he got taken off the Do Not Hire list.
So people do get off the Do Not Hire list.
A few years back, some kid I helped that was on the Do Not Hire list to be a
fireman, he got put on the Do Not Hire list for a stupid thing with the fire
department. He got off and now he's a fireman.
So
it's good to know that it's not a forever thing, people.
But you're not going to get off if you don't ask to be taken off and have a reason
why you should be taken off. And every termination does not lead to the Do Not
Hire list, and we brought that up already.
And that's really about it. I'm just somewhat surprised.
I'm just here to thank you
and your predecessor. She was the number four on the totem pole, and she was doing
the work of one, two, three, and four in the past.
I couldn't imagine the job you had to do, but I called Katie regularly, and I call
you still regularly. I'm just guessing that I call you more than anybody.
I'm not afraid to call you because we can call you and ask you
questions, everybody. You don't have to call me to call HR to ask them questions
about police or fire. She'll gladly talk to you about it.
She will return your call.
So keep up the good work. Glad we got to be friends.
Appreciate all you guys do, and
I'm glad things are going pretty good today. So thank you.
Thank you both for everything.
Thank you.
Thank you, Chairman.
Thank you. Alderman Conway, followed by Cedar Lopez.
Yeah.
Brief questions here. In
fact, my questions will be a relative peace circle relative to other people's, huh?
So all right.
Question for you from
in the report of the Civic Federation,
something that they recommended.
So this is something that I
would just love to get your feedback on.
So this is something that they recommended we do.
And I quote, it said in their report, "The city should cut unneeded or dormant
vacancies, and to the extent cuts are not feasible at this time, make an
offsetting entry in the budget for the salary and benefits of vacancies it will
not fill in fiscal year '25."
And now in some of the other hearings or in returns from the chair, we've heard
for example on CDOT yesterday, they had 180 vacancies.
They cut four in the budget and have another 176.
Streets and Sanitation
has 91 vacancies. The budget cut 31
with 60 still remaining in the budget, as two examples, and CPD is kind of all
over the place. So as someone with an extensive
background in HR, I just would
love to get your feedback on that
idea or response on that.
Well, for DHR, I cut 11 vacancies, which is significant
in a small department. But I know that I had to contribute to filling
the billion-dollar deficit.
In my other vacancies that I have carried into 2025,
we've reclassed some positions because, again, as I said, I needed
a deputy of policy, so I changed one position into
that, and then we also needed to plus up our reasonable
accommodation and EEO staffing.
I'm really asking for the city as a whole, is this something that we here in
city council should consider on a broad basis?
Or how would you respond to that recommendation broadly as an expert in this
field?
Well, I think, again, department commissioners best know what their
department needs are, but
everybody should have a plan for these vacancies and
hiring, and take a harder look if these vacancies
are extending beyond a certain time period.
Now, you mentioned earlier it takes on average
103 days to fill
a vacancy.
Are there certain departments that would be real outliers on that,
including our biggest ones of CPD, CDOT, and Streets and San?
Are they all around 103 days, or they would be greater or less?
No. Streets and San, I believe, is about 99 days.
CPD is longer. And then when you're talking about the overall
vacancies for the city, about a third is in CPD.
Yeah.
And there are macro issues to hiring and law
enforcement across the country, and that's what we have to keep in mind.
There's certain harder to fill positions within
CPD, CDPH, that can cause
slower vacancy fill rates.
Now, the reason I didn't ask about CPD is obviously with the consent
decree positions a little bit up in the air, the numbers aren't quite as clear.
Do you think that this body, in looking at this budget, should consider
a
contra expense line to deal with vacancies that we are unlikely to fill
throughout the course of the year?
I would really defer that to the budget director, since budget controls the
vacancies.
You know that actually does exist.
It's the turnover line.
Well, but it looks frighteningly small relative to how fast we're filling
vacancies.
Now, that's a fair
question. But it does exist, just for the record.
Yeah. No. So, okay. And
as someone who's a HR director for the city, I thought you may have some thoughts
on to what extent we should be dealing with vacancies that we don't want
to cut, but we're unlikely to be able to fill over the course of the next 12
months. And I didn't know if you had anything further to add on that.
And again, that really turns into more of a budget issue.
Mm-hmm.
So I would defer to the budget director.
Okay. Mr. Chairperson, that's all I have. Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman. Alderman Souza-Lopez, followed by Alderman Lawson.
Thank you. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you,
Commissioner, for being with us.
Wanted to hear a little bit more about
the rollout citywide employee
performance review, as well as
how we partner with the Department of Labor through these apprenticeship
programs,
to fill up the vacant positions. I know Alderman Rodriguez mentioned about the
urgency to make sure that we don't leave vacant positions.
So I want to learn a little bit more from you on those two programs.
Yes.
We initiated the first ever citywide rollout of
employee performance reviews. There were a few departments that
conducted their own annual employee performance reviews.
But at DHR, we feel that every employee should have a performance
review. And we've set up a
training. The HR leads of each department have gone
through the training, and the process will start January
2025.
Mm-hmm.
And then your second question.
For the apprenticeships.
We're always looking. As you know, youth unemployment is a
key issue in the City of Chicago. So we were
partnering successfully with CPS, Departments of Streets and
Sanitation, LiUNA 1001, to create a new on-ramp
of city employment for junior laborers.
It was a 12-week program in which 70
CPS recent grads participated. And the great
thing is now we've got 55 young people with
solid union jobs. They're now City of Chicago
employees. And now we want to take the model that we did with this
junior laborers program and extend it in other areas of the city.
Mm-hmm.
Thank you.
What are the updates that you have on the personnel rules and employment plan?
What are those updates for the personnel rules that you're mentioning in your
initiatives for next year?
Yes. That's related to my hiring of a new policy deputy,
so I can have someone focused on updating our personnel
rules and hiring plan for next year.
Part of those rules, again, and I think
I know that some colleagues have mentioned about some ethical
considerations.
I do think that
the due process, obviously, in terms of performance review and
I think that the importance to adhere to facts, right?
And think it's important that we want to have a pro-worker approach,
as well as the due process, especially when it comes to personnel matters.
I understand you just inherited this in January of this
year.
At least, from what I hear today, I do think that these are not
new issues, or they do not hire lease and multiple issues.
We want to make sure that we follow due process.
What are those recommendations that you can make to this body?
Ultimately, I do think it's a responsibility of all of us
to ensure that there is performance review, due process, and
ethics considerations.
I'm not here to judge, but I do know that there are departments, for
instance, like CDPH, that have their own HR departments, that
do not may have that process in place.
What are your recommendations in terms of consistency?
Yes, there are HR units in all departments.
But the City of Chicago has to follow the collective bargaining
agreements and progressive discipline for our city
employees. 90% of our employees are represented by a
union, and those
CBAs have to be adhered to.
Mm-hmm. How can we have a more pro-worker approach?
I
think for me it's like having a due process is very important in regards
of what the politicization of issues are, but I do think that these are issues
that keep coming back, and I think that the due process.
Is there any specifics that do think that when it comes to these ethical
considerations, I do understand that there has to be, in my
opinion, a fair approach, pro-worker, but as well as a performance
review and ethical considerations.
What are those specifics that you recommend perhaps can help us moving
forward?
We're always open to updating and
learning.
We're
always open to making our policies better.
That's why I wanted to put in place a new policy deputy.
But in terms of anything, I'm not sure if you're referring to an
EEO issue with due process, but
investigations take place,
summaries are written, and then a disciplinary recommendation
is given by DHR.
But departments have their final say in how they want to handle the
discipline.
Thank you, Chairman. And I'd just like to end with this.
I do think that
this body can make recommendations as well.
I remember, and I think people can look up back in
2020, so four years ago almost, when we have considerations
of how to do or how to change this do-no-hire
list.
I'm a little concerned about
comments made about mockery on
restorative justice processes, especially from political organizations
that actually have a history of sexual harassment.
So I do recommend that we do strengthen
our policies across the board, and I do
think it's important that, again, I take issue when mockery happens from the
same organizations that are playing their dirty laundry in trials
right now for the public to see. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman. Alderman Lawson, followed by, I'm going to go to
Alderman
Coleman.
Yep.
Go ahead.
Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Commissioner.
I wanted to touch on this. So the supervisor that receives a
complaint or has knowledge of a harassment situation,
discrimination situation, what is their responsibility?
They must report it-
And to whom?
... to the EEO.
To the EEO.
Correct me if I'm wrong, if the complaint involves a member of the city
council, city clerk, the mayor, or our staffs, the
inspector general would also be appropriate
to play a role here or to be reporting to.
Well, EEO handles all of it, but I'm going to ask my deputy,
Judy Marz,
in terms of any interaction with IG.
Judy Marz. I'm a deputy commissioner for the Diversity and EEO team and
Workforce Compliance.
So I'm sorry, the question was if the conduct that's-
So if the conduct involved a member of me or my staff, mayor's office, clerk's
office, their staffs, the IG would also be appropriate to be involved,
correct?
DHR may refer the conduct
to the Office of Inspector General if the alleged
wrongdoer is an elected official.
Other than elected officials,
so for example, all of your staff members, as city employees, would
be covered by this policy. So all of your-
Got it
... staff members would have the obligation to report.
I guess to my point, though, the supervisor who becomes aware of the conduct,
they have to report it.
Yes.
They're not supposed to be doing anything else, right?
They should report it to the EEO division.
Right.
Yes.
But they shouldn't be taking on their own investigation.
No, absolutely not.
They shouldn't be trying to sweep it under the rug.
This should be something we all take seriously.
Yes.
And that we refer to your office to be taken seriously.
Yes.
So I just wanted to clarify that.
I know your Workforce Compliance Division has 22 staff.
There are eight EEO investigators, but probably a few more that work on EEO
issues. It may be all 22. How does that shape up?
We have eight EEO investigators. There's one vacancy now that we hope to
fill in 2025.
Okay, great.
So let's say the department doesn't put somebody on the IFR list,
but
subsequent investigations find that this person was not somebody who we want to be
rehiring. Is there a process to add someone
after they've been separated from city service?
Yes. Former employees who've been found to be guilty of
serious misconduct can be placed on an IFR list.
Right.
Or if you retire or resign in lieu of
termination or under inquiry, and the inquiry comes back that you
are guilty of misconduct, you can be put on the list.
Good, because we see a lot of retirement when it gets hot.
The link is down on your website for the city's EEO policy.
Okay.
Of all days, right?
I know that happens on ours. I wanted to ask about the diversity
platforms for job postings.
Have you worked with any LGBT platforms or organizations in the city
or state?
We have a small budget for advertising, and so we
use
Circa, which is a platform that sends it out to
a range of affinity groups. So
we don't go group by group because we can't afford that.
Okay.
We have to go to almost like a clearing house that then spreads it out
to a range of affinity groups.
That's sensible.
But if you have any
suggestions, because we work with them all the time to add new groups to it.
We can chat.
No, we can chat separately
I've got some organizations, not on the employment side, though.
But the question I have on that too is
how are we tracking LGBT employees,
or are we? I know there was some self-identifying.
Obviously, we're trying to hire trans.
How are we even measuring those metrics right now?
Again, we don't
ask that question about sexual orientation.
We have the selection of male, female, non-binary, but we don't ask
any sexual orientation questions.
So
I wish we did, or I wish there was a process to self-select.
I'll tell you, the city knows that I'm gay because I'm married to a man. Right?
We should take credit for that. That's a mark of a company that
values diversity and values inclusionary hiring practices.
And if we want to measure ourselves on that success, we've got to start to take
those numbers and do it in a way that I know is legally tricky, but
important to do.
Right. We want to be sensitive to employees.
Right. I think I might've said this last year, but I'll say it again.
I would love to see more recruitment from the city in our local universities.
Yes.
There's a lot of opportunity. I know you had a hiring freeze for a good part of
this year. Did we get to any universities at all in 2024?
No, we have our new workforce development director, and she's put together
a local college and university strategy.
Right.
But we had to put it on pause. And
August, September is the time that all of the college students are back.
Right.
So that was the time the hiring freeze occurred.
So we put it on pause, but we're ready to go for the spring term.
I guarantee you there's probably an alum of every college university in the city in
this room, or a member,
that could be helpful. And if we want to hit it again in the spring, in March and
April, we want to be a resource there and bring good people into the city,
because I think there's opportunities we can all create.
So, thank you for everything. Thank you for the work you've done in the short
time that you've been there. It's not unnoticed, and I know we've got more to do.
So thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Commissioner. Thank you, Chair.
Thank you, Alderman Coleman. Alderman Vasquez.
Thank you, Chairman Irvin. Commissioner, I want to just say thank
you publicly and privately for assisting
on the Matiah Travis Jr. that Chairman
Sposato mentioned.
That Do Not Hire process was interesting,
and I don't know where we would
have been had it not been for a relationship in the
police department. But it also just
gave out a red flag.
Someone can be put on the Do Not Hire list, and you have no
authority to help to get them off of the list?
And in that case,
is it another department?
I can't change a department's recommendation to
put someone on the Do Not Hire list.
I
am the person that reviews the appeals that come in from employees
who are on the Do Not Hire list.
Okay.
Were you commissioner during the Chicago Park District
restructuring of the former
superintendent and the COO?
No, I wasn't a commissioner.
Okay. So at the time,
I'll just fast-forward. The superintendent, the former superintendent is
not on that list. However, the COO is on
the Do Not Hire list. They have appealed.
They have gone through the steps. They've gone through the process.
However, they are still on the Do Not Hire list.
Has that come across your desk yet?
I can't speak to specific cases,
but I'm not familiar with what you're talking about.
Okay.
What is the process of getting off of the Do Not Hire list?
A former employee would write a letter of appeal to the DHR commissioner,
who is me at this time.
Okay. And you're not familiar with the firing of
Superintendent Kelly and Alonzo Williams, specifically?
I'll say names. Alonzo Williams is on the Do Not Hire list,
who was just doing his job. But Superintendent Kelly,
he's on the list, but Kelly is not on the list.
Alderman,
I think that's
not a city matter. That's a park district matter.
Agreed, but they're still on the list.
And is
that under your purview because Chicago Police Department, same situation, had
to come off of her list.
The Park District's list is not our list, to my understanding.
Correct.
There's a difference there between what Alderman Sposato's speaking
of to what she's on. So.
Alderman Waterbeck.
Yes.
Alderwoman, the Park District also, at
that time, did not have
an MOU or an agreement with the city to
share those same people on a list. That would have to be done through the city
to have people on that
so that they couldn't be going back and forth between the city and a sister agency.
So, that came up with the inspector general when those incidents
came up. It's a completely different list.
Okay. Thank you for the clarification.
So now I see why you don't know what I'm speaking of.
You're like, "What's going on?"
In the case, and I don't want to beat that horse, but
the women,
can you share the nationalities of the victims?
I really can't discuss this case.
Okay.
And I'm not sure what case you're referring to because there are a lot of
cases at the city.
The latest case, the Ronnie Reeves case.
Oh, no, I can't discuss any of that.
Okay. So it's all under investigation?
Legally, I can't.
Okay.
Someone asked for a point of information.
Hold on. What was your question?
Just a point of information. It's been reported that they were Latino women.
All Latino women?
Yeah.
Okay.
Hmm.
What is the timeline of
contacting your office if I find out that I'm on this
list under review,
that process
for final decision?
In terms of the timeline on your IFR appeal?
Yes.
It will vary due to the complexity of the case.
Okay.
I agree with Chairman Dowell in terms of your own
counsel. I just find it so hard
that you are the Commissioner of Human Resources and
it's difficult to have lists of
people, and we have no idea. There are some people that don't even know that
they're on this list.
So,
that's all. Thank you very much.
You got anything else?
No. He didn't see my signal to stop the clock.
So if you have other questions, please go ahead.
No.
Okay.
What she raises begs a question of, is there
notice given to an individual who is placed on
the ineligible for rehire list?
Yes. DHR does send a letter
to the person.
Do we allow for an opportunity to
appeal before something potentially is published with an
individual on the Do Not Hire list?
Could you... I'm-
So for example,
employee X, the commissioner of department Y
says, "I want to place employee X on this Do Not
Hire list." You get that letter, you inform the
individual they are going to be placed on the Do Not Hire list.
Does that individual, before that information is
potentially published, have a opportunity to
appeal or to say, "Hey, this is
wrong. I shouldn't be on this list," before you actually potentially
publish something with this individual's name on this type of
a list?
They can appeal at any time if they feel that they were wrongly put on
the list.
A normal appeal process would be waiting a year to
appeal.
But nothing prior to... It's almost like
you've been convicted without
a trial, per se. I mean, would you-
Well,
the commissioner or department head would write the memo detailing the personnel
rule violation which got the person terminated and put on
the list.
Well,
let me just say this. Based on today's conversation, it's clear that there needs to
be some more
conversation and/or policy
implemented around this. The process seems to be
grossly, I would say, to the employee's disfavor.
Now granted, people do things and rightfully deserve to be
ineligible for rehire.
However,
there can be points where we, I think, as an organization, need to
be a little more exhaustive in putting that,
what I think Alderman Riley pretty much called a mark of death on somebody in
public service, at least giving them an opportunity to have some
level of a review on that determination prior
to that type of
mark being placed on them. Because even though you may be on the list, you may get
off the list, but you were on the list.
And I think there may need to be some level of
an opportunity for that individual to state his or her case prior to that
being published, I would say. Because I don't know if there is a
published list or if it's just something you keep.
I don't know, but I'm assuming that there's somewhere out there in the
universe a list of people that are ineligible for
rehire with the City of Chicago.
Again, we're always open to improvements and doing things
better.
Okay.
Alderman Vasquez.
Thank you very much, Chairman.
I add one to the list of folks that think you should lawyer up and make sure that
you have someone to look out for your best interests.
It's not lost on me that in the situations that we're talking about here,
it's women and women of color that are carrying a lot of the burden.
I look at your whole
team up here and in the box, and given the subject matter we're talking
about and the kind of culture that would allow somebody to continue that kind of
behavior without the proper progressive discipline, the proper
protocols in place, I think that's why a number of us have these questions.
And so,
I've one through the chair question related to, and then a number of questions
related to process and protocol.
Okay.
If you could send us the number of complaints and categories of
complaints of every department in the City of Chicago, including the mayor's
office, starting in May 2023-
Okay
... that would be helpful for us to get an understanding of the scale of what gets
reported and what's occurring, as well as the nature of the occurrences.
Okay.
You're able to supply that?
Yes.
Okay.
So
the mayor said yesterday publicly that he
inherited a flawed system in place
as it relates to
really how you handle discipline in these sorts of matters, right?
Had any point prior to now, or prior to let's say this
week, had the mayor or the mayor's team reached out to you about what those flaws
were or how to improve anything in a system they inherited?
I can't talk about the specific case.
This isn't about the case. This is about the fact that they said there's
improvements necessary to the whole system.
So if you come into a system that you inherited from a predecessor
You would notice, hey, these things need to be improved.
If the case that the mayor is saying yesterday is he inherited a bad system, then
coming into office, they would've said, "These are problems that we see in the
system that need to be improved." Were any communications of that sort
communicated to you? Not about this case at all, about the actual process and
system in place.
The only systems that we talked about was really like, let's improve the
hiring
speed, but I don't-- and I can't
discern what system. I
can't get to be able to say, "Well, this is the system the mayor is talking
about yesterday." I'm not privy to what he is referring
to.
Have they talked about any system at all related to discipline or harassment cases
or complaints? In general, the system of how that's reported, anything at all.
Was there any communication from the mayor or the mayor's office about improving
anything?
No.
Okay. Thank you.
So my next question is, you've got all these commissioners, right?
They're the ones leading their organizations.
I know when I became a manager prior to being elected, we went through a whole
training about how do you deal with a complaint? How do you submit that?
How do you do progressive discipline? How do you have verbal coachings?
How do you document the cases? Do any of the commissioners go through
any of that training separate from the trainings we all get, specifically for
management and dealing with such cases?
We have three different trainings that everyone in the city takes for
sexual harassment. One is required by the state of Illinois, and
the other two are City of Chicago training courses, and one course
is specifically for supervisors and what they need to do
to handle reports of sexual harassment.
Are those annual?
Yes.
And are there tools in place to submit reports, get that kind of reporting in
place, or is it just an email memo?
You mean reporting the actual-
I'll give you an example
... incident?
Let's say an employee
says something misogynistic in a space.
They may not have understood what they said was something offensive, but
a supervisor hears about it and has to have a coaching.
In any corporate environment, that coaching would be documented in some place to
say, "Hey, we're not firing you, we're not writing you up, but we're putting you on
notice that this was not behavior that should be happening in this
office culture. So we're going to let you know, you've got three to six months to
make sure you're not doing something.
If within that time you do something else, we're moving to the next stage of
discipline." Right? In those kind of tools, you have a portal to track this stuff.
Does the city have anything like that?
We have an EEO case management system, and again,
when our investigations are finished, we provide a recommendation of
discipline, and we also require departments
to get back to us on what they've done to handle the situation
within a certain timeframe.
What's the level of detail
that you would ask for? And let's say, for example, in the case people are
referring to, but let's just say generally.
There's a matter, there's multiple complaints about an employee over months of
time. It gets to the OIG, the OIG goes to the chief of staff
and says, "You need to coach this employee." Do you then get details about what the
conversation is, what points were discussed, or is it just, "Hey, I had the
coaching?"
And I'm trying to make sure I understand your question right in terms of
the reference point, but
we provide
a recommendation of discipline. We ask them to say, "Well, what did you do?"
They need to provide us in detail of what that
department did with that employee who
was
involved in an incident.
Okay.
Did they take the required training classes?
What were the coaching sessions? How many coaching sessions were required
or did you have with the employee? Because we need to have accurate
records given the sensitive nature of these issues.
Do you have any documentation that would be the equivalent of a how-to
manual for a manager to know exactly what you're talking-- Like, here's
the point, here's how it goes, here's the next step.
If you could provide through the chair that kind of documentation, so that way we
know
if we're setting up the commissioners for success in a scenario like that and what
may need to be improved. Because
we may or may not know what needs to be improved.
It's clear that the mayor didn't talk to you about improving any of the things, but
we want to see it to see if there's things we can improve and make sure it gets
moved forward on.
You mentioned as far as the mayor's office, that the chief of staff or the mayor
can send memos. What about the role of senior advisor?
I've never had a memo from a senior advisor on an
IFR list.
What about any other matters related to discipline if they're not the chief of
staff? Just thinking about-
No, I've never had any contact.
Okay.
And then I guess
lastly,
what are the rules around performance reviews for employees in a mayor's office?
DHR's role is we give the toolkit to every city
department, including the mayor's office.
It is the accountability of that head of office,
head of department to ensure that the performance
reviews are done. I don't have the authority to police departments to
ensure that you've done performance reviews for 100% of
your staff.
Okay.
These reviews will be starting in January, and we will be
tracking
that everybody has completed the performance review training.
Within the department, they're responsible for tracking who they've
given performance reviews to.
Got it. So if you could send through the chair that how-to
toolkit.
Yeah. I can send you the training.
Yeah. Just so we get-
If that's helpful
... a sense of that is. I think any of us here, especially those of us who value
accountability, understand that self-accountability is not a thing.
I would love not to eat snacks after 9:00.
If I were to count on myself not to do it, I'm going to be eating every night.
So I think there's a problem there.
If it's up to the chief of staff or leadership to hold themselves accountable to
standards without somebody else checking it in place, I understand you don't have
the power to, but I just think there's inherently a problem there.
So those are all the questions I have. Thank you, Chairman.
Thank you.
I think we also have to keep in mind that
many of the employees, and I think we have to
discern two paths. We've got employees that are Shackman
exempt and employees that are not Shackman exempt.
And I think that we have to keep in mind that
theoretically you have two different
sets of rules on how certain situations are handled,
and not necessarily
points in progressive discipline and other things.
So I think we have to keep that in mind.
Now, I do believe that performance
reviews and evaluations are
a good tool for feedback in giving employees, and I think
that in some respects we need to move in that
direction. However, we need to make sure that our labor partner is also in
agreement with that as well. So she's in a, I would say,
fairly tough spot because while she does
have some authority in
some respects, but most of what she's doing is recommending to
various departments of things they should or may want to do, but
doesn't necessarily have the authority to implement or
require certain actions of
individuals. So I think as we
peel this onion back, may want to keep some of those things in mind in
respect to that. Go ahead.
Yeah. Chairman, to that point, I in my career have been on both sides of
discipline. I've been management in union environments, worked in a union, have
been held to discipline, and so I totally appreciate that.
I think when I talk about the need for those processes, it's not about being
punitive in any manner, but especially in a situation as we're seeing now
where lawsuits might start to be engaged potentially, just having
that kind of documentation allows people to know here's what exactly happened, and
the way it's also protective. And so I completely-
No, I-
... agree to that point.
That's fair.
I agree with you. Thank you, Chairman.
That's fair.
We have Alderman Lapata,
and after that I think we'll hit round two.
Thank you so much.
Go ahead, Alderman.
Thank you so much, Chair. Commissioner, thank you so very much for being with us.
I'm at five minutes. Five minutes? All right, I'll keep going.
Three quick questions. Number one,
I'm looking particularly at the section, it's 3040, employment
services, hiring and compensation.
This feels like the housing of some of the more severe cuts
within your department, particularly under employee processing
and under hiring classification.
It's hard because knowing how difficult it is to work through the process as it is,
how are we going to work within these cuts to make sure
that
our employees are getting processed as quickly as possible
so they can start their work?
Yes. As I said earlier, our capacity for our recruiters is
296 titles for 2025, and they
were only last year-
For all of 2025? I'm sorry.
I'm 296 per month
for 2025 versus the 110 that was
used per month in 2024.
Okay.
So I firmly believe with the staff I have, I can deliver the
services needed for the city.
Okay. We have confidence in you.
If you ever feel like it's challenging to meet those goals, please know that
there's a lot of listening ears. We're here to support you.
Thank you.
I know you've been asked riffs on the same question a few times today.
It was bound to happen with the media cycle.
A department head submits a memo to you outlining why it is
justified to put someone on a Do Not Hire list.
How are the claims in that memo
investigated and/or confirmed before that individual
is placed on the Do Not Hire list?
I don't have the authority to change
what the department head has put as the personnel
infraction that has got the employee on the list.
So they're not
investigated beyond what is listed in that memo?
Well, there should be,
especially with represented employees, there is a lengthy
progressive discipline process.
Okay.
And the same with career service employees.
I nevertheless
find that a bit disconcerting, but-
I'm not investigating what a department head is putting on the
list, but it should match the record of progressive discipline
that
an employee has received before the final termination.
I know, and I appreciate that, and it
distresses me that that puts you in a position
to be relying on a lot of trust and faith that what is in that memo
is accurate. I'll say that for myself.
You do not have to corroborate that opinion.
The last thing that I'll say is not related to your budget because you've answered
on the budget.
Folks who are curious about peace circles, I'm just saying this for public
information, it's worth visiting and making a plug for the
Restorative Justice Community Court that serves youth with
nonviolent offenses at St. Hyacinth Church
in the Avondale community. You can actually witness how youth
work out their behavioral issues in that space.
Whether that is in any way appropriate to sexual harassment
claims
is a bit beyond me, but they are effective in a
lot of places as an alternative to punitive discipline.
Just wanted to share that. Thank you, Chair.
Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman. Any other first rounders?
I've got two
second rounders.
Alderman Lopez?
Thank you again, Chairman.
Commissioner, if I can, through the chair,
the policy updates that you have
revised since assuming this position,
as well as what they were before the revisions.
If I can have,
through the chair,
a list or a breakdown of all of the CETA hiring
preferences for the past year.
I'm sorry, excuse me, I couldn't hear.
CETA preferences.
CETA hiring preferences?
Yes.
For the past year.
If we could have the applications
broken down by demographic and
result hired, not hired.
Additionally, when we speak of 103 days,
is that in reference to job posting to job
offering?
It's job posting to the person walking in the door,
and that's an average of all the hiring sequences
for 2024.
Then if you could provide me, through the chair, what the hiring
sequences are for those hired by department has been.
Yes.
Can you provide, through the chair as well, what the background check
accreditation
certificates received by the onboarding specialists are?
Yes.
Okay.
In the municipal code,
with regards to your ability to create layoff
determination policies,
I don't think we've necessarily had this direct conversation to date.
Do you have a determination or a list by department
of what the potential layoff
possibilities are, broken down per department?
No. We would have to
work with OBM and the department chairs to determine
what positions they would
want,
but we don't have that.
And just so my colleagues are clear, in the municipal code,
Section 274.050, among the rules that you,
Commissioner, are allowed to make are rules that
Section
Rule 10
says that for career service, that you are able to
create policies for employees to be laid off based on lack
of funds, work, or abolition of positions.
And as my colleagues and I are discussing downsizing and rightsizing
government,
has any attempt been made by OBM, the mayor, or yourself
to craft that in accordance with the law?
Well, we would be working with the various unions on
layoff lists, but that has not been
enacted yet.
But do you have a policy-
Yes
... in place?
Yes. We know
how to do the layoff process.
Okay. Then can you share, through the chair, what that policy is-
Yes
... both for those who are covered and those who are exempt-
Yes
... by department? Thank you.
Lastly,
I want to make mention of a couple things.
And for all of my colleagues and for those
participating or watching remotely,
I will say that your policy with regards to the IFR is posted online in its
entirety. I
have one question with regards to this, because I think we've beaten this to death,
and I've heard this throughout today.
When departments make recommendations for a terminated employee
based on those four categories that are listed in your policy, are those
recommendations that happen... So that policy was crafted
by you, the current policy, correct?
Along with the Department of Law.
Okay. So you and the law department crafted that policy.
Can you and the department then craft, without legislative
approval,
a review process
that takes their recommendation and puts a layer of justification through your
office? Or the ability to reject if it doesn't meet the criteria
stipulated in your policy?
Yes. We have the ability to update all of our
policies.
And again, we're open about
increasing transparency-
Okay
... driving accountability.
I'm not wedded to a policy.
Okay. I just want to make sure, because I know we've heard reference to having
our colleague in workforce development have to do it, but I'm glad to hear that you
can do that and hope you do. Lastly, I want to just make mention, if
I may, Chairman, with regards to some of the comments with regards to restorative
justice
as it relates to
not only what has transpired, but what may transpire in the future.
And I will say, Commissioner, that I think your policies with regards to what
gets you on this
list are very clear
as it relates to personnel, police, or other departmental specific issues.
But I want to say for those who are referring to restorative justice, peace
circles, and whatever else,
that requires an individual to actually want to make
restitution
and to have
a willingness to make amends for their issues.
95% of individuals that wind up on this, I am sure if they
are violating the law, if they are making racist, sexist,
homophobic, misogynistic comments,
that is a flaw within their character that you cannot change.
So I would be very, very careful for those who are making
light of this as being an optimum solution moving
forward for any of our issues, because
You cannot use restorative justice for people who are not seeing the flaw
in what they do. Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman.
What role, if any,
does the Human Resources board play
in any of this?
They're not really involved, if you're referring to the ineligible
for rehire list. They review cases of career
service
discipline.
Might they
be a
formal appellate function for review
of
the ineligible for rehire scenario?
Or
they seem to function in that capacity in other
phases of employment.
Would they not be a
body to maybe review or adjudicate something like this?
I would take that into consideration and study it further.
But their primary role is to review
employment decisions by the city
as an
independent arbiter of facts.
Right.
Okay.
Career service discipline.
Okay. All right.
Alderman Hopper, if you had a follow-up.
Thank you.
Just to follow up on the
alderman who was asking about the LGBTQ plus community and
self-identifying.
I think I saw that the mayor's office was also collecting
data about self-identified employees and
disabilities. Was that run through your office?
We
provided advice, but no, that was run through the mayor's office
and MOPD.
Okay. Is that kind of what you do also, is collect that kind of data?
I'm trying to understand what your
role is in that.
Collecting data, making sure that we have a
recruitment strategy,
and an inclusive strategy to bring in all types of people to work for
the City of Chicago.
And again, our recruiters do not know the demographics of the
applicants
to the City of Chicago.
But this year, 77% of our new hires
is people of color.
We can always do better, but I think we had a strong foundation this year.
That's terrific. I'd love to see that also expanded to
not only people of color, but increasing the number
of women who are employed by the city,
as well as increasing the number of people who
are disabled. Because I feel that that population is
also a great workforce,
and overlooked
many times for employment.
And I'm glad to know that you have a new disability officer and that you're
investing towards that end.
That's all I have. Thank you. I'm really concerned about the conversation that
we're having around
the do not hire list, how you get on it, how you get off of it.
I'd like to see
how we can work to prevent us from getting to
that point in the first place.
I'm also really concerned about the way that we're talking about restorative
justice in this room because our public schools
and our LSCs have invest a lot
in the last couple of years, especially since the pandemic,
on how
we resolve conflict.
So, I hope that we can continue to talk about ways that we can
not get to the point. And I also agree with my colleague,
everybody has to be involved in restorative justice
for it to be effective. Otherwise, it could be very harmful.
So it's not an easy thing that we're talking about today, but
I don't want to demean the purpose of restorative justice
practices, and also would like
help with you to
set some standards because, again, what happens here in this
building also happens across the ward and every
other
where we represent
in each of our wards. So please let's work together. Thanks.
Yes. Thank you, Alderman.
Thank you, Alderman. Alderman Riley, anything you wanted to
round two? All right. Vice Chair Lee.
Thank you, Chairman.
I'll be brief, and I apologize if I missed this earlier,
because I had to step away for a second.
So if there is a
department that's investigated a complaint against an employee for sexual
harassment,
and it's investigated and whoever the head of the department is has made a
ruling about a determination as to who they believe or whatever they think the
consequences should be.
Should one of the parties involved not agree with the
ruling? Is there an appeal process that exists today?
Well, first of all, the EEO office is the
body that would investigate a sexual harassment case.
EEO provides a recommendation to a
department head.
The department head
can either accept it or lessen it or increase it.
Okay.
And then they have to report back to EEO on what they did.
But EEO is the investigatory body for sexual harassment
cases.
Gotcha. Sorry that I missed that.
Okay. So in that process, though, if someone wants to appeal the decision,
regardless of which side of the argument that they fall
onto, is there an appeal process that exists?
I think
it's through the... I'll
Career service and go to HR.
It really depends on what level of discipline, and
you can always grieve your union discipline or career
service would go through the HRB board.
Yeah. And I know you can't comment on individual cases.
I think we're all talking about the same one here.
The nature of my question is just what
sort of due process do we have for anybody involved in these situations,
whether you've been accused of doing something or whether you're the
person who's reported
the violation?
I think that all of this conversation about the Do Not Hire list, there's a
lot of power that's been granted to anybody who has the ability to put someone on a
Do Not Hire list. If you are a public servant and you work in civil
service, that's something that could be career-ending at the end of the day.
And I think that there are times when that's warranted, and then I think that this
process has really elucidated that
there may be some policy things that your new policy person can take on.
I think it warrants really
fresh eyes on this, and to look at this from the perspective of
what has been working and what really is broken about this system.
And just to the other comments about restorative justice, I think this,
again, elucidates the need for some more consistent policies and options.
I think restorative justice
has its place, but it requires that all parties agree to it.
I think sometimes restorative justice is pushed
upon victims who aren't interested or ready to participate
in something like that. And if you're the victim of the crime, I think you should
be able to have that choice at the end of the day.
So I don't mind it as an option, as you're considering what
solutions might look like
to have educational outcomes in these.
But in some cases, the aggrieved person is the aggrieved person, and they're the
victim, and they should be able to choose whether or not they want to
engage in anything further beyond the
disposing of
consequences
by whoever's in charge. That's all I've got, but I appreciate all the work that you
guys have done. I know this is
a lot different than the last post that you held,
Commissioner. And to you and your team of amazing women,
clearly, all of you here,
for the work that you do. It is very difficult,
and that's not lost on any of us. But
there's work that needs to be done, and I think
most of you will recognize that. And on behalf of the folks in the
11th Ward, at least, thanks for all that you guys do. Thank you.
Thank you, Vice Chair. Any other
questions for HR?
All right. Well, thank you for joining with us today.
I too mentioned as we walked in, we didn't see any men
in your
cadre of professionals here.
Are you trying to tell us something, or?
He was sick today.
Oh, he was sick.
Sick.
He.
Not they, he.
He was sick, but-
Oh, okay. All right. Very well.
Again, thank you.
What'd you say?
Oh, that's not a good statement, man.
Not a good statement. Nonetheless,
thank you for your service. I know
you're in a unique space. HR is one of
those functions that we often
overlook and don't look at the adequacy in many
cases. And we see why many things
become necessary from a policy and a procedure standpoint.
And this has been an eye-opening experience for all of us, and I would expect
us to have some follow-up on many items that were discussed here
today. But again, I know this wasn't as easy as
Fleet and Facilities. I shouldn't say easy, but less controversial.
But nonetheless, we know that the department's in good
hands as it relates to your work, and we will expect
either a yellow form or something for you related
to some of your additional needs. So, with that being said,
you all are excused, and we will bring in the Department of
Environment shortly.
Thank you.
Good afternoon. We're here
back on with the Department of Environment.
We have Commissioner Tovar with us.
If you could
introduce yourself and the staff here in the box, as well as those that are in
the well.
First, we're going to have a
very brief overview from COFA on the Department
of the Environment.
Daniel Firstrom, Council Office of Financial Analysis.
Next up we have 072, the Department of Environment.
The recommended budget for FY25 is 2.4
million. This reflects a 40% decrease from the
revised budget for FY24.
The FTEs budgeted for FY25 recommended budget
remains unchanged at 14.
Additionally, the department operates with 79.9%
of its funding coming from the corporate fund,
with personnel costs making up 1.39 million and
non-personnel costs making up a million. Thank you.
Commissioner?
There you go.
There we go.
Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for being here with us.
My name is Angela Tovar. I am the commissioner of the Department of
Environment, and I'm also the chief sustainability officer for the City of
Chicago.
I'm joined to my right by our deputy, Jared Policicchio,
and in the box, we have our director of climate
and environmental justice initiatives, Lindy Wardlaw, as well as our
program management project management team,
which consists of Kyra Woods, Gabby Wagner Soberano,
Jackie Wrigley, Sophia Vella, Joe Argus,
and Jared Patton. And we also have members of the team that are out in the
gallery as well.
With your permission, Chair, I'll go ahead and read my opening statement.
Please do.
Okay.
Good afternoon, Chair Ervin, Vice Chair Lee, and honorable members of the City
Council. Thank you for the opportunity to speak before you today on
behalf of the Department of Environment.
After the historic passage of last year's budget, which included the
restoration of the DOE, I'm thrilled to be here today to share
more about our progress to date and vision for the upcoming fiscal year.
Before delving into the details, I want to extend my deepest gratitude to this
council for your steadfast partnership.
Together, we have laid the foundation for a more sustainable and equitable and
climate-resilient Chicago, and stand to make continued
progress in the upcoming fiscal year and beyond.
Our work in the DOE is guided by the Chicago Climate Action Plan,
which sets an ambitious goal of reducing Chicago's greenhouse gas
emissions
62% by 2040, while delivering tangible benefits to
every community.
This plan is our roadmap towards environmental justice, climate change impact
mitigation, and green economic investments in all 77 of
Chicago's neighborhoods.
At the core of our mission is our commitment to equity.
We are ensuring that those communities historically burdened by
environmental harms benefit the most from Chicago's climate
initiatives.
Some of our department accomplishments from last year that we would like to
highlight include the Cumulative Impacts Assessment and
Environmental Justice Action Plan.
We've completed the cumulative impact assessment to measure and
address environmental burdens across communities.
This data-driven report will guide our city's policies, ensuring that
environmental justice is embedded in decision-making processes.
Additionally, we continue to work cross-departmentally on an environmental justice
action plan, a coordinated strategy to address environmental
inequities across city agencies, focusing on pollution
reduction and equitable resource distribution.
The Chicago Recovery Plan. We continue to make tremendous
strides on the Chicago Recovery Plan.
Notable successes include RRoot Chicago, the tree planting initiative,
which in partnership with CDPH, DSS, and CDOT, has
planted thousands of trees in low-canopy communities.
And Chicago Electric, where in partnership with 2FM, we have made
substantial progress in electrifying our municipal fleet by
25% and installing over 200 EV charging
stations for the city fleet across Chicago.
The Climate Infrastructure Fund.
In 2024, in partnership with DPD, we awarded $6
million to nonprofit organizations and small businesses
to support renewable energy, green infrastructure, and electric
vehicle adoption, ensuring that underserved communities benefit from
Chicago's transition to a green economy.
Collaboration and stakeholder engagement.
Our department has worked with an extensive network of partners,
including community-based organizations, academic
institutions, business leaders, state agencies, and other
city departments to create solutions to meet Chicago's climate
challenges. This approach has strengthened our initiatives from climate
resiliency to tree equity to clean energy programs and
beyond.
In 2024, our team committed to maximizing funding through the Inflation
Reduction Act and other federal programs.
We supported city departments, community organizations, and sister
agencies through funding to advance bus
electrification, community-wide energy planning,
citywide EV charging, and more.
Less than a year into our formal establishment of the Department of Environment,
we focused on building capacity by nearly tripling in
size and hiring personnel skilled in administration,
project management, communications, and grants management.
These hires are essential to supporting the department's expanded scope,
particularly as we continue to explore future opportunities to
migrate existing environmental functions and duties under its purview.
Looking forward to 2025, we will continue to prioritize equity,
sustainability, and climate resilience across all aspects of our
work. We plan to advance environmental justice
policy. One of our top priorities is in continued development
of the cumulative impacts policy.
This legislation will formalize environmental justice considerations in city
decision-making. Ensuring that we proactively address the compounded
impacts of environmental and social stressors on vulnerable communities.
We will scale up green infrastructure solutions.
We're working with the Department of Water Management to publish Chicago's updated
green stormwater infrastructure strategy, which will include
initiatives to manage flood risks, advance nature-based solutions, and
improve water quality. We will also continue our tremendous
progress on Space to Grow, a partnership with DWM,
CPS, and MWRD to create resilient and healthy
schoolyards for Chicago Public Schools.
Promote climate resiliency. In collaboration with OEMC, Cook
County, and community partners, we will continue to support the city's response
to extreme weather through heat mitigation efforts, air quality monitoring,
strategy building, and analysis.
Expand sustainable transportation.
Building on the success of Chicago Electric, we will continue to partner with
2FM to develop a comprehensive fleet electrification plan,
complete with actionable goals and recommendations.
This plan will position Chicago as a leader in fleet transition and emissions
reduction. Furthermore, we will serve as a partner to CDOT
to support their ongoing planning efforts and implementation of their
equitable citywide public charging program.
As part of our focus on creating healthier energy-efficient homes, we will
co-lead with DOH the rollout of retrofit programs for one
to four-unit homes and multifamily buildings.
Through Green Homes Chicago, we aim to deliver much-needed retrofits that improve
energy efficiency, address outstanding deferred maintenance,
lower utility costs, and enhance the comfort and health of residents.
We will seek opportunities to expand our reach to coordinate more directly with
residents, sector leaders, community organizations, youth, and this
council. We are thrilled to launch the Shoreline Advisory Board and
the Data Center Working Group this year and will continue to create
avenues for cross-sector coordination on important climate-related
issues.
This past year has been one of tremendous progress, and the years ahead
present even greater opportunities.
We stand ready to continue to build on the foundation that we've laid,
advancing climate and environmental justice for all Chicagoans,
especially in the face of changes at the federal level.
Our success relies on continued partnership with this council, our
communities, and our city departments.
As we consider the budget for FY 2025, I ask for your
support in empowering the Department of Environment to continue to fully
realize its mission. Together, we can ensure that Chicago remains at the
forefront of climate action with a focus on justice and
equity. Thank you for your time and partnership, and we are happy to
answer any questions that you may have at this time. Thank you.
Thank you, Commissioner.
We're going to start with the chair of the Committee on Environment,
Chair Hatton.
Thank you, Chairman.
And thank you, Commissioner. It's great to see you and your team.
And one advantage of many of chairing this committee is being
able to go first at 4:00 PM on Tuesday with
multiple departments still to go.
So in looking at your budget,
it appears that
you're maintaining the same number of positions that were budgeted for 2024 into
2025 at 14. I know that you did
recently get to fill four of those positions with some new project managers,
which we're very excited about.
Just wondering that as your department is slowly growing,
and thinking about positions that existed in the Department of
Environment kind of pre-2011, are there any
positions
currently or as you're looking into 2025 that would be coming
back to your department that had previously existed under the Department of
Environment?
Chair, thank you for your question.
Currently, there is not a plan to migrate positions
for 2025 beyond what we have in our budget.
However, there is a commitment to an ongoing
study to explore the future of the Department of Environment.
As you know, we have undertaken efforts over the course of a couple
of years now to look at the best structure for the city, and we did a landscape
analysis of ways in which departments of environment
served various cities across the country.
And now we are going to, in the coming months, with the
support of CCA,
to conduct an additional study to look at where
the environmental positions lie within the city and what the potential
opportunities are to migrate additional positions
for future budgets.
Thank you. And I appreciate and I know as
myself and other alders have had the opportunity to work with you over the last
several years in
combined efforts to
build this department. I've appreciated the fact that you've been able to do
studies, and I just want to point out, I know your department is small, but it is
mighty. And as we have asked other departments
like the police department and even HR earlier today,
we've asked people, and I just want my colleagues to know, departments can do these
studies.
Commissioner Tovar and her team have looked at other cities' departments.
They've looked at their staffing, and that's how the work has been done to build
our staffing. So I appreciate the work that you have done because it is
frustrating to sit here year after year with other departments that we ask
to do the same thing, and they haven't been able to come through.
And so I appreciate, even with your limited resources, that you've been able to do
that and continue to work on this path and make
continual year-over-year progress.
A question around some of the things that we know that are part of the
growth of your department. So, one of the primary reasons a lot of
us wanted to reestablish this department is to give the Department
of Environment enforcement authority.
We hear from our constituents all the time,
concerns around air quality, environmental pollution,
how are we keeping our community safe and clean and healthy?
And so,
we know a lot of our enforcement positions are currently under CDPH.
Going into 2025, are there any changes that
we're going to see in kind of enforcement authority or regulatory
authorities that are going to come under your department?
Sure. Thank you for the question. So in terms of regulatory
authority related to environmental enforcement and permitting,
for 2025, that will remain
with the Chicago Department of Public Health.
I should mention that we are seeking a
transfer of one authority from
BACP, and that's related to benchmarking.
So buildings over 50,000 square feet in the city of
Chicago are required to adhere to the benchmarking ordinance, which means that they
report on their energy use on an annual cadence.
That is something that this team has managed for quite some time.
But formally, it has been under the purview of
BACP. And so with the support of the BACP commissioner,
as well as OBM and the mayor's office, we are recommending
to make that transfer to the Department of Environment.
Fantastic. And I know there's more work to do, but really glad to see that
progress
as we move forward, so thank you for that.
I will say that
I've got some questions about going into 2025 on the
ComEd franchise agreement. Could you give us just an update on
where that stands and what you hope to see for 2025?
Sure. So I
think one thing to point out, which is important, is
that both of our utilities this past year
had rate cases at the ICC, the Illinois Commerce
Commission. So the Department of Environment, in coordination with
the Department of Law and under the leadership of the mayor's office,
we were interveners in those cases.
It was important for us to advocate
as both utilities presented rate increases, as well as
plans to the IECC on the future, in the case
of ComEd, and the future of their grid plan.
So what does grid planning look like?
How do we ensure that that's happening equitably?
How do we ensure that investments are being made?
Those were things that were very important to us as a department.
And so that work, especially given our size, did
require us to
prioritize the ICC rate cases.
Both of those cases for the utilities will be wrapped up.
ComEd's should be wrapped up by the end of this month, which will then
allow us to revisit the franchise for 2025.
Great. Thank you. And I'll take a round too, Chairman.
Go
ahead. Go ahead.
Oh, okay. Awesome. Thank you.
Easy.
All right.
So I know that some of your 2025 initiatives are going to be around the
Inflation Reduction Act.
And with the outcome of the election, and it seems
like some of our climate goals and federal funding could be at risk
with the incoming presidential administration, at least some of his stated goals.
Have there been talks within your department or with other partners,
even especially at the state level,
about what we can do to safeguard some of our efforts at the local and state
level?
Yes, absolutely.
Following the
election night really, the following day, and also
just given the amount of money that's at stake.
And just for context for the rest of the gallery, the Inflation
Reduction Act was the largest climate investment in the history of the
country. And so there was
opportunities and tax credits and grants, formula funding, and other
resources that were available at the municipal level for
nonprofit organizations
and for state agencies to advance their climate
priorities using this funding.
We, as the Department of Environment, we're
in partnership with many departments and sister agencies, aggressively pursue
dollars
for the city of Chicago,
as well as supported many nonprofit partners who pursued dollars
to support their own climate initiatives.
We are hopeful that the state of Illinois got a
substantial award from the Inflation Reduction Act through the Climate
Pollution Reduction grant, and they also received some
additional funding. And
between those two awards, we're talking upwards of about
$600 million.
And so because of that, we have pivoted
very quickly to having discussions with the
USEPA and as well as the state to say, "How can we
ensure that shovel-ready projects that exist in Illinois are
prioritized for this funding?"
We are less concerned about funding that has already been awarded,
funding where the entities have already signed the grant agreement.
It'll be more difficult to untangle that funding should the administration
deprioritize
IRA.
And in this case, in the case of the state of Illinois, they have
already wrapped up their grant agreement.
And so we are
very hopeful that the plans that the governor's office has put in
place to advance these various programs will still move
forward, and that we could be a partner at the city level in
advancing those projects as well.
It's good to hear, and thank you guys for proactively
looking into that. I know it's been on my mind and a lot of our
community members' minds, not just as it relates to your department, but so many of
our important programs and projects here in the city.
Last question that I've got for you.
What role does the Department of Environment currently play with regard to city
contracts?
So,
in October, a local environmental group put out a report called "Paid to Pollute,"
saying that there isn't any city department that's monitoring the environmental
requirements and city contracts like those that go through the Department of
Transportation.
The Department of Public Health has said that they're not responsible for
monitoring those vendors or contracts, and that they don't have a process for it.
It doesn't appear that CDOT monitors environmental compliance.
Has your department been given authority to have a role in
this?
So we do not have formal authority either.
However, I should say that we are the conveners of the
Environmental Justice Action Plan.
And what that is, is a cross-departmental working group that we
convened at the same time that we convened the cumulative impacts
assessment report. So in the development of the report and
understanding the data that was presented, especially looking at how
pollution impacts vary across a number of
communities, we knew that it was important to also convene
cross-departmentally every department that touches
essentially air, land, and water, to say we need to come
together and identify solutions.
Given the unique role that procurement plays,
they're not a regulatory agency, they don't necessarily have purview
over one of those things, but their role
has impacts and implications on the environment.
And so they have been great partners in naming a
goal of better incorporating some of those
ideas in their procurement processes to understand
where,
through their processes, they can minimize environmental
harm. So they have been wonderful partners.
We've been meeting with them, and have been meeting with them even
though they've had a commissioner transition
recently. They have been really wonderful in remaining at that table, and we're
confident that we'll continue to work with them
to devise the strategies to address some of the things that were highlighted in the
report.
And on that note,
and this can be a through the chair request if necessary.
I know we have plenty of opportunities to engage on this.
But in thinking about this, is that a sufficient mechanism?
Do you see some need, and do other departments of environments
that we're kind of modeling towards in other cities, do those
departments have more oversight or regulatory authority?
And is that something that we should be considering in city council?
Sure. It would be too premature for me to respond
today. I don't know what that regulatory authority looks like in other
cities, and of course, that's a conversation that I would want to have with our
partners across departments.
Sure.
It's certainly something with every
environmental justice action plan, the commitment has been there.
I think that everyone that is involved in that process is
identifying a number of strategies.
Some of them could potentially lead to policies.
I don't think that that's off the table.
So it's certainly something that we hope to continue to work through with the
procurement team.
Thank you. And thank you, Chair.
All right.
I know Alderman Lospada had questions. Any other folks with questions?
Let's keep in mind it's $2 million. So, okay.
Alderman Lospada, followed by Vice Chair Lee.
Thank you very much.
Commissioner, I really appreciate the work that you and your team do.
I'll ask literally two
brief questions because
Chair Hadden asked some of the best ones there.
In terms of,
I think outside of what your team and your department can
do through the corporate fund, something that a lot of us had hoped
for was to find ways for your
department to be competitive for grants that would support
environmental and sustainability work.
It looks like currently
there's only one grant that is currently supporting your
department directly on page
581, the Energy Efficiency and Conservation
Block Grant, which seems also substantially reduced
from 2024. I'm wondering if you or your team can
tell us more about what that grant accomplishes and what are
grants that we might
seek to apply for that would support the work of your department in the future?
Sure.
Thank you for that question, and you are correct.
We have aggressively tried to pursue funding.
Because of the cross-departmental nature of our work, some of that
funding was awarded, in the case of the EECBG grant,
directly to the Department of Environment.
That decrease that you see in that number is because we sub-awarded some
elements of that to other departments.
So the EECBG grant is
supporting some of
our work internally at the department as well as work
within 2FM to support their fleet
electrification planning, additional planning for that, as well as building
energy audits for our own internal buildings here at the city.
And then a portion of that fund will also go to the Department of Transportation to
support their fleet electrification planning.
Some of the other awards that the city has received for Inflation
Reduction Act, again, we've been very supportive and have been partners in
supporting other departments in
whatever they need to pursue those dollars.
So just to highlight a couple of those that the city has received
We did receive a $6.86 million grant for
our tree initiative to do the tree inventory
work, and that will be going directly to
DSS to help advance that work. Our Bureau of
Forestry department,
EECBG, as you already mentioned. CDOT, I know that they
were here yesterday. They received $15 million for the charging and
fueling infrastructure grant to support citywide and
equitable EV charging.
And then we still have a number of grants that are still pending.
So the city is still waiting for
news about an award from the USEPA
related to our building codes work.
That would be a $20 million grant.
And we were also partners with a
citywide
group of nonprofit organizations, 11 collaborating
community organizations, for another $17 million
proposal, a community change grant with the EPA
to support community-led climate resiliency programs.
So we have been aggressive.
Busy.
We've been busy. So again, some of those awards we're still waiting to
hear, and others we've been successful as a city.
So,
when it comes to environmental work,
every department that's advancing this, that's our success too.
We support them in any way that we can to pursue those dollars.
And
we're very proud of the success that our
peers have seen in pursuing these dollars as well, and hope to continue to support
them.
I had a feeling that it was a lot more than what I saw in the paper, and I really
appreciate you sharing. I share the support of those who
would love to see, in the future, more
functionality and head count
come to the Department of the Environment.
With the time that we have left, I know that there was a
site visit recently to the renewable energy
site that is going to be powering our municipal facilities.
With the time I have left, I'm wondering if you could share how that site visit
went and what the implementation of this project is going to look like in
2025.
Yes. So the implementation of our 100%
renewable energy goal will look
like,
come midnight January 1st,
the City of Chicago
will proudly be able to state that we will be powered by 100% renewable
energy.
And a big portion of that is made possible by
the solar farm, the Double Black Diamond, which is located in
Waverly, Illinois.
We are very proud of that project as the city.
This was the first equity-focused RFP that
ever
hit the market
in terms of requiring equity provisions as part of the project.
So we really did change the market with ensuring that there were
elements of this project that benefited both the state of Illinois
and the City of Chicago. So we're very proud that
the solar farm is being built here, right in Illinois.
We're very proud to report that the developers have hit
their labor provisions. There is a project labor agreement in place
for the project. They have also hit their equity
hiring requirements that are guidelines that are put forth in the
state of Illinois statute through CEJA.
And there is also a community benefits agreement from the
developer back to,
this year it's Chicago Women in Trades.
Wow.
So the energy supplier is supporting Chicago Women in Trades.
They are giving them funding to train a cohort of BIPOC
women
that have had
solar training to support future projects like this one.
And that will be continued support throughout
the time that the city has that contract.
That's fantastic. Really exciting. Thank you for sharing. Thank you, Chair.
Thank you. Vice Chair Lee, any others for questions?
Alderman Taylor have had, and Alderman Hanah.
Thanks, Chair.
Go ahead.
Hi. How are you?
Hi.
Good to see you. I'm going to just pick up where Alderman Laspada left
off, and I just got a couple follow-up questions.
On the 100% renewable energy for municipal buildings,
what's the impact on the grid, actually, of us doing that?
So the impact of the grid in terms of-
Just like, I know it's like an exchange, right?
We're being powered by solar
because we're funding this program, the Double Black Diamond
program, but we're not necessarily taking our power off of the grid,
right?
Power's still coming to us the way that it's been coming to us for a long time.
I
guess for a layman's understanding, what does that actually mean at the end of the
day?
Would you like to take it?
Yeah. Thanks for the question, Alderman. Jared Pellicciotto.
I'm the deputy on the commissioner's team.
I think I understand what you're getting at, and I think maybe the easiest way to
understand why we think this is important is
there's different ways that
a corporation or an organization like Chicago could say it's
becoming 100% renewable. And sort of the easy way out,
you can
buy on a market these credits called renewable energy credits, and it's kind of a
paper transaction. I think why this project's important for
us is we're adding new supply
right here in Illinois onto the grid.
So this is a
very large project. That was one of the results. Alderman Laspada's left.
That's one of the results of the site visit.
I mean, it-
Here's a quick factoid to give you a sense of the scale of this facility.
It could take a maintenance person upwards of 30
minutes to drive. They're working on a panel in one part of the facility-
Mm-hmm
... 30 minutes to reach
a panel on the opposite end. It's quite large.
It's about 600 megawatts of capacity, which will likely make
it the largest solar facility east of the Mississippi when it opens on
January 1. So, when we talked to the experts when we were
planning this project,
what we consistently heard was that if we as a
city, country, state,
globe, want to
reduce the impacts of climate change, we need to just add
massive amounts of renewable energy as quick as we can.
And that's what we're able to do here with our buying power.
So I think that's the way. I don't know if that's what you're getting at, but
that's the way to think about what this is doing.
Directionally it is. I just wondered if there was something like
when you drive a
electric vehicle, it's taking however many more cars off the road or how many.
Yeah.
I don't know if there's...
Again, for the layperson, I think it's just
when I talk to my constituents about why this is such a big deal, I want to
be able to just articulate it in a way that
we can
make it as simple as because we're getting all
of our electricity for municipal buildings through solar now,
that is equivalent to not burning five tons of coal-
Yeah
... or something like that.
And we do have that number. Chicago is expected to reduce its
carbon footprint by more than 290,000 metric tons
each year.
Equivalent to the emissions associated with 62,000
passenger vehicles.
That's perfect
and that's great. That's incredible work.
Can you talk really briefly, and I don't need a round two, just about
how climate infrastructure grants have been spent this
past year?
Yes, I can. So we're very proud of the
success of the Climate Infrastructure Fund.
Again, that was $6 million that was
allocated this year
to small businesses as well as nonprofit organizations.
In terms of the spend for climate infrastructure funds,
I am going to ask my colleague, Lindy Wardlaw, to just
report on the progress related to the fund.
Thank you, Commissioner. So we have been working closely with Department of
Planning and Development and working with our 50.
We have 54 that were awarded, 50 moving forward in contracts.
Our goal is to have the
bulk of them in contract by the end of the year.
We've been working to help them firm up their scopes after they meet with
contractors. We're finding that a number of
those that were proposed, costs have changed, and so we're readjusting scopes
accordingly.
But we have a total of
18 renewable energy or energy efficiency projects, 21
electric vehicle projects, and
11 green infrastructure
projects that are moving forward right now across the city.
That's great. Thank you. Chair, that's all I've got.
Thank you.
All right. Thank you much, Alderman Taylor.
Thank you, Chairman. How you doing, Commissioner?
Nice to see you.
What is the work that you all plan to do to hold the railroads accountable?
The railroads that are accountable.
So, what I will say is two things.
One is that the
Department of Environment currently today does not have regulatory authority
related to environmental enforcement.
That is the power of the Chicago Department of Public
Health today. However, we understand that there are
tremendous impacts that come from the railroads.
We have talked directly to members of your community,
as well as communities across the city that have been concerned about
the impacts. One tangible thing that we have worked on this year and
that we're advocating for, some of that money that I
mentioned that the state has been awarded,
that is money that is going to addressing emissions,
particularly for railroad facilities.
I would love to talk to you more and to circle back to the
state as that money comes forward to talk about shovel-ready projects
and ideas for emissions reduction for your community.
Because that is something we know is important.
We know we need to address those impacts.
And now that we have money in place where we can pursue
projects,
this is our time to advocate at the state level to ensure that
that money is utilized to minimize those impacts in your
community. So would love to
have a greater discussion about what that looks like and where we can support you
in that effort.
I want to make sure that you all understand the
seriousness
of the railroad being in a community full of young people.
Literally,
one of the railyards is across
the street from a school and then across the street from a building that
houses at least 400 families that include children.
And the amount of asthma idling those trucks do
and just pollution from that company, and
I get the same kind of talk. And
of course you know this is not what I'm giving to you.
I just want to make sure-
Of course
... that the folks in our community are aware that this is
something that even the
The deal that was made with Norfolk Southern was done with the federal
government, which is D**k Durbin, and the
alderman before myself. And they've done little to nothing to hold them
accountable with even the cleanliness of the railroad.
And so they continue to buy more land in my ward.
They're now trying to buy another strip of land in my ward when they're already
bad actors. And so I want to make sure and work with you all, so this is
not Alderman Taylor throwing the responsibility on you.
I want us to work together to hold them accountable.
Because I literally am being asked as of now to use my menu
money to put up signs that say you cannot park your trucks
from this street to this street, and you cannot idle your trucks.
I shouldn't have to take out of my menu money to do that.
That is a responsibility that the railroad should have.
They also are not responsible for fixing the roads.
So their trucks are tearing up streets that I'm being made to use my menu money to
get repaired. And so we have a real problem.
I want you all to work extra hard with, his name
is John. Let me tell you his name.
I get emails from the gentleman all the time. Have never met him.
It's John Paul Jones.
Oh, yes. Yes.
From Englewood.
Mm-hmm.
He's brilliant with the things that he talks about environmentally.
I've never met him in person, I kid you not.
But I get his emails and texts all the time.
But he is on point, and he's been living in Englewood to deal with the
railroad. And it's just not Norfolk Southern.
Canadian Railroad as well. I've never ever
even talked to one contact person from their organization.
And so it's problematic when the federal government, our congresspeople, get to
make those decisions, but it's left to be thrown in the ward.
And so I'm made to deal with it.
And so I want us to have a real conversation about that.
Also with looking at land in our wards.
I have myself, Alderman Scott, Alderman Coleman,
and Alderwoman Dow have a lot of vacant land.
We know that historically, that land is not being cleared, but it seems
like we'll still sell it off.
Mm-hmm.
And so that is a real problem. And there's one patch of land in my
ward that has this big tower on it with these metal pokes in it.
I've continued to ask what it is, who owns it, where does it come
from? And it's literally right behind my office, so it's on 56th
and Lafayette.
Okay.
And so those are the type of things.
And I want you all to take a good look at tire shops
and folks who are doing construction in our ward, because my ward has been a
dumping ground for folks who do that all the time, and there's no
real follow-up, there's no real conversation with these folks.
Even when we know in our community people are doing construction.
We pay enough money for cameras. I'm pretty sure we can catch
people who do fly dumping. I want you all to have a serious conversation
about those tickets and what they look like. That's really all I got.
Thank you, Chairman. Thank you, Commissioner.
Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman Taylor. Alderman Anna Hoepnerwirth?
Thank you, Chair. Hi, Commissioner.
Hi. Alderwoman.
Last time I saw you maybe at the DNC,
and you were doing a special project over there.
Can you speak a little bit about that?
Sure. I had the privilege of serving as the
chair of the Sustainability Subcommittee for the
DNC.
So that was a unique opportunity for us as the City of
Chicago to advance sustainability,
and to
pursue the title of the most
sustainable DNC ever, right? So we
got to work on a number of different initiatives.
We partnered with CDOT
to work on a bus idling plan to reduce emissions and
idling
for buses that were transporting passengers
to and from the venues.
We were able to work on
micro-mobility projects as well, encouraging people to take public
transportation, as well as utilizing our Divvy system, which
was really exciting.
And then the highlight, of course, for us, was the work that we were able to
achieve with recycling and food waste diversion, and
in particular, food rescue.
So we were able to divert,
I believe that the end count was
700,000
pounds of food recovered
that would've otherwise gone to the waste stream, that was redistributed to
nonprofit organizations across the city.
So it certainly sets a precedent for how we, as a
city, when we prepare for large scale events, what we can do
differently to ensure that we are meeting the
moment and
redistributing resources that would otherwise go to the waste stream, that we could
use them to benefit communities across the city.
In addition to that, there is a state law that will go in place on
January 1 requiring all large venues to
recycle and to compost.
Mm-hmm.
So it was an opportunity to work with experts in the sustainability
field, consultants that were hired by the DNC,
and to pilot what this looks like in practice.
So since the DNC, we have been convening some of those large venues.
That's something that we've already been working on in coordination with some of
those consultants, as well as Cook County Department of Environment, to
say, "You'll be subject to this law come January 1.
We want everybody to be successful here, and we'd like to
share the success that we've had during the DNC so that we can help
think through some of the challenges for your venue." So come
January 1, we'll start to see a lot of venues across the city,
if they haven't already incorporated sustainability practices, those should become
much more noticeable.
Terrific. I love to hear it. Anything that we could do to
divert from our
landfills, that would be terrific.
And we would like to be able to incorporate those things at the ward level too.
So I hope that we can work together towards that and
increase the people who are actually composting in the wards.
I had a question about weather's getting colder,
and can you speak on
ways that you might be working with OEMC?
Seeing you work at the DNC is really inspiring.
I like to see you working across so many different agencies.
And I'm concerned about the people who are houseless right now, of course.
But how are you working right now with
OEMC around extreme weather or disaster preparedness, like
right now and also long-term?
Yes. So we have a project manager on our
team that is dedicated to climate resiliency, which is
important for all of the reasons you just mentioned, right?
We're seeing more extreme
weather events. You're seeing extreme heat, extreme cold, and we know that that
has a huge impact on vulnerable populations.
So I'd like to ask my colleague, Kyra Woods, if she'd like to just talk a
little bit about our relationship with OEMC and some of the things that we've been
able to do collectively this year.
Sure.
Great. Thank you. And thank you for the question as well.
As the Department of Environment, we're very grateful for the partnership that
we've been able to develop over the last few years with the Office of
Emergency Management, particularly to assist with several
plans, both at the hyperlocal city municipal level, as well as
with the county, understanding that both of those emergency management
teams are responsible for the formal planning and execution of emergency
response efforts. So at the county level, the Department of Environment
has worked with OEMC to support the hazard mitigation
planning efforts, and that is formally done at the county level, but we will
also move forward to do that at the city in the near future as
well. We assisted with what is called the Chicago
Urban Area Threats and Hazard Identification
process as well. The THIRA and SPR is what
usually they call it. But that allows us to identify which hazards and
risks will most impact our area, and also assess
how we are prepared to respond to it.
And so we are in the middle of updating that as well, and DOE is assisting in that
process as a contributing stakeholder.
Next year is the year that we will also support OEMC in
developing or rather updating the emergency operation
plan. That's also critically important and goes hand in hand with the
THIRA and SPR. That is where there are
annexes for specific emergency weather
instances, like extreme heat or extreme cold, and that's where the
details are as to what roles and responsibilities each
department has.
Mm-hmm.
And so the update in 2025 will be very important and an
opportunity to say, as our climate patterns are changing,
are these thresholds for action appropriately set?
And are those actions associated, or written in that
EOP appropriate for what we would like to do as Chicago?
It's primarily a response tool.
Mm-hmm.
And so I think we should also give some thought to some of those longer-term
planning efforts that can help us with preparedness, and that is where
our team really, I think, is well suited to think about climate
resiliency and long-term vulnerability reduction, along with
departments like the Department of Public Health and OEMC.
Thank you. I appreciate that, and thank you for all your work
towards that end. Can I ask another question?
Are you-
Quickly.
I had a question about
your transition plan,
and actually, the mayor announced a transition plan for this
department.
And I was curious how it differs from the environmental
governance study that was done in 2023.
Firstly, is that publicly available?
And then can you speak on
what's the end goal for that transition, and
what does that look like?
Sure. So the environmental governance study that was
conducted is complete, and we can make sure that you get a
copy. That's information that is publicly available.
That is the landscape analysis that
Chair Hadden mentioned,
that looks at the various structures of how environmental
functions
function within city governments across the country, right?
So what does that structure look like?
For some cities, there is a sustainability office at
the mayor's office level. For some cities, it's a hybrid.
For New York City, for example, it's much like Chicago.
The Commissioner of the Department of Environment is the chief sustainability
officer there as well. So there's different ways that cities
organize and structure their environmental teams.
Some of them have enforcement authority, some of them are focused on climate
mitigation,
some of them are both. And so we did an analysis of what
those various structures look like and then
presented that information to the mayor to determine the best
structure for the City of Chicago.
We
made the recommendation. He wanted to
retain both the chief sustainability officer and the commissioner of the Department
of Environment as the same person.
And so that is the structure that we're using now.
But he also wanted and
he deeply cared about reestablishing the Department of Environment.
That was a goal of his. So we went with the model to have
the-
The chief sustainability officer report directly to the mayor's office and
to maintain that
department structure to have everything under one umbrella.
For the second study that we will be pursuing
for 2025,
we have a little bit more work to be done in terms of
understanding the regulatory functions that exist within the city
now, and what positions we'd like to migrate
under the umbrella of the Department of Environment.
With the budget considerations that we have to make, with some of the budget
constraints that other departments have, it's not just a clean
break, right? We can't just take a list of positions and say, "We're moving all of
these over," given that there are some functions
within departments that may have multiple roles that serve one or two
teams. So it really does require a deeper analysis to better
understand what makes sense for the coming
year and for next year's budget. So that's the work that we're going to
continue to do to be able to
sort that out.
Thank you. I appreciate your work.
Thank you.
That's all I got. Thank you, Chair.
Thank you. Any other questions?
Okay. Alderman Vasquez, and
Alderman Conway. All right.
Thank you very much, Chairman. I'll just get to the questions.
So I know you're working with DOH on the Green Homes program for low-income
constituents, and I'm excited to see the work that comes from that.
I have some constituents who are interested in voluntarily greening their homes and
can pay without subsidy. One constituent,
shout out to folks in our environmental board in particular, has been
having a very hard time finding a city-licensed contractor who is willing to do
electrical work in order to move to a heat pump system.
Can we have your commitment to work with our office and Department of Buildings on
streamlining electrical permit process for folks who want to
voluntarily green their homes?
Sure. So I'd have to know what some of the challenges are first.
So I will say that our electric utility does maintain a list of
electrical contractors that are
licensed and trained to install heat pumps.
So
I think what you are pointing to is that we, as the city,
can do a better job of navigating on behalf of our
residents, where those resources are, right?
We know a lot of people want to voluntarily pursue solar,
want to pursue heat pumps. This is a journey that I'm on
myself, personally. We've just done those things in my own home.
And it does require navigation and understanding of where
those resources lie.
Yeah.
One of the things that we will be working on in 2025, with
that EECBG funding,
is to be able to provide a more front-facing
resources for people so that there is sort of that one-stop shop
of where to go to pursue some of these resources.
So we do want to consolidate that and have that available from the
DOE and our website to encourage more people to take
advantages of the resources that are available. They're tremendous right now.
We still have tax credits, we have utility incentives, and we want to make sure
that people, one, realize those are available to them, and that two,
that they're taking advantage of the opportunities while we have them.
So it's certainly something that we commit to doing in the coming
year. Regarding the streamlining of the
electrification process, I'd have to check in
with my fellow commissioner, Marlon Hopkins.
We have a really wonderful working relationship.
She's been a tremendous partner on many things
buildings related. So I'd be happy to talk to her and you, if
you'd like to talk about some ideas that you may have for thinking through ways we
could support that effort.
Yeah, that'd be great. It is thinking about the end user, right?
When you have somebody who voluntarily wants to do the thing, how we can help them
and walk with them through their journey, whether it's regulatory permits or
whatnot. So yeah, thank you for that.
Next, during CDPH's hearing, I asked some questions about the air monitoring
project. Per the responses, it seems as if CDPH intends to keep this
project and move forward with it, even though we've heard from community groups
that there's been no action on air monitoring for the last month.
Do you think that community air monitoring is an environmental project, and would
you be in support of moving it under DOE? Why or why not?
Just so we have clarity on that.
So I do want to convey that the
Department of Environment is a partner of CDPH's on that project, and
we will remain a partner. I know that they recently had a
staff transition,
which is part of the reason why there was a delay in
the project. Dr. Ige has mentioned that and
has committed to continuing progress on
that project. And so,
I am going to remain in partnership with her to make sure that that project moves
forward. We meet at a biweekly cadence,
Dr. Ige and I, to talk about environmental issues, and
we'll continue to work in partnership to make sure that that moves forward.
Thank you very much. Through the chair, can you share how the DOE
spent its money by project in 2024 and its plans to
spend money by project in 2025, just to get an understanding for us?
Sure. Our budget is small. So we do
not have any project-specific budgets currently.
We will be issuing RFPs for our first contracts.
We have one RFP for the green infrastructure
plan that we just mentioned in our
remarks. That would be the only project-related
spend that we have. Most of our non-personnel budget goes to
general administration of our department.
Okay, awesome.
Last year, we talked about how the DOA has a lot of different plans,
and there was talk about hiring a public information officer to help convey that to
the public.
Has the hiring of that position been filled?
And can you share, through the chair, any communications plans for this year?
Yes.
Okay.
So we have filled that position,
and we can share some details about what we have planned for
2025.
Oh, I have more questions, but I can send those through the chair.
I think you guys do incredible work, and it is even more
vital with the incoming presidential administration as we're thinking about
how they look at this stuff. And so
I feel very good about the fact that you're in this position, as is your team,
and want to make sure that we do everything we can as a council to support your
work. So, thank you so much again, and challenge us to do better.
Thank you. Thank you, Chairman.
I appreciate that. Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman. Alderman Conway.
Yeah. Actually, my questions kind of dovetail off the
first subject that Alderman Vasquez asked.
As
I look out over the city, I don't see
solar on the roofs of any government buildings, and I don't really see
much solar on the roofs of any private buildings.
And
I would love for you to tell us
what we can do to make that happen. I'm sure there's some...
And I know a lot of that is probably with the Department of Buildings too, but I'd
welcome your guidance on what you think we can do to improve that.
Especially since, I believe,
among the Inflation Reduction Act, we can get cash payments for
the ITC now, so that we could actually take advantage of that.
But anyway, I'll leave it there and...
Sure. So I should mention that the city is
pursuing a pilot project right now-
Mm-hmm
... to do retrofits of four libraries, as well as
rooftop solar. The retrofit element of this work is
important because we're lowering our energy use, which,
as you know-
Yeah
... as a solar expert, is critical. Right?
We want to ensure that we're lowering
the energy use in buildings before we add
solar. So we are piloting what that looks like on
city-owned assets today.
And so
we have four libraries that are in the queue.
Some of those retrofits are already underway at two libraries, and
then we've also received some congressional discretionary
funds to support two more libraries.
And so that is just a pilot right now, but it certainly sets a precedent
for
investing back in our building portfolio.
That's why the EECBG funding that we talked about is so critical, because we'll be
able to do building energy audits and work with
Commissioner
Tomlin Hernandez at 2FM to think about a
plan for how we reinvest back in our buildings.
We know that that's going to be a tremendous cost savings as well.
So in terms of the city portfolio, the pilot is already underway.
We would love to deeply expand that.
Of course, that is going to be contingent on resources.
But we certainly are committed to exploring that with 2FM
and to continue to invest in our own buildings.
Related to public buildings,
or private buildings, rather, there's a couple of things I'll mention.
One, first and foremost, DPD has a wonderful sustainable
development policy that has been recently
updated.
Commissioner Boatwright is an incredible partner as well.
So they just updated their sustainable development policy.
Any
development that receives city funding, as well as
any industrial development, has to pursue measures within the sustainable
development policy. So we have seen an uptick in solar
because of the sustainable development policy and that just being one
pathway.
So that is a great opportunity, and we're very
supportive of that policy,
and continue to work with DPD as well.
And then there's just the resources that are available
through individuals that want to pursue renewable energy.
We certainly have our work.
As we've expanded, now we have the opportunity to really invest to
make those pathways more visible to people.
We're lucky to be in the state of Illinois.
Again, having that alignment with the state level too, related to
CEJA means that-
Sure
... and right now with the Inflation Reduction Act, there's alignment at all
three levels of government, which means that there's tax credits.
Again, there's utility incentives.
Cook County has a wonderful solar group buy program,
which is great. It allows people to aggregate, right,
their solar projects, and it allows for a deeper
discount on
solar.
Okay.
So those are the types of programs we want to make sure people are aware of so that
we can continue to encourage people to generate their own electricity.
It's a tremendous cost savings. There's a lot of resources out
there that are available to subsidize those programs.
So we do, and will in 2025, be doing
a better job of communicating those externally now that we have the
capacity to support that work.
That's great. And the only thing I'd add is that in
my prior life doing solar development, I found
schools were very good
or natural for solar because they use all their energy when the sun's shining.
And they use a lot of energy, so I recognize that's a
sister agency and a little more complicated, but I hope that's something that down
the road the city will continue as well. And I appreciate your thoughts on that.
And please let us know
to the extent that we need ordinances to be updated or red tape to
be cut. I'll be happy to lead the way, and I'm sure 49 others will be
join us.
I appreciate that. I appreciate the support. Thank you.
Absolutely. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Alderman Conway. Any other questions for the Department of the
Environment? Alderman Cesar Lopez.
Thank you,
Chairman. Thank you, Commissioner.
I think a lot of the questions I had have been asked.
I don't know if I
missed this one, but did you give an update on the community impact
study ordinance? Did you give an update on where we are in the process?
I'm not sure if I missed that, but-
Sure.
So the cumulative impacts ordinance.
So as you know, we have
developed the assessment, which is the report.
Mm-hmm.
The next step is
the convening of the EJ Action Plan and that interdepartmental working group.
So we'll actually have an update on the EJ Action Plan that
will be available at the end of December on the website.
That's something that we'll be issuing publicly.
A part of that is the cumulative impacts ordinance.
That is an ordinance that we have been developing internally, as
you know, and was an ordinance that
came out of a pretty robust community process
where we
really stuck to our values of co-governance to work with
historically underserved communities to develop
the process for the report and as well as recommendations for
future policy. That ordinance is still in development.
One thing just to mention is that
every commissioner that we were working with on that ordinance,
there was a commissioner transition that happened, right?
So we have a new commissioner at DPD, we have a new commissioner of
CDPH, and a new commissioner of transportation.
All of those commissioners are now at the table and have been very supportive of
ordinance development. So it took a little bit longer because of
that transition. But we are continuing
to meet and to be at the table, and are working
with the mayor's office now to finalize that.
Our next step will be socialization of the ordinance.
We know that this is going to require additional
conversations across many different sectors across the city.
And so, we do hope to work with you and with others
on having those conversations in terms of what that looks like
for our communities.
Thank you, Commissioner. So you expect this ordinance to be socialized
next year, perhaps, we gather support to be ready for a vote
in 2025?
We are finalizing the
recommendations currently for the mayor, and we
do hope to socialize that publicly.
In terms of the timeline,
I think that the most important thing for this coming year is to be able
to discuss that with stakeholders and to make sure that we get
it right.
And so that will be the focus for the coming year.
Mm-hmm. Thank you, Commissioner.
My other question is just a follow-up
on enforcement. I think that
is, in terms of permit renewals and permit reviews
and so forth, I know that you don't have enforcement power per se, but
I wanted to check in terms of the air monitoring.
I know that for communities like us, community impact study and
the enforcement of city code through the air monitoring is critical, and engagement
that you have with the stakeholders and community leaders and community members
in
the wards.
My question is around the coordination with the Illinois EPA
around this kind of permit review,
the coordination with CDPH.
How do you expect this to
maybe help us in terms of enforcement?
Because I know with 14 staffers, I think that that is
unrealistic to ask of all the Department of the Environment.
However, with all the regulatory agencies as well,
I know that the attorney general has stepped in, in a few occasions
to inspect and help monitor these
polluters. So anything around that, that can be of help,
especially when it comes to reviewing permits, and
other enforcement mechanisms that you can envision for next year.
Sure. So is the question what my role is currently or-
Correct. And then maybe what other things that you can envision, especially in
light of changes at the federal level.
Sure. And so I should say across the board, we're
hyper-aware of
some of the rollbacks that we experienced in the last Trump
administration, right?
On the environmental front, we certainly saw a number of rollbacks, I
think upwards of 100 in terms of
environmental regulations. So it's certainly a concern of ours.
We have already started meeting with national partners, with other cities, to
understand where at the local level and at the state level,
we can really work together to fortify local and state
policies to protect our residents.
So those are conversations that are underway.
That is going to require cross-departmental coordination.
CDPH is still the regulatory agency, and they're still making the
permitting decisions.
I hope that we've already demonstrated our commitment to working together.
As I mentioned, I do have, at a regular cadence, a meeting with Dr.
Ige to talk about pressing environmental issues.
And certainly, as with all of our policies,
even if we're not the people pulling the levers because we don't have the
regulatory power, it's still important for us to work with our department
partners that do have those powers.
And so,
that is similar to our work with the Department of Buildings or with
Planning and Development. We'll continue to work with CDPH to ensure
that we are thinking through
those policy solutions, so that we can make sure to maintain
protections for the residents of the city.
Mm-hmm Thank you, Commissioner. Looking forward to working on that community impact
ordinance as well as their monitoring implementation.
They're important in our community, and appreciate the efforts of the department.
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman Cito Lopez. Any other questions for the Department of
Environment?
Chair Dial, followed by Alderman Waguespack.
Thank you. I only have one question, Commissioner.
I'm very interested in seeing the city promote
more electric charging vehicle stations.
I have been in and out of here this afternoon, so I don't know if this has come up.
What is your department doing
to encourage the location of, or incentivize
that in communities across the city? Sure.
So
one of the things that we mentioned earlier was that we
have been very supportive.
The funding for electric vehicle charging for public charging
was awarded to CDOT, and we're very proud to share that
CDOT did receive a $15 million grant for public charging.
In addition to that, we collectively pursued something
called the Energy Efficiency Community Block Grant
program through the Department of Energy as well.
And on top of that 15 million, we were awarded more funding.
So
CDOT,
that is where the expertise. We have a wonderful EV
team at CDOT that is leading that, but we are certainly very supportive of
that effort and are working with them
to advance public charging. So you will see
a more robust process. They've begun already
in developing an EV framework, and so we will be working with
them as well as our utility partners to think
about ways that we can pilot in an equitable way, right?
Because we don't want to charge-
That was my next question. The equity lens that you were using to determine
where you're going to put this resource,
which is very limited.
Right. And so that analysis is something that is within the EV
framework. Currently, EVs are clustered in a very
small amount of communities, and if we want those benefits to be
reached by communities across the city, we have to change
that. And so the piloting of different strategies, whether that's
curbside charging or public charging within public facilities
or other types of methods to advance public charging, those are
all things that are on the table with this funding.
So we are looking forward to supporting that effort
in the coming year.
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Chair Dial. Alderman Waguespack?
I don't have a question. Thank you.
Oh, I thought you said you had a question. I'm sorry.
Oh, okay. All right. Any other questions?
Really, man. Go ahead.
There's one last one that I forgot to mention.
About the HUD settlement, this year's
report of HUD was much less robust than last year.
Do you have any challenges to coordinate with departments on their environmental
justice plans? Is around the HUD settlement.
Thank you.
So the question is related to the HUD settlement, if we've had any
challenges working with departments on their
implementation.
And the answer is no.
We have,
again, through the EJ action plan process, it has been
a very committed group of departments that have
named
various processes that they're committed to alleviate environmental
harm. It's a matter of time, right?
Some of these processes will just take time.
And so not every report is going to look
identical. Some will be more robust.
Others,
the update is that the work is in development.
Again, I do want to point to some of the progress that we've made.
For example, I know that we talked about procurement.
I think that the outcome of this process overall is going
to be
unprecedented in terms of city governments really coming together to identify
strategies. I think we'll all take a look back at this process and be
very proud of the work. I don't know of another city in the country that
is convening an interdepartmental working group to do this type of
work. So I will say it's a work in progress, and
we're making a lot of progress. So we
are really
supportive of our departments, our peer departments that
are undergoing this effort, and we'll continue to support them to realize
the commitments that they've made in the plan.
Thank you.
All right. Well, thank you for joining us today.
We know that while the department is small, but mighty, so
I know that you guys have been more focused from a policy perspective
for what you all are doing.
Do you all envision futuristically moving into the
enforcement aspects, or do you all envision primarily staying in the
policy lane and advising departments on various
ideas and issues of concern and of sustainable
energy and things of that nature?
Thank you for that question, Chair.
With the hiring of a number
of project managers, not only will we continue to work on policy
and cross-departmental coordination, I think this coming year with our
project management team, you will see us have a more public presence
as well. So,
in the same level of coordination that we've had with departments and with
some community organizations, just given our size, we'll have a greater
reach-
In addition to that, the
future of our regulatory work
for this year's budget, we have proposed two
functions that will migrate to the Department of Environment, one
being benchmarking and the other the franchise agreement.
Okay.
The city's franchise agreement. So we'll continue to
pursue that for this year. And then in future years,
in 2025, we will be working with the mayor's office, with
2FM, and with the Department of Public Health on exploring what
regulatory authorities will migrate back to the Department of Environment.
So that work will continue and we will have in preparation for a
proposal for FY 2026.
Okay. All right. Very well. Well, thank you for joining us
today.
You all are excused. And the committee will stand at ease for a few minutes
while we transition to the next department.
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you. Welcome back. We have before us the Department of Administrative
Hearings with Director Patricia Kowiak, as well as
her members of the team here in the box
and in the well. We have a brief
overview by COFA,
followed by opening statements, and then to questions.
Dan?
Dan Firstrom, Council Office of Financial Analysis.
Next up, we have 030, Department of Administrative
Hearings The recommended budget for FY25 is
8.5 million, which represents a 4% decrease compared to
FY24.
The total budgeted FTE positions for FY25 is
39, which is one FTE fewer than
FY24.
The department operates entirely on corporate funding.
Personnel costs for the department amount to 3.4 million,
while non-personnel costs are 5.1 million. Thank you.
Thank you. Director, please proceed.
Thank you.
Good afternoon, Chairman Irvin, Vice Chairman Lee, and members of the
City Council. Thank you for the opportunity to appear today and
update you on the Department of Administrative Hearings, DOAH.
DOAH strives to provide the highest level of customer service
to those who appear at our courthouses.
As such, several customer service modifications
which were made during COVID-19 are still
continuing at DOAH.
These modifications ensure respondents have easier access to the
administrative hearings process.
For example, respondents can file motions to set aside
default judgments online. Previously, these motions could only
be filed in person.
Also, those who have pending building code violation can email
photos, receipts, paid invoices, permits, and a
sworn statement attesting to full compliance.
If the property owner is in compliance, the law department
transmits a request to non-suit the case.
DOAH also continues to offer virtual hearings as an
option. In 2023, there were
14,102 virtual hearings conducted for
parking, speed, and red light camera cases.
This represented 24% of the total in-person
vehicle hearings conducted in 2023.
As of October 31st, 2024, DOAH
conducted 11,567
virtual hearings, representing 25% of the
total in-person vehicle hearings.
Virtual hearings are also available for other DOAH case
types. In non-parking cases, respondents log
in to their assigned courtroom and are connected with the
city representative for a pretrial conference.
Subsequent to that conference, the administrative law judge, the ALJ, will
enter the hearing. The Coordinated Advice and Referral Program for
legal services, CARPALS, which staffed a virtual
advice desk during COVID, returned to on-site
consultations in June of 2023. They assist
respondents Monday through Thursday at 400 West Superior.
CARPALS also has a dedicated phone line for respondents who
have matters pending at our two satellite hearing locations.
DOAH posted additional signage and distributed CARPALS
contact cards at these two locations to ensure that the
respondents were aware of CARPALS services.
CARPALS provides practical how-to advice to
respondents in presenting their defenses to the alleged
violations and in preparing any applicable motions.
The legal help desk also promotes equal access and
understanding of the administrative hearings process for
respondents who are self-represented litigants at DOAH.
DOAH also utilizes LanguageLine translation services
to ensure that those whose first language is not English
can fully participate in the administrative hearings.
The top four languages for 2024 are Spanish,
Russian, Mandarin, and Polish.
LanguageLine offers translation services in
170 languages and dialects. In
2023, there were 2,178 calls,
resulting in 24,815 minutes of
interpretation. As of October 31st, there were
2,899 calls, with
28,440 minutes of
interpretation.
DOAH remains committed to achieving its core mission
in 2025, providing a forum for fair and
impartial adjudication, maintaining an exceptionally
high level of courteous, respectful, and prompt customer service for
the public.
In furtherance of this mission, DOAH, in collaboration with the
Department of Technology and Innovation, redesigned its
webpage to greatly enhance functionality and the user's
ability to navigate through hearing-related information.
One of the most significant changes went live on November 20th,
2024, and now allows the public to submit their
comment cards online. This provides for real-time
notice to DOAH and allows for prompt responses to
any concerns or issues.
In August of 2006, DOAH accepted its first
electronic filings, e-filings, for the Department of Streets and
Sanitation violations. The e-filing system has been
updated over the past 18 years with the intention
of other enforcing departments also being able to e-file their
cases. On February 2nd,
2024, DOAH received its first
e-filings for vacant property cases, and on September 9th,
2024, the Department of Transportation e-filed its
first case.
E-filing obviates the need for staff to manually review paper
documents. All documents are now stored for review
on DOH's case management system.
DOH's '25 budget
provides for continued funding for two students to work year-round
instead of only during the summer breaks.
In 2024, the students gained experiences in the
courthouse in office environments.
The interns also serve as DOH's community engagement
ambassadors as we strive to effectively and efficiently
serve all who appear at DOH.
DOH remains committed to increasing the diversity of its ALJ
bench to reflect Chicago's current demographics.
DOH's Equity, Racial Justice, and Inclusion team
have attended job and service fairs, and the Illinois State Bar Association's
annual minority bar program to distribute the notice of
ALJ opportunity flyer.
Additionally, the ERJI team assembled a focus
group of current ALJs to gather new ideas for recruitment and
retention. One participant asked whether our notice could be
displayed on the city's website for open positions.
In 2024, in collaboration with the Department of Human
Resources, the notice has now been included in DHR's
Job Flash. The ERJI team also wanted to be
more proactive in its recruitment efforts.
They will now personally distribute the notice to law firms located in
underrepresented communities in Chicago.
Thank you. We're here to assist with any questions you may have at
this time. I'd like to introduce also my staff chairman.
Please do.
To my right is Deputy Anthony Rizzo,
and to his right is Wilgenia Irving, HR business
partner excluded. Thank you.
Thank you. Questions. Chairman Dial.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Commissioner,
there's no mention of any money here in your
statement. So can you tell me--
I want to get a full picture. So you say you had
14,000 virtual hearings, right?
How many in-person hearings? Can you break it down
by
streets and SAN?
I'll take that information through the chair.
Okay.
But I would like to know the total number of hearings
that you've had,
and how many of those hearings were non-suited.
What's the percentage of
cases adjudicated and cases that were non-suited?
We can get that through the chair. We have a breakdown by each case type, the
reports that we prepare, Chairman.
Okay.
Can you tell me,
did you do better than last year or worse than last year?
What's the trend look like?
I can because those were responses to Alderman Riley.
Let me just
flip to that right now because that is something he asked for.
So in 2022, that's how far back he asked,
Motion City non-suit was
14,481. In
2023, Motion City non-suit was
17,204.
As of October 31st of '24,
15,532.
Then he also asked, and that's where the city decides not to
prosecute on a case. He asked for the dismissed warrant of
prosecution. That's where there's improper service, and the
administrative law judge will not proceed with the case.
In 2022, we had 958.
In 2023, 1,871.
As of October 31st of '24,
2,577.
Okay. And do you have a list of the same
trend information for
the fines collected or fines
adjudicated or...
I can give you the fines assessed at the time of the hearing.
Yes.
Any collected would have to be between-
Chase
... the Department of Law and, exactly, and Department of Finance.
Okay. Can you give me that? Is that-
We
don't get that. I can give you absolutely what has been assessed.
Yes. That's what I'm looking for over-
Absolutely.
Do you have to do that through the chair?
Yeah.
Well, depending how far back you want, I could.
Well, if you gave me 2022-
Of course
... '23, and 2024.
There you go. In 2022, assessed by the
department,
$106,073,852.
In 2023, assessed
$105,364,258.
As of October 31st,
$90,701,087.
Okay.
Now, I'm just going to tell you what I've been hearing, you can respond to this,
that
you all could collect more,
and I don't think I focused on this until
we're in bad shape right now. So do you
think we could be
getting more
revenue?
As the-
Or I should ask Chase if he-
Thank you, Chairman.
Yeah.
Because I will say we will rule on each case as it is
presented to us. If they have met the burden of proof,
if it's more likely than not that the city should prevail, we will enter a
finding of liability If they have not the case, there will be
a not liable on a particular count.
And another thing too, for clarification, when I provided the
motion city non-suit,
I put a little disclaimer in there that that does not include
the Department of Buildings, because a motion city non-suit in buildings
means the respondent has come into full compliance.
Okay.
Mr. Chairman, do you think we could ask, or can your
committee ask Chase to give us
the collection numbers?
Yes. I think that we can ask for
collections from the
OAH
actions from, what you had, 22, 23 and 24?
Sure. We-
No, those were the numbers that you just gave me
That's the numbers I just provided, correct.
Okay. And going back to the non-suits,
we non-suit
15 to 17,000 out of how many cases
that were filed
in that same time period?
Let me go back to-
That was the information-
Seems like a high number
... I thought she was giving us through the chair, but-
I will go back to 2022. There were total, this is all
the case types except the vehicle, so that would be
236,258
cases filed as of December of '22.
In December of '23, there were
272,825 cases filed.
So that's roughly 5% or 5% to 8%
of cases. I
just thought that was a high number, but not in relation to the number of cases
that have been filed.
What's the one for 2024 to date?
Yes. As of October the 31st,
it was 223,343 case
filings.
Okay.
All right. Well, I don't have any other questions.
I just wanted to
get a sense from you as to how you thought things were going regarding
administrative hearings and the cases that we're seeing and what we're
assessing
violations against. But we'll get the other side of the
ledger from
our comptroller. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
Thank you. Any other questions for administrative hearings?
We got four. Okay, I'll just work my way around.
Wax, Lawson, and then
Vice Chair Lee.
Thanks, Chairman.
Good afternoon. Well, it's evening, actually.
So
whatever you can provide through the chair, I think, would be helpful on this
issue. We've had discussions with the comptroller, in brief,
about trying to figure out more information about this.
And I think over the years, you've done a great job, going back to, I think,
maybe 2008 or so when we've had discussions about
what happens when we perhaps have
a billboard that goes up, they get a $10,000 fine, it gets reduced.
Can you provide the information about,
you
had said
if they're not liable
on a particular count,
do you break it down
when you have one of those cases and then say, "If I
don't get it on this particular count," does that reduce the amount
of the ticket?
And does the rest of the ticket get
followed through on?
The way the system reports, if there were two counts, one
that there was a finding of not liable and the other was a finding
of liable, the case will be reported as a liable decision.
Okay.
Correct.
And then whatever amount was assessed would
go through to the comptroller?
That goes through to comptroller, as well as the Department of Law to
enforce our underlying judgment if they see it has not been paid.
Okay.
Would you have that breakdown that you could provide through the chair, or
would we have to go to comptroller to get that?
Exactly.
Okay.
Exactly.
So we'll go back to him. Now,
in terms of the breakdown per judge and what each
administrative law judge is doing, do you keep track of that as to
who is making what kind of decisions, what the
general outcomes of their decisions are over a one-year
period? Do you look at that, too? So that, for instance, Judge A,
are they
80%
or, say, 20% non-suited,
10% are non-suited? Do you break that down per judge?
No.
Okay.
How things get brought to our attention, if a respondent
believes that an order of liability was entered in error,
they'd either go to circuit court, and then we also see then what a reviewing court
would look at. And if something comes back to us in that
decision,
we
have retraining, we have remediation sessions if they need a retraining on a
certain subject matter, on administrative hearings processes.
Alderman, that's how we address it.
We don't keep those statistics.
Okay.
But there are many ways, because we also take calls.
Deputy Rizzo and I take calls from the public saying, "I believe this
case,
an order of liability was entered in error." All right.
We review the audio. All my division chiefs are attorneys,
and that's how we have a sidebar, if you will,
with the administrative law judge who said, "Do you know what?
Let's go through this again. Let's go through the process."
It looks like you may have missed something, so we will do that.
There's many opportunities that we have when issues are brought
to our attention, but that type of statistics, no sir.
Okay. So you're doing corrective action throughout
the year, let's say.
Every day.
Yeah.
Every day if something is brought to our attention.
And we do in-house training too for the administrative law judges.
In general,
what's the average
time that ALJs have been on the city
payroll?
Are they younger attorneys coming out of law school?
Are they-
Well, by ordinance, they have to be a minimum of three years as-
Yeah
... a licensed Illinois attorney, but it runs the gamut.
Some who are retired, assistant state attorney, assistant public defenders,
private defense-
Okay
... prosecution. So, it does run.
We have a nice mix. We really do, and we do a lot of recruitment. Ms.
Irvin and Ms. Holtzman from our team are always out there
doing the recruitment. They're the ones that came up with that idea
to go out into the community so we can solicit new
administrative law judges also.
Yeah. I know in the last term, I went to a couple law
schools and we're talking about the type of jobs that the city offers
for attorneys, and I don't know if that one came up as
much, but it would seem like a good one for
somebody who had their 7-11 maybe and then two years under their belt, or three as
you're saying.
Sure.
So, I will circle back with the comptroller
and probably DOL to try to figure out.
I was under the impression that
ALJs were really reducing the number or
non-suiting a pretty significant amount of tickets, and
that we were not, I think as Alderman Vidal was kind of getting to, not
getting the full balance of what the city was expecting from
a lot of these.
And just to clarify, that term is prosecutorial discretion.
Motion to stay non-suit is the prosecutorial discretion.
If it's a not liable, it means the ALJ has heard all the evidence and
believed that it was against the manifest weight of the evidence and then enters a
not liable.
Okay. Thank you for the clarification.
You're welcome. Thank you.
I need more coffee when I do that. All right. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Chairman.
Thank you. Alderman Moss?
Great. Thank you, Chair. Hello, Director. Good to see you.
Good to see you too.
I just have a couple quick questions.
You guys are generating a lot more than you're costing, certainly.
It-
In a fair and impartial manner.
I was just going to say that. I was just going to say that.
I got to beat you to it. I'm sorry.
I have no doubt in my mind.
Couple of things I'm just sort of looking at.
It looks like maybe based on the years that you've mentioned, our
average
fine or total fine is somewhere between $300 and $400 per case.
And that's just back of the napkin. You can get that through the chair.
I don't expect you to do that in your head either.
If I could-
Yeah
... pre-COVID, because I call 2019 my last
normal year.
Right.
The total assessment in 2019 was
$179,415,968.
So that was my next question, is that over time, we're taking in a lot less than
post-COVID than we were pre.
And is that because we are writing less tickets, or we're non-suiting
more, or we're charging less in fines?
The number of case filings that I was-
Right
... let me give you the 2019.
Okay.
This would be illustrative.
Case filings in 2019,
440,571.
And we haven't changed where these cases are going.
There's no other court that's taking care of business affairs or buildings.
This is us.
Right.
And the biggest increase right now would be streets and sanitation.
We will hit well over 50,000 filings, and that would be the most
that we've ever seen with streets and san filings.
So, that's sort of a curiosity of mine too, is who's writing these tickets?
Who has stopped writing these tickets since 2019?
I think that's something that we need to think about as a council.
We all have issues of enforcement or where we want enforcement or have too much
enforcement. But clearly there's a big drop-off as to
what we've been writing and citing people for.
So I think that's very, very helpful to know.
And yeah, if you could send sort of the 2019 to where those
cases are coming from and those drop-offs.
Maybe we need to talk to our ward supes
or buildings or business affairs because I don't think anybody's
behaving any better than they did in 2019.
We have that. We have a breakdown-
Awesome
... that I'll be preparing for Chairman Dowd that I'll send through the chair
that'll have the breakdown of each case filing for the departments, and
then she wanted also the non-suits and the-
Right
... not liables. You'll see all of that in there.
Right. I guess the only other question I had, well, a couple of quick
ones then. Do we have an average case timeframe from issuance of
violation to resolution?
It depends on the case type.
Yes. That I know.
I'd have to say the buildings because they're looking for-
Much longer. Yeah
... compliance. So those would be a little bit longer.
Whereas I have maybe some drinking on the public way or cases of that
matter-
Not in 44 you don't.
No, of course not.
No. Where those cases are
adjudicated on the very first day up in court.
Right.
But I also had stats like for example, the vehicle related from the
time they get scheduled,
the in-persons, it was 31 days from the time it's scheduled in the
hearing to us.
Contest by mail, 27 days. So that's for the vehicle
related. But the others,
when it gets to us, most of them are adjudicated on the first day-
Right
... when they are sent, with the exception of buildings,
tax cases, procurement, some of the ones that are much more complex.
Right.
I guess the only other question I have is since we're doing more remote
cases- Maybe I've already answered this with your volume.
Are there any cost savings that we've realized since we have less in-person?
I don't know that you have less equipment or space or staff certainly, right?
Or not much.
I don't think so.
Okay.
I think it's a convenience which the public
clearly-
Oh, yeah
... is using. So I'm not saying there would be any cost savings.
Okay.
It's just a convenience.
But definitely anything with electronic filing is the way to go for-
Yes
... for the user, for your own costs, and everyone's headaches.
So thank you for all you've done. You may have been
a chair, commissioner, director longer than anyone we've talked to in these last
two weeks, so I want to thank you for your city service.
Thank you.
It means a lot and does not go unnoticed.
Thank you so much.
Thank you. Thank you, Chair.
Thank you, Alderman. Vice Chair Lee.
Thank you, Chairman. Hello, Director.
Hello, Vice Chair Lee.
And just for the record, the director is a constituent, so she
is my favorite commissioner.
I want to pick up on a couple things here.
Sure.
If you can, what you're preparing for Alderman Dell, provide that information
by ward as well.
The citations and the whole breakdown that you're doing, just
include-
Okay. Let me see if we can... We probably could with
Geographics, right?
My concern is
about the boundaries, Anthony, being updated.
Oh, to the new boundaries?
Yes.
If you're not caught up with that yet.
But we'll just go with whatever they currently have.
Whatever you can currently provide, and if there are a handful that
are in new wards now, we can work with that.
Okay.
I think we'll get the majority of it
from you. So, and also just picking up on where you and Alderman Lawson were just
talking. So I get frequent complaints from some of our
neighbors
about
the time between when our ward superintendent might issue a citation
for garbage or high weeds or something like that-
Sure
... to the time where a ticket is actually issued and received by
the person who's been issued the citation.
Because the length of time which
it takes from the time that he's hanging the tag to the door to the time where
they get an official notice in the mail can often be,
from a neighbor's perspective, an excruciating amount of time that they have to
deal with whatever is sort of in their face.
And then we get repeated requests to then continue to
issue citations until the problem is fixed.
But the reality is, just because you get a door tag doesn't mean that you're going
to get the official citation in the mail, because there's a step in between.
Can you talk about that?
Sure. The step in between is once Streets and San sends it
over to the law department, they have to do the title search, and
they need to make sure if the property's in trust, they have to break the trust,
get that information.
Mm-hmm.
So that's where it's at. But they have come up with
procedures to shorten that time period,
and that's why we're going to see...
I looked last night, it was over
49,336 or something like that filed as
of November 30th, and that is the most.
So I know we'll hit well over 50,000 by the end of this year
when they file with us.
But so that has been, we know they have decreased the amount of time.
And also, if it's multiple, they want them heard as a convenience to the
respondent to be heard on the same court date.
So they have them for the same court date, same time, same courthouse.
So they have been decreasing their time.
But the thing is too, once they put that door hanger on there
that's notice to that-
Right
... respondent something's going on, because they'll take the pictures-
Mm-hmm
...
and clean up the property. I think that's what they want.
Yeah. So we'll continue to do what we have to do to put pressure on the
bad actors in the community to continue to do that.
It's just good to know that the law department is beginning to address the sort of
backlog issue.
They have.
And I know it takes time to do title search.
Look, when we're trying to find the owner of a troubled building
ourselves, we know how long that takes.
You've got 49,000 of those in your queue to deal with.
So anything that we can do to help in that process, I
think we'd be all for. Obviously, you know, in this current
budget climate, we're all looking for additional revenues.
I think it is worth looking at all of the data that's coming back about the
types of citations that are being written, kind of where things have fallen off.
Because I do think that there is room for
additional enforcement of laws that we have on the books that we're not necessarily
taking advantage of. If I'm going to judge by all of the calls that
we get for people who are not parked where they're supposed to be,
over to people who aren't taking care of their properties properly, or
even shoveling the walk at the end of the day, I think there's a lot of money
being left on the street there in terms of citations.
So I think that we've got to take a harder look at that.
I know that you're only one part of this, but I think that the work product that
comes out of your department is very informative to the rest
of us about what's actually being produced in terms of
citations and the fee income that we're getting from that.
And with that, I thank you. Nice to see you in your purple as usual.
Thanks, and keep up the great work.
Thank you. Chairman.
Thank you, Vice Chair. Any other questions? Any other questions?
Alder Cecilia Lopez.
Thank you, Chairman.
I think some of the questions have already been asked.
I did notice in terms of one of the new initiatives about
the underrepresentations of the administrative law judges in
Asian and Latinx communities. So wanted to ask
about what are the specific efforts in terms of addressing that
underrepresentation? Maybe there's something that we can do to help out.
Do you think that representation is critical there?
I would appreciate all the help Alderman Vice Chair Lee
has also offered. So anything within
the ward, if you could please, the notice of
opportunity. I'll have Ms. Irving and Ms.
Holtzman actually make a visit to your ward office so we have
these flyers out there to get that word out, and to
any other
alders here who would like it, we most certainly will make those visits.
I also identified the law firms, and they will be-
Going directly to those firms to let them know, because we've done
bar associations, we've done alumni, we've done law school.
We've done so much that we get invited to.
That's why Gina and Randy decided that they're going
out into the community, because something more active than just
being what we're invited to. So
anything else, you have any suggestions, we're open.
We're definitely open to that.
Sounds good. And then finally,
for the implementation of this electronic filing that you mentioned also for
2025, especially with DOB,
there's an expansion of the electronic filing for the Department of
Buildings for what I see.
There's a new internal case tracking software.
When do you expect that to be...
This is mentioned in your budget review.
For buildings? No.
Not for the Department of Buildings?
No, for transportation, and that was for the vacant
property.
Okay.
That's done by the police department for the vacant properties.
Those are the ones they send to us. For buildings, they actually
have let us know they are going to be doing a new filing system, but
we have to put our piece in for the
adjudication and filing.
Okay. Is that the one that you're working with the Department of Technology and
Innovation? Is that-
Yes. Those two areas, for the e-filings, for the
electronic filings, so they don't have to bring the citations over to us.
Got it.
They now hit a clerk review queue when they file them, so
our staff doesn't have to be sifting through all those documents.
They go right on their monitor and review to make sure there's a proof of
service, there's a complaint
in there according to the municipal code.
So those are the first expansions now for vacant property,
as well as for transportation. And then there'll be some others
that
Department of Technology and Innovation will be working with us on.
Okay. Yep. Thank you very much. I appreciate you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ald. Sixto Lopez.
Any further questions?
Going once, going twice.
Thank you, Director Jakoviak, for joining us today.
You guys keep up your fair and impartial work,
and we will appreciate your
kindness.
And also,
there was this question asked about, I know we talked about the
makeup of your ALJs, and
looking forward to getting more
out into the community to get
more individuals. But just overall, what is the makeup of your ALJs now?
Well, I will let you know that I have made 55 appointments
since being the chief ALJ.
28 were African American,
20 were Hispanic, 29 were Caucasian.
So 71% of my appointments have been minority
appointments, Chairman.
Okay. Very well. And how many vacancies?
Do you have vacancies or your
system runs a little different, as I recall?
Yes. So we're now at 65, which I had at one time been 80.
So that's why
Ms. Irving and Ms. Holtzman are going to be out in the community.
We actually have a class already for January.
I believe they have four resumes that they've already
gone through now the process. They come to us for a committee,
which Deputy Zahn, Ms. Irving, Ms. Holtzman are on.
But we continue. We continue because of the cases that
are filed with us.
And what do you feel is your natural number of ALJs
to have in the cadre?
I would like it to be around over 70 now.
Okay.
Yes. That's what we're shooting for.
And you're at 65 now?
We're at 65.
Okay.
We have four that will come on in January,
and then we'll be continuing on with their recruitment then
for the beginning of the year.
And one last question,
is it a daily rate or an hourly rate that these individuals are paid?
It's an hourly rate. They're compensated at $68 an hour.
And has that changed
in the-
The last time was effective 1/1 of '23.
Yes, sir. It went from 63 to $68 an hour.
And
is that competitive? Is
that competitive, I guess is probably the best
question I can ask.
Well, I don't have a lot of resignations, but
as my deputy always reminds other agencies that have
far fewer cases than administrative hearings,
they compensate it at a higher rate.
They may be like at $85 an hour,
but they may have what? One case a month.
Okay.
So yeah. The market's still hot.
Because you hear cases from a whole bunch of places, right?
Yes, we do, sir.
Other than just the City of Chicago.
No. Just the city.
I mean, like-
All the departments
... do you hear
CHA cases? I thought you guys heard their cases, too.
We do.
Okay.
We do have those cases also.
Okay.
Not many, but we do have some.
All right. And what you're saying, though, is that the
market is
generally higher than what you guys are paying your
ALJs. However, you're saying your ALJs get steadier work
out of the committee.
The work is at the Chicago Department of Administrative Hearings.
Okay.
Correct.
All right.
Very well. That does sound
to me relatively low for somebody with that level of
experience and has made that level of investment and time
of getting that degree. So I'm just curious as to
what the market is paying
others in similarly suiting. And just to make sure we're getting the best
quality people.
Of course.
Okay. All right. Well, thank you very much. You all are excused.
Thank you so much.
And we'll take a brief
at ease while we bring our next department in.
Okay, everybody.
Thanks for hanging. It's 10 minutes to 6, and we are
now on...
What are we on right now?
Chicago Animal Care and Control. I had the acronym in my head, and I was
missing Chicago. It's been a long day.
He had to leave.
I don't know if he's coming back.
We're going to start with a report out from
COFA. Daniel, are you going to do that for us?
Yes.
Excellent.
Dan Pristam, Council Office of Financial Analysis.
Next up we have 073, Chicago Animal Care and Control.
The proposed budget for FY25 is $7.5 million.
This reflects a 2% decrease from the revised total of
$7.7 million for FY24.
For FY25, we have 79 FTEs, which is
a reduction of positions from the revised budget.
The
department is entirely funded by corporate sources.
Personnel costs for FY25 are projected to be
$5.87 million, while non-personnel costs are
$1.7 million. Thank you.
Thank you very much. And Director Capello, would
you like to do the honors of introducing your team that's here with you, and then
you can read your statement?
Absolutely. Thank you so much. I'm Susan Capello, the acting executive
director with Chicago Animal Care and Control.
Next to me, I have Armando Tejeda, our administrative executive
assistant, I probably said that wrong, and PIO.
And in the box I have Angela Rayburn, our operations manager,
Chloe Snowden-Morgan, our HR business partner, and Arthur
Hamilton, our animal shelter manager.
Right. So Chairman Ervin, Vice Chair Lee, and members of the City Council,
thank you for giving me the opportunity to address you today.
I'm here to speak on behalf of Chicago Animal Care and Control, CACC,
a department dedicated to the welfare of our city's animals and the well-being of
our community.
Over the past year, CACC has achieved remarkable
milestones, including a 34% increase in
adoptions, despite a nationwide surge in shelter
intakes. In October, we celebrated a significant
milestone. We successfully transferred our
6,000th, I can never say that word, I'm sorry, 6,000th
animal into rescue. A huge thank you to all of our amazing
partners who help
us give these animals a second chance at life.
Our ongoing efforts to control costs have led us to
form new partnerships, including the impactful PAWS
Chicago 360 at CACC program, which has
been instrumental in improving outcomes for the animals in our care.
This initiative provided comprehensive support from pet owner
assistance to enhanced adoption services, all at no
cost to taxpayers.
As we celebrated these successes, we also faced significant challenges
that require critical conversations about our operations.
Our city witnessed a profound rise in the number of animals entering our shelters.
Many pet owners struggle to provide for their animals due to financial
constraints, while others face the heartbreak of surrendering their
pets due to housing issues. The increased awareness about animal
welfare led more individuals to seek help, which, while
positive, added to our intake numbers.
Moreover, the rising cost of essential services such as medical treatments
and supplies compounded our challenges.
To navigate these financial fiscal constraints,
CACC implemented some necessary adjustments effective November 1,
2024. To begin, we updated our intake hours to
3:00 to 7:00 PM daily to allow us to focus our resources more
efficiently while continuing to provide high-quality care
for the animals. Importantly, our viewing hours remain
unaffected as we are still open to the public from noon to 7:00 for
adoptions and pet reunifications.
Furthermore, starting November 1st, CACC is asking Chicago
residents to leave healthy outdoor cats where they are.
The current practice of admitting healthy community cats is an outdated
modality and often fails to service the public or the goal of
advancing animal welfare for cats and each community.
This decision was based on research indicating that cats thriving in their
natural environments are often better left where they are.
In fact, lost cats are 13 times more likely to return
home if they remain in their familiar areas.
Conversely, less than 2% of cats brought to shelters are reclaimed by
their owners. By prioritizing animals that truly need our help,
those that are sick or injured, we can better serve our community's needs.
Throughout our operations, we continue to emphasize the profound human-animal
bond that enriches the lives of Chicago residents.
Animals are deeply ingrained in our communities, and we recognize the importance of
these connections. CACC is also committed to implementing our
racial equity goals by engaging communities to hear about their
relationship with animals and supporting those pet owners with
resources to thrive, ensuring that our services are accessible
to everyone in our diverse city.
We are committed to supporting survivors of domestic violence and gender-based
violence by recognizing the critical bond between survivors and their pets.
As a member of the 17th District Domestic Violence Committee and a partner
in community initiatives like those in Little Village,
CACC works closely with agencies such as DFSS and
their delegate partners to ensure survivors can transition safely
without leaving their pets behind.
By offering resources and collaboration, CACC is dedicated to
helping survivors achieve independence and stability during times of crisis.
I want to take a moment to express our gratitude to everyone who shares our social
media posts and helps promote CACC as a place with amazing
animals available for adoption. With over 2,000 more
strays, owner surrenders, and confiscates this year
compared to last, your support means the world to us, and together,
we're making a difference
CACC will continue collaborating closely with our rescue partners
and the community to ensure that all animals receive the necessary support.
We also emphasize the importance of responsible pet ownership in reducing
shelter intake, including spaying or neutering, and ensuring pets are
properly identified. While these required changes may have
raised some concerns, I assure you that our commitment to animal care remains
strong. We encourage the public to consider adopting or fostering,
which will help reduce intake needs and give more pets a chance to find loving
homes. Your support and understanding during this transitional period are
crucial,
excuse me, as we continue to work toward a brighter future for all animals in
our care. Thank you for your attention, and I look forward to answering any
questions that you may have.
Thank you, Director. Are there questions from folks in
the room? Alderman Sigcho-Lopez, go ahead.
Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair Lee, and thank you, Commissioner or Deputy
Director. I appreciate
all your work. In fact, your team was in our office today, and I
appreciate all your efforts and all your work.
Also, you are my constituent in the 25th Ward, so I
have the privilege to work with a dedicated team.
So want to first
thank you for your efforts and your work.
I know that
you also work diligently to support domestic violence victims
and gender-based violence in general.
So I want to thank and commend you for all the efforts.
My question is actually in line of what are the challenges?
I know that in terms of
the work that you provide, I think you've seen probably, at least I can see
firsthand, just given the proximity and the work that
we
develop over the years.
So I know the need. So my question is in terms of some of the
challenges that you're facing in the department, and how can we
helpful, how can we of help to address and help you during these difficult
times? I know that you are a special member of our
community, so wanted to
take the time to thank you, but also offer more help in terms of the challenge that
you're facing right now.
Well, thank you for that, Alderman.
So I know, in particular your ward yourself, you do
share our adoption events, and you've hosted a
couple of events at your office, including a vaccine clinic in your ward.
So we definitely appreciate that.
But we do send out pretty much regular
notifications of our events and ongoings to the ward offices, so
sharing those to get the word out that we even exist.
There are so many people who still don't even know where to go if they lost their
pet. They know where to call when they see a dog running down the street,
but they don't know where to go if they lose their own pet.
So people knowing where we are and what we do, I think is really important, and we
could use help with that.
Thank you.
In terms of the
budget, I know that there's three positions that
you're cutting.
Was that having any effects on
the operations that you have and any kind of critical services that you think
will be affected?
So, those cuts we made were vacancies.
The veterinary medical manager unfortunately has been vacant for some time.
Actually, quite a few years. We had posted it several times through
HR, and we didn't get any viable candidates for that, so we did work with them to
change the title a little bit for this year's budget.
It still didn't work. We are not getting any viable candidates for that.
So
we're able to safely say that giving up that title
is something that we can do. We also gave up two
other vacancies that we were struggling a little bit to hire, the animal
care aide and animal control officer.
Other than that, once these two vacancies are out of the budget, we are fully
staffed with all of the other vacancies in those titles.
Yeah. Thank you again. I just
wanted to thank you. I don't have any additional questions.
I want to thank you for
the service to our community, and again, offer anything that we can do.
Again, we are really proud to have you on, glad to have you in the 25th Ward.
Thank you.
Thank you,
Chair Sigcho-Lopez. We're good. Go to Alderman Waguespack, then to Alderman Quinn.
Thank you, Chairwoman.
Ms. Capello, thank you for being here.
Is there any hurdle that we're missing that would allow you to become the next
director?
That's a softball that you can just knock out if you want, but...
Oh, sure.
Well, let me preface it with, I've heard a lot of good things.
I do, both in terms of constituents and
people who are within the animal community,
the adoption area,
have spoken highly of you. And I don't know how
long it takes sometimes to get these things done, but acting,
to me, at this point, just seems
unnecessary. So I didn't know if there was some hurdle that we were missing as a
council.
Well, thank you so much for that. As you know,
department heads are appointed by the mayor,
and then approved by City Council.
I've been with the city now for 33 years, and 22 of those
are with Animal Care and Control. So I'm proud to be here, and I'm happy to be
here. And whatever the mayor's office
decides is the route that we will go.
So 22 out of 33 is pretty great.
And I knew you were there for a while, but I didn't I'm not saying it's bad, but
that's a good long time to understand a lot of the issues that people have been
talking about. So, segue into that, the concerns
about the facility continue, are persistent over
many years.
And I know it's in part because it is an overwhelming
amount of work that goes into it. I don't think, unless you
volunteer there or you work there, that people
understand the depth of, first of all, the concern that all of
you have, whether you're a volunteer or a worker there.
But
the amount of detailed work that goes into it.
Can you talk a little bit about
some of the improvements that you personally are trying to make, or changes that
you would like to see?
On those
internal things, the day-to-day,
trying to take care of stuff in the facility.
That's a really great question.
I think as I mentioned to Alderman Cincho López,
it's really about getting the word out that we're there.
Again, people don't know where to go to look for a lost pet.
People are still looking at breeders online, Facebook.
It's all over Facebook. "You could get your next puppy here." We have
great dogs and cats at our shelter, and helping get the word
out that we are there, and we exist, and we're there to help, I
think is the main thing that we need to do.
We tried that with our advertising last year on the bus tails,
where we put the big signage on the back to "Come adopt your next pet" or "Look for
your lost pet at Chicago Animal Care and Control." People still don't know that
we exist. And I keep saying that, and I think my team is probably tired of
hearing me say that. But people truly don't know what we do, and
why we're there. So I think trying to work on that.
My team has been doing some Facebook
live.
Yeah, so we've done... Oh.
Go ahead. Sorry.
Armando Tejeda, executive administrative assistant,
Chicago Animal Care and Control. So we took over our social media.
It was previously volunteer-run,
just in the direction that we'd gone.
We're doing more engagement with
our social media. We're doing lives where we're actually engaging with the public,
answering questions, just being as transparent as possible.
That also just goes hand in hand with everything else that we're doing in the
department, just overall trying to increase our reach.
She touched on a good topic. People don't know where to get their pets.
They did a survey recently where: Where do you take an animal when you find it?
And the answer was animal care and control.
That same group of people, most of them didn't consider animal care and control as
a place to go to pick up their pets. So we do as much as we can with
the funds that we have through our outreach, through basically everything, through
you guys. We do send almost monthly newsletters and, not
newsletters-
Yeah
... press releases about our adoption events.
I want to thank all of you for sharing those.
I think that helps us get to this 34% increase that we're seeing, even though we're
seeing about 40 animals come in a day.
And kind of going into the next part of that, if we're not
funding the department appropriately
and you have to move towards more euthanasia of
animals, what is the impact on that, both in terms of the
budget, the long-term budget, because I think that leads to other
problems if you're not properly funded.
And then
I know psychologically that's not fun either,
for sure.
And I wonder if you could talk a little bit about the impact
on the budget should
you not have what you need for that aspect.
So during the budget engagement sessions, we've had several of our
volunteers and advocates come out to those and really speak on
Chicago Animal Care and Control.
Wow.
They did all the research for us. Although we already knew the answers, we still
needed to do it.
That there are other major cities with less population than us
who are almost double the budget that we have here in Chicago.
We make do with what we have, right? We have to do what we have to do.
But trying to get things done is very difficult, and with the
overtime freeze, it's been a little more difficult.
Because we've worked on overtime for so long, and now we don't have
it. So we've had to reduce our hours and cut back on some things.
Yeah. I saw your overtime
in pay period one, and this is obviously
231,000 total. Is that correct?
Um.
For 2024.
What's that here?
Sorry. My fingers are stuck.
You don't need to get into too much detail there.
Yeah. That's probably about right.
Okay.
Yeah.
And that's-
We're usually three to four times over our budget in the overtime budget.
And is that on the management side, or is that at
the level of
people out on the street doing the work?
Who would that fall under for the most part?
That's the workload, right? So we get over
40,000 calls for our service through the 311 system.
We're open seven days a week, 365 days a year.
More than 80% of our staff are union members, which means they get paid on the
holidays when they come into work, and they get whatever the holiday pay is
for that.
So that's including all of that. If one person takes a vacation and one
person calls in sick, we have to call in people for overtime.
Yeah.
And I'm not downplaying anything for the public
library, but it's kind of different.
They have books, we have live animals.
We just can't close for the day and nobody go to work.
We always have to have staff there.
Our population has been high. Armando mentioned the sheer number of animals that
are walking into our doors every single day.
We have to take care of those animals.
When we think about the euthanasia aspect of everything, there's a
cost to euthanasia also. So it's not just the easy way out to
just euthanize animals. It's also not the fun way out.
It's not the-
Yeah, and I'm sorry I put it that-
... respectful way out.
I'm sorry I put it that way. I didn't mean to.
Oh,
I'm just saying that. But that is not the way out of this.
Yeah.
It's not. It's helping people in the communities, helping the owners
keep their pets, making sure they're spayed or neutered, making sure they have
access to quality vet care.
Keeping those pets in those homes is what's going to be the best for us.
The last place anybody should ever consider bringing an animal is to,
I'm just going to say, Chicago Animal Care and Control, as we are
thinking back 20 years ago with the dog pound.
And that's the last place you want any animal to have to go to.
Every animal that walks into our shelter
can be euthanized at any time for whatever reason.
Chairwoman, can I just-
Fine
... knock out the other two?
Yeah, please go ahead.
We're jam-packed in here.
I know.
It's only because I like you.
So,
two things there. One, I did see in pay period 1,
10, 11, and 12, those look like the holiday pay periods or roughly coming
into those. So, it's very understandable.
Somebody might take a day off for a holiday.
A person might get sick as you go into winter.
So, it
correlates in terms of that employee overtime.
And I think that's where you're only talking about
231,000, but I understand getting a budget cut would be
impactful to those employees' wellbeing as
well as just trying to manage that.
Last question.
Do you coordinate at all with CPS or encourage
involvement with the school system in terms
of
teaching
kids about... And I'm sure this just puts an extra load on you, but
when I go out and I'm talking to different
schools or classrooms, I try to talk about the different
things that we do as aldermen.
My last dog that I had was through ACC,
but
I wonder if you do any outreach through CPS to educate kids
about how to take care of their animals, and how to
avoid sending them back to
ACC, especially post-COVID. I know there were a lot of
people that got pets during COVID, and then
nationwide, it was basically, "Okay, I got to go back to work.
I'm done with this dog or this cat, so I'm sending it back to ACC."
But is there
education effort through CPS that you do or could do?
So I'm going to let Armando Tejeda talk a little bit-
Yeah
... about that as we've gone out to a couple of high schools.
Okay. Thank you.
Armando Tejeda, executive administrative assistant.
So we did run into challenges trying to get schools and
the youth involved, just because even to be a volunteer, they have to be 18 and
over. We found innovative ways to get through that.
We actually went to the schools. So we have something going on right now with
Austin High School, for example, where we're going to do some virtual stuff with
them, have them talk to our vets, our vet techs, our animal control officers,
just to look at different career paths.
We're planning a field trip where they can actually come out to the shelter and do
some enrichment.
We also do a lot
of community
events. So you'll see us out there in the communities, not just talking about
adoption and strays, how to pick up your pets, but also talking to the kids in
general. We recently released a video just about
building empathy with children.
Mm.
People who have pets growing up, there's empathy there, and we just want to build
on that. So we did have a struggle initially, but this past year, we had
Senn High School, I believe it was, come to our shelter and do enrichment for the
day. This year, we're hoping to get two high schools in before the year is out.
We have one, and then one in the first quarter.
And do you support, other than going through
veterinarians' offices, other organizations?
There's guys like Jeff Jenkins who do programming for
different organizations like Humboldt Park, Lathrop Homes, where they go
out and they do
interaction with kids and, for the most part, dogs.
But you're saying that you also coordinate with third-party
groups like that that are involved in...
It sounds great what you're doing.
Yes.
I just wonder if you can continue that, if you have the means to do it.
We do. So we work with a lot of rescue partners.
One of them is Safe Humane Chicago, and they have great programming where they
actually do manners classes with high school kids.
Yep.
So they teach the kids from start to finish, like, "This dog learned sit with you,"
and just building that relationship.
We've actually had families come in afterwards, and they end up adopting the dog.
But they do programming like that. We'd love to build on that going forward.
We also do have relationships with...
It's skipping right now, but I can get the response to you through the chair.
There's someone who does Freedom Flights for dogs, and they actually are based out
of downtown Chicago. So even though he can't do the flights for us, he actually
manages six restaurants in downtown Chicago.
So what he does when people do get takeout, he staples a picture of one
of our pets on there that's available for adoption.
So we try to find different avenues that way that's working with the community just
to promote our adoptions and animals and welfare in general.
Yeah. I was going to say wellness for kids, that's a huge issue.
We talk about veterans having
access to dogs for the most part, so that you have
The wellness that's created there for the veterans, know some of those
colleagues or friends. But
I think working with children is very important, too, to have that
ability to interact with a dog or other animal,
and that's important that you guys continue to do that.
So-
Yeah. And if I could just jump in, too.
We did several, I think all of the Take Back the Block.
Take Back the Block, yeah. And we took animals to a few of those.
Each animal that we took got adopted, but it was great seeing families
that just had never touched a dog before in their lives.
Yeah.
Even full adults interact with these animals and that rapport.
Some of the areas we went to, they couldn't have animals in their housing, but just
the fact that they can even volunteer at the shelter, visit the shelter, and they
got to meet an animal at the events that we had, we definitely want to build on
that.
Great. Well, I hope you guys can keep it up.
And I know that also builds on creating more of a
volunteer base in future years. So you're starting out with
kids early.
And hopefully over the next few years, we can build up that budget a
little bit more and tackle some of the internal issues and
improve the facilities for everyone.
So I appreciate the work you all do with the limited resources you have, and
continue to do a great job. Thank you. Thank you, Chairwoman.
No problem. Thanks, Alderman Waguespack. Alderman Quinn.
Madam Chair. I have no questions, Director.
Just wanted to say thank you on behalf of the residents of the 13th Ward.
You're always quick to respond and anything that we need, you're very
attentive. So I really appreciate all the hard work, and
33 years is quite a career. So thank you, appreciate it.
Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman Quinn. Alderman Lawson, followed by
Alderwoman Poppen.
Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair, and thank you, Deputy Director.
I just have a couple quick things. What was that you said about the cats we see
outside?
Leave them where they're at.
Thank you. If there was a member of the media here, I would ask that they put that
out, but they're already after 6:00.
So
I think that's important because a lot of people think, "Oh, I need to either
feed this cat or take it in, or take it in to have it fixed."
And we should...
You should leave them where they're at.
Wonderful. Thank you.
You will not see rats.
Well, I love the feral cats in my alley, trust me.
I've given them names.
Oh.
One is after my award soup.
So whatever we can do in the 44th Ward to help, I have a pretty plugged-in
population. Armando is great. Whatever you send, we will put
out, whatever event we can be helpful with.
I know that your targets tend to be out in different communities, but
mine is a supporter, and I would love for us as a city to finally give you guys the
resources that you need.
I fear that you are doing more with less every year.
And in a year where we're asking people to do more with less, you might just run
dry. And so I know it looks like
there's a small increase in
food
and a very small decrease in drugs, medications,
chemicals.
Right.
With the way inflation is handling everything else, are you getting a good deal
from Alpo, or how are you managing that?
So we have to go with whatever the contract or through our contract,
right?
Okay.
So we have the food contract, and we have our medical supply contract.
It's
more about the cost than the amount that we're using.
So costs are going up just like they are out in the real world, so they're going
up for us, too.
And that contract is through procurement services.
Yes, correct.
Right. Have we ever thought about a corporate sponsorship? I just mentioned Alpo.
I don't own a pet, so I'm not shilling for anyone. Or Chewy.
You see there's a lot of money being made right now-
Yeah
...
in animals, right?
Is there a way that we could be creative, and maybe this is for the finance team,
but along with you guys, in really harnessing some of that to give you more
resources to bring the education, the marketing that really has to happen?
Yeah. So I know there are a couple of organizations that provide pet food
specifically for shelters.
Right.
Do you remember what it's called? It's like you can't use anything else other than
what they provide you.
Exclusivity.
So exclusivity. Thank you.
It's Pepsi at the ballpark, really. I've known it. Yeah.
Right. You have to advertise them in the shelter.
Sign.
Yeah. So you have to sign your life away to them for the length of the
time that they're doing that. I'm currently actually going to schedule a meeting
next week with somebody from the law department who's looking into that for me, to
see if that's something that we can do to save a little money here and there.
Doesn't mean we're eliminating that whole food budget-
No, no. You can't
... because we have other pet food, right?
You can't.
We have to feed the chickens and roosters that we get, the goats that come in.
So they all have to eat, too.
No, I definitely appreciate that. We see the CTA doing this.
If there's a square inch, the CTA has put an ad there.
And I know that hasn't solved all their financial issues, but I want you to
be able to have those resources since you are a consumer of those products,
certainly.
I feel like there's a lot of coyotes being reported on the north side.
Is that just a Facebook thing, or is this something you guys are actually seeing?
Coyotes are wonderful.
Tell me more.
Well, they also control your rat population, right?
Oh, do they?
Yeah.
So, coyotes are there. They've been here before us.
Actually, when people call and say, "I saw a coyote," "Congratulations.
Good for you. That's wonderful." That is really the response, because the coyotes
are there to do what they're supposed to do.
So we stay out of their way, they stay out of our way.
If
there is a coyote in the area that's becoming a nuisance, there might be trash out,
people are trying to feed it. We see people walking up trying to give it a chicken
leg, that we do not suggest you try to do that.
Hazing is the best route to move the coyote along.
But if they are truly a nuisance or sick or injured, we will help service that and
work with our partners to get them to a rescue, a wildlife rehab.
So maybe along with the cats were living alone, maybe we add coyotes-
Right
... to the PSA on that.
I think, are you still getting a lot of surrenders overnight?
The people who will come and tie up their dog, goat, chicken?
Oh, overnight, after hours, after we close?
It has not increased. I'm looking over to make sure I'm saying
that right.
So it has not increased after our change in hours.
It's going to happen regardless.
Right.
And we pick them up the next morning.
Right. I know it's cold out there right now, but how many
ballpark average are you seeing after-hour surrenders, where they're just tying
them up somewhere?
So tied up outside?
Yeah.
I wouldn't even know. I guess we'd have to look into that and really try to figure
that out. I don't think I have that number with me today.
Obviously, we want to help people be able to maintain their pets.
Part of that is their housing. Part of that is affordability of food and medical
care.
So whatever we can do to bring in partners. You guys are all corporate funded.
I would love to see you get some major grants if possible,
because I think that would help us a lot.
You might be one of the few departments that are 100% corporate funded.
Yeah.
And like I said, you guys are doing a great job.
We should have a permanent director.
That should be someone with 33 years experience in the city before you retire.
So thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair.
Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman Lawson. Alderwoman Mona Hoppenworth,
followed by Chair Vasquez.
Hi, Deputy Director. Actually, Alderman Lawson asked a lot of my
questions, including about the coyotes, because we're not very far
away from each other.
I had a question. Well, firstly, thank you for all your work,
especially around Armando also.
My office says thank you so much for every time we needed something, you were
there,
so we really appreciate it.
I also appreciate that you've done so much to support survivors of
domestic violence, gender-based violence in my area,
Edgewater, Uptown,
beyond
vehicle related calls for service for 911.
Number two is domestic violence.
And I heard all you said that you do in the schools.
I think right now we could use all the help we can to
create environments that foster empathy.
And so
towards that end, we want to support you as much as possible.
I'm looking on your Facebook page. I've never gone on it.
It's got 50,000 people following you, which is
incredible.
I'd like to see your Instagram too.
It's terrific.
I'd like to see your website also,
to that end.
I don't know what you need for that, but it seems like it could be
also a good way for you to attract people on Google
who don't want to be on social media right now.
I would like to not be on social media right now, but I understand how
it could be really easy to share stuff.
And please come to the ward office whenever you need stuff
to be shared out. We would like to help.
I think
that was the biggest question is the coyotes .
But in terms of
what you might be doing with the new Department of Environment,
I hope that you might have goals around
working with biodiversity, wildlife,
all those issues, and interested in learning about that
in the future.
Okay.
And towards Alderman Lawson's point, we need to get you more
resources. And whether that's through grants or,
I don't know what the answer is, but
it's really important.
I'm a pet owner too, and I know how it feels when I
lose a pet as well.
And I can't imagine the stress that your team goes through every time you have
to lose a pet.
So I hope you are taking care of yourself and
finding ways to do that with the little resources that you have.
So thank you.
Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. Chair Vasquez.
Thank you. Add me to the love coyotes team.
Definitely during COVID, we saw more of them everywhere, and so we were very
aware that we saw less rats, so thumbs up for that.
So we've heard from a number of volunteers with CACC
with concerns that they have about the auditorium, which used to be used for
exercise and training. Since the space is now classified as an official city
meeting room after its recent renovation, we've heard that dogs are no
longer allowed inside the auditorium, even when it is not being used for city
meetings.
Volunteers have reported that this policy has created significant challenges as the
auditorium is the only indoor space at CACC that provides the necessary privacy
and enough space to work effectively with medium to large size
dogs. Can you speak to why this change was made?
Yes. Thank you for that, Alderman.
So when you come out to the shelter, because we know you're going to come visit
us, you'll be able to get a full tour of everything that we have there.
We do have a very large auditorium.
It fits anywhere between, I think, 30 to 45 people.
We've, yes, historically used it for animal
related
events, right? So we would bring dogs in there, do manners classes, do some
trainings. We recently underwent some construction,
so mainly for our whole front lobby and the auditorium. They cleaned it up.
They spruced it up, polished the floors.
Realizing that those floors in that room are the office
type of flooring, so it's the square tiles.
Once you get water underneath, they start popping.
So there were some spots that had to be replaced, and it was recommended
through our engineer that we probably not use that room
for animals anymore, right? They have no
control over, let's just say, their bladder, right?
Yep.
So,
we did put that into effect after we opened back up from construction.
So we didn't use it for well over nine months during construction.
We did set up a middle hallway that we have at the facility with some
gates so that that can be used for these type of classes.
I understand their point where there's not a lot of room in there, but you could
fit at least two dogs per corridor.
So they could do up to four dogs there.
But we also have a huge backyard,
with several play lots, which are just big open yards with gates
so that they're secured. You could let a dog run loose in there.
We have four, five, six of those, I believe. I could be off.
There might be seven. And we also have these smaller medical runs where a lot of
work can be done inside of there too.
I do understand the Chicago weather, right?
Yeah.
It's cold out today. I wouldn't want to come in and stand outside with a dog for an
hour.
And I understand that, but at this point, we are trying to come up with something
creative. We were looking at our nonprofit arm, Friends of Chicago
Animal Care and Control, to see if we can do something like a very large,
sturdy, heavy duty tent in our backyard with the side
panels to keep protected from the weather, whether it's raining or
snowing. So they are actually looking into something like that to see if that's
something they can purchase and have installed.
Also thinking about what we can do in our front lobby as long as
we're not open to the public, because once we open to the public, the lobby fills
up with people. So, if we can do something a little earlier in the morning for
that. So we are trying to consider other options, asking the volunteers
what options do they see-
Yeah
... what can they suggest.
But,
the building is run by 2FM, our building engineer.
They really suggest that it is not a room for animals, and that's really why
we closed it off for that.
Okay. So when you mention the tents-
Mm-hmm
... is it imagining keeping it out there or moving it around?
The reason I say that is I think about container homes and using some of those
shipping containers to create the space in a way that might work if there's
room back there to do something similar.
Oh, there's room.
Okay.
We got plenty of room.
Okay, that's a-
I never even thought about those containers. That's a really good idea.
Spent a lot of time on Netflix looking at container homes.
We've got a few wards that probably have container yards in them too, just saying.
Yeah. It might be something to follow up with 2FM and maybe get something going.
Okay.
So look forward to more conversation there.
Yeah.
Next question I got is the executive director position at CACC has been vacant for
two years.
What support do you need to fill a crucial position?
I'm sorry, what was the question?
It's the executive director position at CACC.
Yep.
According to what I've got here, it's been vacant for a number of years.
Is that filled? Is it going to be filled?
So that's a position that's appointed by the mayor.
As the deputy director, I am also the acting executive director at the time.
Got you.
So I'm doing them both.
Scott asked the question. Sign me on to let's remove the interim piece-
Yeah
... and get you where you need to go.
I think-
So yeah.
Again, it's appointed by the mayor's office.
Yeah. It's clear you've got the skills and the passion for the work, and so
I don't see what we're waiting for.
And then lastly, if it's okay, Chairwoman?
Please.
We've heard from CACC volunteers that the signup process is a bit complicated and
daunting, and it might discourage future volunteers.
Are there ways that you can simplify the process and reduce barriers to entry?
For example, allowing volunteers to partner collectively to meet
minimum commitment requirements.
Folks want to help, but I think that's what we're hearing.
I will say this,
the number one department we got emails about was y'all, so I wanted to
make sure I'm asking the questions, which shows how much people care about it.
Right.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, our volunteer process is a lengthy process.
It takes just as long to get physically into the shelter to do the work than it
does when you hire somebody.
All of our volunteers come to the shelter for an information session, so they're
learning what is needed at the shelter.
After that, they fill out their application,
fill out all of their confidentiality waivers, and all the
other stuff that they have to fill out, and then they have to go downtown to be
fingerprinted. So the only place to be fingerprinted, our volunteers are
fingerprinted just like employees, is at City Hall.
So they have to make the time Monday through Friday, 8:30 to 4:30, to be
fingerprinted. So they come down for fingerprints. We wait for clearance.
We get them into their next step, which is trainings.
So depending on which route they're going, working with dogs, working with cats,
there's several trainings involved with that too.
So yes, that can be pretty lengthy.
We are, again, trying to come up with some innovative ways to work through
that. So once a volunteer physically goes for
fingerprinting, we're not waiting for the clearance, we're actually bringing them
in to do-
Training proactively
... hands-on, well, enrichment. So they could toss
treats into the kennels for the dogs. Give cats their toys to play with.
Sure.
But they're not interacting with the public, and that's really what it is.
So volunteers are really seen to us as employees.
Mm-hmm.
They come off as we work here because they do.
They have a lot of interaction with the public with that too.
Another creative thing that we're trying to do is to really reach out into the
communities and get volunteers in those communities to help
us. So
you're going to be our volunteer in your ward, in your community, and when a lost
dog comes into the shelter, we're going to send you a lost pet flyer, and you're
going to place it out in the community.
You're going to put it on your Facebook page to try to help us reunite that owner.
So we're looking for volunteers like that too.
So volunteers don't physically have to ever come into the shelter.
They could just help us with things like that.
Now that we don't need to have the fingerprinting for.
So on that, there might be things that the ward office we can help.
So folks in refer figure out our portal thing, so that'd be helpful.
The other one is
loose leash dogs at parks because the only folks that can ticket are
CPD and y'all. So if y'all can get us to get some volunteers and give them some
ticket books, I'll get them over there at Winnemac Park ready to roll.
They'd love to do that.
I want to hear Winnemac Park.
Yeah, fair enough.
Yeah. Dog friendly areas has always been a struggle.
Yeah.
Police are the ones who cite.
But last year when we asked, they said you all do too, right?
We will. We have to see it, though.
Yeah. What I was saying is, is there a way to deputize some volunteers?
Oh.
Because I'll find a fleet and 40 that are willing to hold the fort down.
So the other struggle to that is how many people actually walk their dog or go let
them loose in the park and have their ID with them to really know who you're
issuing the citation to.
Okay.
So there's a couple of different nuances to that.
People, just keep your pets on leash. That's the safest place for them.
Yeah. We're down to help.
Our staff is so down, so we'll ask to do all of it. So hit us all up.
Get my sword. We'll deputize them. We'll move it on.
All right, sounds good. Thank you so much. All right, guys.
Thank you.
Thank you, Chair Vasquez. Alderman Mosley.
Thank you so much, Chair. Good evening, and it's so great to see you all
again. Thank you for coming out to the 21st Ward Take Back the Block event.
It was great to have you there.
I want to learn more about what happens when the fortunate
case of a animal is expired and is left on the
sidewalk, on the road. Is that your department?
That is not our department. So that is through Streets and Sanitation.
They have their Bureau of Rodent Control who has a dead animal pickup, so they pick
up off the streets.
Perfect.
We don't put dead animals on the trucks with live animals.
Great. Great to know that, and thank you for that clarification.
I was excited to hear about the work with schools and veterans.
I definitely welcome you again to the 21st Ward.
Wondering, are there opportunities for our senior
buildings? Have you all engaged in that way?
I would love to engage with senior buildings because I do engage in one at my
ward, and they save all their newspapers for me.
Oh.
And we go pick them up because newspaper is like gold for us.
So we seem to get a really big
pile of newspapers from our senior facilities.
So if you have a couple of places that you would like us to reach out to, send them
over, and we will reach out and see about that ask.
Great. And I think another one, I heard you mention libraries
earlier. There are partnerships there as well, particularly, I
want to go to my libraries and read books or stories.
We were trying to do that this year. This year went really fast.
I think it went fast for all of us. But I'm working directly with Chris Brown over
at the public libraries to see about doing that over the warmer months, when
they have their... I think they have camps that come to the libraries.
We'll bring a dog. The kids could read to the dog.
And that's really what it's about.
It's that initial engagement for the
kids to learn about good pet ownership.
Excellent.
And we are working on that, looking to do that next year.
That evokes
parks. Do you do anything with parks and summer camps as well?
No, but that's a really good idea. I didn't even think of the park camps.
Over the summer, the summer camps.
All right. Well, it looks like we'll be seeing a lot of you in 21.
You are welcome there.
Yep.
Thanks so much for the great work.
Thank you.
Okay. I have questions.
We talked about volunteers earlier.
How many volunteers do you have on an annual basis?
So on an annual basis, I don't think I've ever figured it out that way, but we have
about 200 active volunteers in our system right now.
Active as in they come in once every two weeks at least.
Our volunteers are available to come into our shelter any time, seven days a week,
noon to 7:00, and then we also have some extended hours for them, depending on what
they're doing.
What generally is a volunteer doing to help in the facility?
So the volunteers are basically providing the enrichment to the animals that we
just don't have the staff to do. So enrichment is very important in
an animal's life, especially when it's in a small cage in a
shelter type of environment. It helps relieve some of the stress.
So they will, again, they walk them, which is considered enrichment.
Mm-hmm.
So they will walk the dogs out in our big backyard.
They provide, again, treats through the cage doors.
They do different types of Kongs. They put treats inside
of a rubber toy, and they drop it in the cage.
The dog gets tired of it, passes out, takes a little nap.
That's mostly what they're doing. They also help us with our Doggy Day Out program.
So they take them out into communities.
They'll come in and sign a dog out for four hours, go out, walk around, go
through the Home Depot, advertise where we're at, and then they bring them back for
the day.
Am I missing something with volunteers?
Like...
Oh.
Yeah. Again, a lot along the enrichment lines with playgroups.
So they run three, four dogs all together out in our backyard.
And yeah, socialization is really what's important.
So I know we were talking about overtime earlier.
And you still have, even with the reduction, you're still going to
have
vacancies or will you
be considered fully staffed at that point after the-
No, we'll still have some vacancies.
You'll still have some vacancies.
Yeah.
What do you think are your biggest challenges to filling those vacancies?
Are we paying people enough?
That's a great question. I'm being told we're not paying people enough
from those in the outside world. We have a great relationship with PAWS Chicago,
and they are saying that our medical staff is probably the most underpaid staff.
And we have a lot of animals, so we do work our medical hard.
Shelter staff, I'm not going to ever tell
people they don't deserve more money.
Of course.
They work really hard. We would need to have probably a full audit through
either DHR or Finance or Budget to see-
Yeah
... what we can do.
I think as we're having these budget conversations, especially with a group like
yours, are we competitive enough
to retain people, to attract and retain folks?
And I think the important part about attracting and retaining them is
our hours are not always,
let's say, the sexiest hours to work, right?
We are open seven days a week, so you do have to work weekends, holidays, late
nights, early mornings.
Do people want that?
And I think that's really what we have to look at.
Mm-hmm.
We did some interviews for certified vet techs earlier
or later in the summer, and we selected candidates, and they were like, "No, the
hours just don't work for me."
So we were literally turned down from them after that-
Right
... because of the hours. So I think really that has a lot to do with it, but our
operation is, it is what it is.
Right.
And as soon as we find those right people, hopefully we get to keep them.
So what have the ramifications been of the overtime cuts
and freezes and stuff?
I know your hours are now more limited.
You can only take in animals in a smaller window-
Right
... essentially. So talk to us about
what the ramifications of all that are.
So with the overtime freeze, we did have to limit some of our services.
Previously, so prior to November 1, we were open from noon to 7,
seven days a week for animal intake.
Mm-hmm.
Looking at our hours and trying to figure out the best hours for people to come
in, so we shortened them to 3 to 7. We're still getting the same
exact number of animals in, maybe even more right now,
so we are squeezing them all in. But what we also did, and then we were able to
combine our staff to make sure we had enough staff there to deal with all of that,
to take care of the customers. We opened a second room for intake,
because previously we only had one room for intake.
And in between each animal, we have to fully clean, because you don't know-
Mm-hmm
... what that animal had when it came in, to not spread any type of disease.
So we did open a second intake room, condensed our hours
for our intake staff to only be there for that time,
which actually helped. So we do have the number of staff there during that time
period.
And then also looking at field staff, we had to shorten those hours as well,
as we noticed that we consistently work on
overtime. So now with the overtime stat, we had to stop doing that.
So in shortening the hours, we used to have an officer all by
himself, one person out on the street till 10 o'clock at night.
Which, again, is a big safety hazard.
Mm-hmm.
So in order to be able to have enough staff available during the hours that we
can, we looked at our service request numbers to see when our calls are coming in
the most, and we condensed them into those hours.
And what does a field person typically do in a day?
So I'd like to ask Angela Rabern, our operations manager, to respond to that.
Hello.
Can you repeat the question?
Oh, she needs you to repeat the question.
Sure. The question is what typically does a field person do in
a typical day? Like when they're out in the field, what's their responsibilities?
So no day is ever the same for any of our field officers, and I think that's part
of the allure to the job. One of the most critical things we do is assist the
police. So every day, multiple times a day, we're getting calls to assist
on search warrants, unrestrained animals,
loose animals that have bitten,
safety concerns. So that is our top priority. It can stem from there.
It can go to a pet wellness where someone might not be taking care of the
animal, or an animal is left abandoned.
So it's a wide variety. We also have our officers engaged in...
Over the last two years, we've really focused our officers on a lot of community
engagement. So it's those conversations with the public, so they can
come up with solutions before further calls
come down.
And how many field agents do we have out in the field in a typical,
on a regular basis during the day?
So for this year, right now we're, as of two
months ago, we're the most fully staffed in field that we have been in
years. So right now we have 19
positions. 18 of those are currently
active and working.
With our hours change for field hours, we have two shifts.
So it's a shift of 10 in the morning and then, or
sorry, 9 in the morning and 10 at night.
So keep in mind,
Sue had mentioned earlier about officer safety.
They're going to all the same neighborhoods the police are.
So we do sometimes partner staff if they elect
to
want to partner, but there's also,
it's a large city and their calls are
zigzagging. So we're actually working, one of the biggest things for 2024 that I've
been working on is efficiencies for calls.
Because part of it is the system we've noticed is a bit of a
problem because we can't see it as a map.
So it's based on knowing streets, and some people are very good at that, but
I myself am not.
I got to get you some new technology so that when the calls come in, they...
There's AI for all of that. I got to think that there's something that we
can get you in terms of just better technology to make that more efficient.
I am actually glad to hear that you're fully staffed more than you've ever been.
My concern was going to be like we've got three people out, and they've got to
cover the entire city with all of these calls that are coming in.
And that's what was happening before the hours change, and unfortunately, because
of overtime being a limiting factor, we had at
times, there were multiple times when one officer was out per night.
And they're at 110 South, and they have to go all the
way up to 5700 North. So it really created struggles for us.
But at the same time, we had to look at those efficiencies when we're looking at
bodies, people on the street, and what 2025 looks like.
Got it.
You mentioned cats earlier, and that we should leave them alone.
Yes.
So are we turning away cats now? Is that what's happening?
Yep.
If people are bringing you cats?
I just went back through my emails to make sure I didn't miss anything from the
stuff that people have wrote in.
So
we're having the conversations with those people bringing those cats in.
So if it's your cat and you can no longer keep it, we are accepting that
animal. If it's sick or injured, regardless if it's yours or a
stray, we are accepting that animal. But we have the conversation.
Why did you pick up this cat? The cat's wandering around, hanging out on
the lawn, living its life, being happy, and you just
walk up there and swipe him up and take him.
"I'm going to bring him to the shelter."
Catnapped him.
So you catnapped him, exactly.
Leave him where he's at. He's doing great right where he's at.
And if the time comes where the animal's no longer thriving, no longer
able to live out there, and you have to bring him in, then that's the point that we
will take him in.
Okay. What about raccoons?
Yep.
Leave them to-
Leave them where they're at.
Raccoon can be angry, though. So I haven't gotten a ton of calls, but
on the rare occasion that I do,
my understanding is that that's not something that you all will come out
unless the animal is
being aggressive, maybe?
Or inside the home.
Or, oh, gosh.
So if-
Yeah
... if the raccoon is inside-
Okay
... of your home, in your living space, we will come out to help service that.
Okay.
Other than that, we ask that you clean up your yard, trim the
bushes, mow the lawn, make sure your trash is covered, make sure you don't have a
lot of debris, and make it unwelcome for them, and they'll go
away.
Okay.
Please.
Oh,
one thing that we did do that we've done for the past few years, so we partnered
with Lincoln Park Zoo and came up with a wildlife guide.
So, I could send it to all of the-
Yeah, please
... officers today.
That would be great.
So it gives a lot of hazing and things.
So if you have raccoons or squirrels or foxes, coyotes-
Foxes scare me
... anything in the area, these are the best approaches to deal with them.
Because a lot of these animals are also protected.
Right.
So, it's just best practices, best approaches, not only from Lincoln Park Zoo,
but Animal Care and Control, and just overall.
Yeah, I think we'd love to have that.
So if you wouldn't mind sharing that with the alders, that would be great.
I'm to the end of my questions. I'll just
dispense with my thank yous. I have Angela on speed dial.
She's great. And
I haven't had many occasions recently to call her,
but I will say that
the last time I called her it was a real doozy
where
we had a home that had, I think, what did we count, Angela?
22 cats
in the home, and it was infested with fleas.
And it was a multi-departmental response.
And we were able to
allow the owner to retain some of the cats, but also find homes for the other cats
as well. So, I just want to compliment the team,
and Angela in particular, for just the
problem-solving that was involved in trying to
address this particular situation in the most humane way possible.
It was very clear that the owner of the residence was
in some distress and had some other things going on.
So between Animal Care and Control, Department of Buildings, and then
DFSS, we were able to really generate a positive
outcome, I think, for everybody involved.
So,
I appreciate the partnership and all of that.
Are there any other questions from anybody that's left in the room? Okay.
Oh,
Alderwoman Coleman.
Thank you,
Madam Chairwoman.
Please.
Commissioner, thank you so much, and the team.
Seventh District hosts the pet tag,
and it's such a great event, and I know that the department is out
along with it.
Livestock. I am getting more
chickens and roosters,
and they're going viral
in Inglewood. And I'm just wondering, I know it's very
gray,
but I get a mixed review from residents.
Some neighbors love it. They say it brings life.
And then some neighbors are complaining about the noise.
What's the position or what do you recommend that we do
around livestock, especially in our residential
blocks?
So I'll go back to what I said to Alderman Lawson. Leave them where they're at. No.
So there's nothing against having livestock in the City of Chicago.
They do need to keep everything clean,
have proper housing, provide food and water, proper
care, medical care.
Yes, it could get overwhelming if somebody has-
Roosters
... 35 chickens in their yard.
I wanted to say hens.
But I will let Angela Rayburn talk a little bit more about this.
Great point, because I absolutely know what you're talking about.
So I think there's definitely a difference.
We're seeing a lot of urban livestock that we've seen over the last
three years start to increase. So one of the things is, if
they're smaller flocks and they want them for the eggs, that's one thing.
That's the issues that Sue's talking about where are they upkeeping?
Are they feeding them right? What does housing look like? That's one thing.
But I do know in your ward, we're seeing large numbers where it's mainly
roosters and they're crowing. And that's actually something that could be
potentially concerning because
typically in all the situations we're seeing, they aren't necessarily seen as pets.
So the question is, what are they being used for?
And one of the things that we're actually looking at, and I think in about two
weeks, we're going to be meeting with an outside agency to talk about, well,
what are the circumstances that they have them?
Because it might be beyond just what Chicago Animal Care and Control
may be able to handle. But at the same time, is it
a
potential violation of state law?
So I think we have to determine, but I definitely know in
your ward, we're looking at it very closely because we're starting to
see and point dots around the areas that are,
I would say, a little unsettling because I don't know what someone would
do with 30 roosters
outside,
tied up by their legs. And actually, Alderman Lopez,
I know he's very passionate about it too, and
we probably butt edges right there, but that is absolutely the area we're seeing
them in.
Mm-hmm.
Back of the yards, and
now we're getting past Garfield, around
57th Street. And the demographics are a little
differently than back of the yards, and I don't
want neighbors to start arguing, and
it goes elsewhere.
Because of the different dynamics of Back of the Yards versus Englewood.
So I am noticing that this has become more and more prevalent.
It has not gotten to that point, but I know when grandkids get
involved, that it can get to that point.
If my grandmother is complaining about this loud rooster,
it's...
Mm-hmm.
We haven't had any horses lately. I know that was another.
Did we figure that horse?
We haven't taken in any horses this year.
Okay.
I
can't think of any major horse complaints
in 2024. In 2023 we had one.
Mm-hmm.
And then previous years, but nothing too
out of sorts.
Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you, Commissioner.
Quick question about the rooster.
So I'm not familiar with what the city ordinances are
on the rules for the number of that sort of livestock that
one can own.
Is there guidance on that?
There's nothing in the ordinance about that.
Oh, sounds like an opportunity for some legislation.
Okay.
Mm-hmm.
I think there's probably a few people who'd want to talk to you about your
recommendations on that based on what you're seeing.
I
hadn't heard about roosters. So
it sounds like it's becoming a bigger problem in certain areas of the city at this
point.
But same with, I know some folks who have chickens for
eggs, for the most part.
So there's not rules along the same lines for chickens as well?
So you could basically have a whole egg
production thing in your backyard and-
As long as they're your pets.
Oh, okay.
And if you're selling the eggs, I think you need to go through BACP for a license,
right? Something along those lines.
Okay.
Good to know. I learn something new every day, especially during budget.
If there are no further questions for our friends at Chicago
Animal Care and Control, we will just say thank you. Thanks for hanging with us.
I know it's been a long day. And thanks for all the work that you do.
Thank you. Thank you, everybody.
We're going to stand at ease for a minute as we transition to our final hearing of
the night.
Chicago City Treasurer. So you're going to see me again.
Thank you.
Okay, we're going to hold just a second here.
Oh, gosh.
I'm going to...
Yes, ma'am.
Okay, everybody. It is
six minutes to 7:00.
Woo.
We are on our final hearing of the evening.
Thank you very much to the team from the city treasurer's office and the
treasurer who's here.
Thanks for hanging with us. We're going to start with our friends at COFA, who are
going to give their brief report.
Dan, you're going to-
Yep
... kick us off?
Dan Fristrom, Council Office of Financial Analysis.
Finally, today we have Department 028, Office of the City
Treasurer. The FY25 recommended budget is
6.5 million. This is 4% higher than the
FY24 amount. Personnel services increased by
8%, in part due to increased FTE count.
The total budgeted FTE for FY25 is 43.
This is an increase of three over the FY24 revised
budget. The Treasurer's Department is
50.9% corporate funded, and personnel costs
make up $4.29 million, while non-personnel make up
$2.2 million. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Dan.
Treasurer Conyers Ervin, welcome.
Thank you.
Thank you for being here. Would you like to introduce your team?
Absolutely. Thank you first of all to
Chairman Ervin,
who I see did not grace us with his presence on this evening,
and certainly to Vice Chair Nicole Lee, and to all the
members of the committee. And thank you for those that stayed with us this evening.
And certainly to my team, who has been in the office
all day waiting,
so I know I owe them one after this. But nevertheless, to
my immediate right, we have Craig Slak, our chief
investment officer. And then to his right is Matt
McGrath, the chief of staff. And over, as I
state your name, please wave your hand.
James Ramos is the deputy chief of staff.
Katrina Walker is the deputy chief investment officer.
Amanda Brown is the director of human resources.
Zach Martin is the director of intergovernmental
affairs. Sharita Chiles is the director of
programming. Cherise Bradford is the director of
development. Mauricio Banuelos is
portfolio manager. Momen Hawk, portfolio
manager, and Regina King, executive assistant.
Thank you.
Do you have a statement that you want to read?
Is it-
If I could just abridge it-
Yes
... for the sake of time, I would just say-
We would love you for that.
Thank you.
I do not want to take away-
Yes
... any of your thunder.
No. Mm-mm. Currently, our office manages
$10.7 billion in assets under management.
That is a $700 million increase over last year,
and $1.8 billion increase since I took office
in May of 2019. Each year I come to City Council,
it's always more and more in assets under management that we manage.
We have a very lean staff that really
punches well above its weight class.
Our total staff right now is about 35 people, and
in the financial sector world, for a $10.7
billion in assets under management, you will have at least
probably about 35 people just managing that alone.
And our total, as I went through our introduction, includes a variety of
different departments even within our office. And so we really do well with that.
But also, we earned,
as of today, over
$252 million,
and we're expecting to earn for taxpayers $400
million
in investment returns for 2024. That is a healthy
increase over 2023 and more than double the
$175 million earned in 2022. I will
also say I'm very proud that we have traded with more
than 60% with minority-owned brokerage
firms, and we are certainly setting a standard.
Diversity, equity, and inclusion is very important to me.
Now, another objective that is very important to me that is also
required by statute, is providing financial education and
empowerment to Chicagoans. And in
2024, we were happy to award 10 Chicago
students with $5,000 in scholarships.
We had our huge, amazing summit,
Building Wealth Today for Tomorrow, where we had
over 6,000 residents that registered for
that event this year at UIC. A major event.
We're still getting a lot of testimonies from that.
As well as initiatives we have all throughout the year, Wealth Wednesdays, Money
Mondays with Melissa, and we launched this year a new
initiative, Money Matters Institute.
This is really an amazing curriculum that helps residents and
small business owners. And I will stop there for questions.
Thank you very much.
Alder friends,
questions for the treasurer?
Yes, Alderman Sigcho-Lopez.
Thank you.
Thank you, Vice Chair Lee, and thank you, Treasurer, for
your report. I also want to thank you for recognizing one of our small
businesses in your
small business fair. I think it was good to see
the small businesses across the city being able to be recognized,
highlighted, and supported. So I want to thank you on behalf of our community.
One of the things that I would like to emphasize is I think the importance of
support to our local businesses with the resources that we have,
especially given the changes in the federal
government
support and the climate in general.
Speaking
as a representative of an immigrant community in a climate that seems to be very
challenging.
One of the things that we struggle with is access to financing
for small businesses. We have talked to
BACP, of course, all the weight of city government.
So my question around,
I know that there is a conversation around
public options, right, to financing.
I think that in my opinion, a public bank,
it is Is feasible and really critical in a time where
the private sector offer really high interest rates, access to credit is very
difficult. We also seen very draconian
policies that I think, in my opinion, are going to worsen inflation.
When we have people talking about tariffs
to some of our main financial partners
like Mexico or China even. I do think that those are really
conditions that are going to be challenging for us.
The fact that
I think that we're trying to address unemployment by mass
deportation, that is extremely concerning that these
draconian policies are even mainstream today, but that is the
reality that we live. I hope that we see the need
of local participation. So again, in
terms of financial options and how we can use our public
dollars reserves
to shift it to be able to fund small
businesses from, or areas that don't see the kind of investment from the
banking industry.
That's right. And first of all, Alderman, I want to personally thank
you. I know this has been each year for the past five years I've
come here,
you always ask about the public banking initiative.
And so I can honestly say this year that this
is an initiative that Mayor Brandon Johnson certainly has
taken the bull by the horn, and he's working aggressively and
really bringing that to fruition in 2025.
And I can say as the treasurer that his team has worked
with our office to ensure, since this is something we do
all the time with financial education, and as I mentioned by statute, I'm
required. He has worked with us, his team, hand in
hand, to make certain that we are involved and at the
forefront as an office, as the Treasurer's office with that initiative.
And so I do want to thank you. I know you've been involved as well, you
along with the Comptroller, in making certain, and we have some work
to do, but certainly I'm appreciative that we are being
provided resources finally to be able
to make that fruition come into play.
I will also say in regards to the small businesses, you bring
up an excellent point.
And we know year after year, we've been talking about how these major banks, we
know that residents and small business owners do not have access to capital.
And so I am proud to say that the amount of money we have with
smaller banks have increased on purpose because we know
smaller banks are the ones that tend to loan money to
our residents and small business owners.
And I will say this to you,
and please share with the other alderpersons.
I was shocked for the first time since I've been treasurer over five years,
Chase Bank actually reached out to me for a
meeting before I came here on today. That shocked me.
And they sat down with me to talk to me about all the initiatives that they're
doing, and by the way, our deposits have decreased
tremendously with Chase Bank because we have been
intentional about putting
our deposits with smaller banking institutions.
But when I had the conversation with the vice chairman at Chase Bank, we sat
down, me and a few of our team members, and I told them, I said, "Our city council
members are not pleased with the service that you are providing with
our taxpayers here in Chicago, access to capital." So they're very
aware of this. I know that because they reached out.
But I thank the city council members each year you all have
been diligent on this topic, and I want you to know that
it matters.
So thank you.
Thank you, Treasurer. I really appreciate that you're being open to look at
different financing
opportunities for small businesses in our communities.
Like I said,
you already have come to our neighborhood on many occasions, work with,
even come to our parades to really
learn the challenges directly from our small business community, and I really
appreciate that.
The other thing I think I know that you mentioned is small bank, community banks
that have been struggling over a long period of time, credit unions and so forth,
and I really appreciate your efforts.
The other is, in terms of coordination, maybe with other local
government, like state government, county government, is there any
way that we can
really pool resources together? Again, my
concern is that the
potential loose regulation at the federal level and predatory
practices that we already have seen could worsen in this
climate. So I do think that helping our small communities
and helping our
small business owners, it is fundamental during this time.
So outside again, are you making efforts to bring that to
fruition? There's anything else around the State
Treasurer's office. Any kind of efforts that we can bring together,
the need is dire. And I think the backbone of our economy are not
corporations, are not big businesses, are small businesses
in our community that provide good employment, good paying jobs.
And today, I tell you, they are suffering to pay rent.
They're suffering to
make ends meet, and I've seen time after time.
So I really would like to partner with you, and I don't know if you've seen any
other potential opportunities. I know the public bank being one of them, but I
don't know if you see anything at the state and county level, things that we can do
to partner up to really bring some resources to the small
businesses.
I think that is a great point, and I'm certainly open to that.
I know that I will certainly need some help from city council if we're going to try
to get other
units of government involved. We work, of course, with the State Treasurer's
office, obviously, in both of the work that we do.
But we know that sometimes the county and the state and federal government have
different initiatives than us. So certainly I am more
than willing because we need help.
I have the smallest citywide office, and the amount of requests coming
into our office for financial education, so many
organizations, to your point, small businesses that need help.
We're doing the best we can with a very lean team.
But I We know financial education is needed.
It's needed for residents and small business owners.
And so, by the way, you mentioned a business owner in your ward that we featured,
and we featured so many business owners throughout the entire city from
all 77 neighborhoods. Is it 77 still?
Yep, 78.
77 neighborhoods, so that we can make certain that we
showcase them, and so that we can bring business to them.
So really thank you for that.
Yeah. Thank you,
Treasurer. Last one. I think you mentioned financial education.
I do think we mentioned it with
the Secretary of State at some point, the issue of financial
literacy and literacy in general, right?
I do think there's a huge need to reach out in terms of
libraries or local libraries, spaces where we can have
more head start programming. Financial literacy is, I think, part of it.
So I'm not sure if there's any other programming or any other efforts that your
office would like us to help out. I do think that your
office, again, I know is doing a lot with a very limited budget, but anything else
that you think that some of the challenges that you're seeing-
Yeah
... around helping
address these financial education gaps, and also
financing gaps.
If there's any other challenges that you're seeing out there, maybe you can share
with us, how can we be of support?
So I'm glad you asked me that. I will tell you, this new
initiative we have, Money Matters Institute.
If you all have not heard about it, we call it MMI.
Money Matters Institute, if you look at the curriculum, I literally had
to ask my team, I was like, "Who came up with this?" It's an
amazing curriculum for residents and small business
owners. But here's the challenge.
Because we just do not have the funding, most of our budget is
personnel. We can't
technically even let residents know
about this initiative. That's why we focus so much in
partnering with the aldermen. By the way, so many thank yous to the
alderpersons that every time we give you information, you send
it out to your residents, because it's really you that have that direct contact
with your residents. But we truly have a limited
marketing budget. And here's what we have found, Alderman, if
the residents know about it, they will come.
Mm-hmm.
But guess what? How do we get them to know about it?
And so marketing has been extremely limited for
us because we want to get the word out and help residents.
And by the way, also, when you talk about the small
businesses, this year in 2024, we gave
$25 million
to smaller banks that were so elated to
receive those funds with First
Eagle Bank and Albany Bank. And that made a huge
difference for those banking institutions, and we know again, that they will lend
to small business owners. But we need to continue to help financially
educate residents and small business owners.
We have the curriculum, we just need help in getting the word
out. Imagine how our city would be if more
of our residents were financially educated.
And by the way, you and I both know where we come from, people pay for those
type of resources. We are providing this to our
taxpayers for free.
Mm-hmm.
It's included in their tax dollars.
But we got to get the word out, and we just don't have the budget to do it.
Last one, Vice Chair, if I may. Do you sit any of the
pension boards?
I think that was one of the things that I know is being a concern.
I know that, again, we are paying we are honoring our commitments to pensions.
We also talk about a supplemental payment plan or pension
payment.
How do you see in terms of projections, I think that it is
important that we catch up, definitely to the
payments that are made.
Again, there was a suggestion to reduce the payment, just given the huge deficit of
a billion dollars that we had this year.
But also, of course, that we're hearing the concerns of the
credit rating agencies.
Just overall, that's my last question.
How do you see that and just the future of it?
Again, I think there's a lot of fear-mongering in terms of the city
losing population. I always said, and I have said it before, that I wouldn't
bet against Chicago having a strong labor force, having many
conditions that I think is a beautiful city.
So again, in terms of just the pension projections, anything that, again, in
terms of the council members should know based on your experience sitting in these
boards?
You know what, I am so glad you asked me that question.
Because I will tell you that Craig and I,
as the chief investment officer and his team, we spend a lot of
time at pension fund meetings. I don't even know if city council is
even aware of how much time is spent.
For me, as my role as treasurer, because I am a trustee of
all the city's pension funds, and I'm the only elected official that is.
So when it comes to pension funds, I do know a lot of information
about it. And I will tell you that we
are finally, finally, Craig and I was talking about this
the other day. Because of the advanced payments
that have allowed us to be in a position to not liquidate.
By the way, when I first came into office in 2019, we
were liquidating.
We were liquidating assets to pay benefits.
And so now we're at a point that we can actually
invest and be a little bit more aggressive in our investments to make
money. And I would always say each year that I come before city council,
while we cannot invest our way out of this pension problem,
certainly my role as treasurer and our role as we come into the investments
every single month with these pension funds, we're holding these asset managers
accountable, we're holding these investment consultants accountable.
But we're finally at a point That we can be more
like our peers, where we can invest in private credit,
private equity, more alternatives, so that we are
able to generate more money. And I will tell you this, we're
finally at this point. Please don't make us walk backwards.
And I will tell you also, as an elected official, I am
so sensitive to the position that City Council is in right
now. I am sensitive. But I will tell you that
the reason, unfortunately, we are where we are is because the can has been
kicked down the road for so long, and not a fault of probably
anyone in this room right now. But my mother would always say, "You got to play the
hand you've been dealt." And this is where we are.
And if we do not make those advance payments and liquidate,
the statistics show, we had some actuaries project
that it'll cost probably the city over $568
million.
We cannot afford that. And so for the
$272 million advance payment, if we
liquidate it, it will be $333
million. And so then if we continue to liquidate, what we
have found is that it will cost more.
And if we did not liquidate,
then we would save $2
for every $1 we invested. This is a huge deal.
So it, number one, makes us fiscally responsible.
It helps our credit ratings. Certainly, I can
tell you all real quick how our credit ratings have increased, because the credit
agencies look at us as more stable. Moody's.
Greg and I was talking about that the other day. I had something about Moody's.
Several upgrades from Moody's, that we are now
at
positive. Oh, stable. We were at junk.
No, we were at stable and now we're at positive.
So thank goodness we weren't at junk.
But we were at stable, now we're at positive in the green.
That is a big deal, and we certainly do not want to go backwards.
In 2021, we were negative. I said junk, but it's negative.
We were at negative in 2021, and in 2023 we became
stable, but we're positive. We don't want to go backwards.
Thank-
So thank you for asking that.
Thank you, Treasurer. And I think, looking forward to working with the state.
I know there's a lot of work to do in terms around pensions.
I know that is a partnership. Also glad to see movement away from predatory
hedge funds and other costly instruments that have been
not managed properly. And I'm glad to see big banks like Chase doing more for
the city. I do think that that
reinvestment in the community banks, credit unions, and I think calling
on the attention, I think is critical for the $1.1 billion portfolio.
So thank you, and I'm looking forward to working together.
And when you bring up credit unions, I always say because we're partners, we work
together.
And when I come here, I like to tell you about help that is needed.
Certainly, we still have not gotten to a solid legal
perspective from the law department for the credit union legislation.
While we have gotten to a great point that we're able to lend to the smaller
banks, we would love to be able to lend to the credit unions.
As you know, they are insured by NCUA.
We would love to be able to put some deposits in credit unions.
And when you talk about people that just invest in our residents,
credit unions partnered with us for our Building Wealth Today for
Tomorrow summit, and they don't have a dollar of our deposits.
Hmm.
I just want you to just let that soak in.
There's no reason for them to work with me.
Hmm.
They want to work with us. They want to help the residents.
And right now, I cannot give them any of the residents' deposits.
Thank you.
Thank you, Treasurer.
Thank you. Alderman Waguespack.
Thanks, Chairwoman.
Just one question for you, Treasurer. I know it's late.
Can you give me any information on the Chicago Community
Catalyst Fund? I know we were supposed to have these drawdowns over the
years.
I think there's a few million left in the account, but do you know
the status of what's happening with that other than the fact that we
do not have enough people appointed
to invest those funds, and
perhaps why we don't have people
both on the board, I know we're missing three of them or four of them, and then
on the advisory committee as well.
And I know that's not your fault with the appointments, but I wonder if you could
give us an update on that.
I'm glad that you asked that question. I think that's a very important question.
As you know, and you've stated, the governing structure has expired.
I am happy to announce that in
conversations with the administration, the administration is
interested in us having discussions as to how we can restructure
the Catalyst Fund.
And what my suggestion would be, and the team and I have really been talking
about this, and so we're hoping over the next
year that we will have some legislation coming before City Council.
But in the past, the City Council members were just
advisory-
Right
... board members.
And as you know, there were outside people, a part of the board, who
actually had no stake in the board.
Well, if it's city's money, we actually think that probably the City
Council members should have a more active role in that, and not necessarily
advisory. And so very similar to other, as you know,
funds and boards that we have within the city where City Council members do have a
voting
point in the board. So that is something that we are looking at,
and we would like it, and I'm sure you hear it, many alderpersons tell us
about gap funding that is needed for a lot of small business owners.
There's some different things that we're looking at.
We're speaking with Commissioner Boatwright
Just having some discussions as to how we can be more helpful to small business
owners and how city council members can take a more active role in it so that we
can more directly help your businesses.
Yeah, and I think that's a good idea.
That's something that several years ago when it first started up, a
handful of us were commenting that
just having aldermen on the advisory side of it-
Yes
... was not
helpful, and having people come in on a frequent basis that had
no clue what those needed investments were at the small business
side was not helpful.
We agree.
So restructuring would probably be good.
Do you happen to have the amount in front of you at the moment that
is available?
52.3 million.
It is 52.3. Okay.
So all of the small business resiliency loan that we did-
Yep
... during the pandemic where we helped so many businesses stay afloat,
those businesses, pretty much all of the funds, it's only a
few million, very small, that is still
outstanding. And so pretty much all of the money has been returned, which
is great news.
But if we did have people appointed to that board, presumably we could start
utilizing that 52.3 million. We're just in
holding pattern-
Yep. But I-
... far too long right now
But I would hope, as we all work together going forward, that
we make it that it's more palatable for you all.
We want this to help your businesses.
You all are on the front lines.
As
the treasurer,
my office, our role, we know how to make money, right?
We know how to manage the money. We know how to be a custodian of the money.
But you all are on the front lines. You know what your small businesses need, and
we wanted to make it more
of something that can be more helpful for your businesses.
And so-
Yeah
... we're looking forward to working together on that.
But yes, that's what it could do.
I wholly agree, and I think if there are discussions about
restructuring that aldermen are put on
the agenda for the board side of it, if it gets completely
restructured,
because I think aldermen,
for the most part, are pro-growth in terms of our small
businesses.
Absolutely.
I don't think there's anyone who would argue against that, but
we do need to see those funds utilized. I know it's been several years.
Mayor Emanuel was the first one to create that.
I think his intentions were good at that time, and maybe it
had some hiccups in the way it was structured.
But
if we could see that 50 million invested and start
creating
both
funding for the budget, but also
creating those business entities or supporting them where they--
Which maybe some people upstairs don't understand, when you
support the businesses, the business community, you are creating
jobs, you're creating revenue that we can in turn then use for the
programs that people want to see in the city.
And until you get that aspect of it correct, you can't really move
forward. So whatever you-
Well, the administration has been open to it.
Yeah.
So thank you.
So whatever we can do there, it'd be helpful.
And that was the only question I had.
I've read through a lot of the other
things that you've put out there. So I think we're all good on that.
Thank you, Alderman.
All right. Thank you very much, Chairwoman.
Thank you.
Any other questions? Alderman Coleman? Nothing? You-- Yes, please.
To our Madam Treasurer, born in the 16th Ward.
Yes, ma'am. Proud of it.
Right on the west side. No, I want to commend
you and your team for doing a Herculean job
with such a minimal
support. And in every capacity, in any
capacity, please know that the 16th Ward, it's always spreading
and sharing. I was so excited when I saw the home
buyer's workshop-
Yes
... live. And I'm going to try, I was down here-
Yes
... yesterday, but I'm going to try my best to get there on the 16th,
pending what's going on down here.
But I just want to commend and maybe ask
if we can do
maybe a once a quarter live. Monday,
Melissa, south side, west side, north side,
far south.
Maybe.
Mm-hmm.
And by the way, Alderwoman, thank you.
There are several alderpersons that always share our information.
Certainly you and your team being one of them.
And so we had a list of thank yous, but I'll say that early.
Thank you very much because, again, we really rely on our partners
to spread the information. We don't have a marketing budget for that, per se.
But I will also tell you, the live in the community is a huge
deal. Many residents on the south and west sides of
Chicago are intimidated in going into banking
institutions. And so we are welcoming them into
their local banks, where we have
credit agencies like TransUnion talking to
residents right there, one-on-one, about how to
increase their credit scores and giving them tidbits on that.
We may have the Chicago Urban League that is there talking about different
programs that they have for parents and small business owners.
And then we have those from the banks that is there talking to them about
how to become a homeowner. All of this for free right in the
community. This is unheard of. But these are the
partnerships that we now have. And the banks, they're
opening their hours at 7:00 p.m. in the evening.
We were out in Bronzeville yesterday. We've been in Pilsen.
We've been all around. We've been in Pullman, I believe, in Pullman.
We are all around trying to make certain that
residents can right there be able to touch these people and
ask the questions that they need. So it's a very big deal.
So really thank you for putting the word out on that.
Yeah. And
Just curious, because I was just thinking about the South and the West Sides, and
the business community,
especially in hospitality, because they've gotten hit and haven't
quite made it back from the pandemic.
Yeah.
If maybe the Black Caucus could work with your office, and
seeing how we could do maybe a special on just
how you did for homeowners, homebuyers, maybe for the hospitality
and maybe connecting them with BACP and what other city
opportunities, Urban League-
Yes
... to just give them a leg up, specifically for
restaurants, because we know that we don't have many-
That's right
... let alone sit down, but just healthier options.
Yeah.
So I'm thinking of the Soul Veggies, and how do we help them expand
maybe to the West Side and-
Mm. And bring the banks in.
And bring-- Yes.
This is why the relationship with the banking institutions are so important.
Absolutely.
And last but not least, I just had to shout out James Ramos.
Yes.
Ms. Regina and I, I was a baby working at the Clerk of
Circuit Court, so to-
Oh, wow
... to still work with 20 years, 15 years later, and
of course, Jowon Hall from the 16th Ward.
You just have a remarkable team.
Thank you. James Ramos's been around
a long time, I know. He doesn't look like it, though.
Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman. I've got a couple of questions, and I promise it won't
be long. I'm timing myself over here.
Mm-hmm.
So you talked a lot about the institutions, the smaller institutions that we're
investing in. Do we collect any information from them on what sort of
small business loans they're executing on?
Can you share some of those highlights? We'd love to hear them.
Yeah, that's a big deal for our office, because we have, since I've been in office,
we implemented a scorecard. And so we want to know, we hold
these banks accountable, and we want to know that they are investing with
our institutions, so.
Yeah, and I think it's-
Here you go. Say your name.
Craig Slack, Deputy Treasurer and Chief Investment Officer. Thank you.
Yeah, my team,
along with our IGA team, did some extensive research with these
organizations to talk about their loan portfolios and where they were lending
within the communities that they serve.
And we want to be
satisfied with the types of loans that they were making and making sure that they
were consistent with the pillars of impact that we were trying to make.
Of course, we're always trying to
specifically care about our underserved neighborhood, South and West Sides.
And specifically, I know you care about our underserved youth, and so
Albany Bank, very
active in the one to four
lending space, multi-family housing.
But that bringing in and lending on a multi-family unit,
they're bringing in carpenters, plumbers, electricians, all creating
jobs within Albany Park and transitioning and transforming their neighborhoods.
We've just
struck a deal, well, struck a deal, we've just made a deposit with
First Eagle Bank. They operate as a CDFI, and to your
point, CDFIs and
credit unions are much more deliberate and intentional about getting
money into those communities that they serve.
So we're very pleased to be working with First Eagle.
And
now, not just
where were you when we gave you those dollars, but really tracking
impact and growth and really holding them
accountable to making sure that those monies were put into places that we
wanted to see it put.
Yeah. Through the chair, if you have the total number-
Absolutely
... of loans, and then by type, I think that would be interesting for all of us to
see how the fruits of our labor, if you will.
And I agree-
That's exactly why we're
making these deposits.
Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly, and to Alderman Waguespack's
comments earlier, we had all of that data available through the Catalyst
Fund,
and tracked those loans and
were to women, Black, brown, Asian,
all the metrics that we could have, where those dollars were being put to work and
how.
Just really trying to get a gauge on the community impact that we're having.
That's great. I know you have no marketing budget.
We have some.
Some?
Very minimal. Not enough to
yeah.
You're not buying bus ads and all of that.
I will just make a suggestion to you. Especially the two things.
With the institutions that we are investing in, they would be a great way
to share information about programs, especially because we're investing with them.
Yeah.
Do we have programs where we work with CPS for building financial
literacy with students?
I know that one of the things that I think a lot of communities struggle with is,
depending on the type of job that you have, you may not ever actually have a bank
account.
Mm-hmm.
And
the unbanked, I think, is still a challenge.
And getting kids started at a younger age, in terms
of wanting to save. So I don't know if we have budget to do, or if we can get
partners to pony up some matching dollars.
I love it.
So if a child and their family opens up a savings account, whether that's with a
credit union or with a bank, and saves right before Christmas,
we'll match you up to a certain number of dollars.
I think there's opportunities to build financial literacy at a very young age-
I agree
... to do that as well.
So James Ramos is going to respond to that about CPS, but I will tell you,
I would love the kindergarten to college program.
And the state, by the way, even with its fiscal
challenges, it is investing in children.
And I always wanted for us as a city to put some type of
small bank account investment into small children.
Or even savings bonds. Nobody does that.
I would love that. That's a great investment.
Yeah.
And so if we can look at that, and I know in the future, but that's a great
investment. But James Ramos.
James Ramos, Deputy Chief of Staff.
Yes, we are currently speaking with CPS in terms of partnering with
them and And getting into the schools, maybe
not citywide, but getting to certain schools.
But at the same time, we are planning for our strategic plan for
2025 to do an all-bank day with CPS students,
and that's where they learn about savings and
investing, and things of that nature.
The goal here is to really focus on all
grades, per se. We historically have been able to work
with CPS, even on the investments team, to
work with them during the summer, especially with-
One Summer Chicago. So we work with those students and did
some workshops with them.
So we are definitely working closely with CPS.
At the same time, one of the things we want to focus on 2025 is
also connect with our state legislation.
Our legislators, we know that there is some type of bill and
conversations about possibly having
statewide legislation where there will be some financial education
through the education systems throughout the state.
We also want to be a part of that. We want to make sure that the treasurer's office
is represented, and the treasurer's office has a
say in direction of how we can implement that with CPS here in Chicago.
It'd be great if Treasurer Frerichs had a way to
give us some of that unclaimed property
that we could put to good use.
I think there's lots of opportunities with young people, especially if we can make
small investments, whether with our own city funds or really
leveraging institutions that do business in the City of Chicago
to make investments in our young people and really building their own future
customer bases. So
anything that we can do there. I'll offer up the 11th Ward as a pilot.
I'll talk to our local banks. I'm willing to do that, and ask them
what they'd be willing to do to contribute.
They're always handing out piggy banks at events, right?
So how are we going to help people fill those piggy banks and start really
getting the kids off on the right foot?
You're welcome.
The one other question I've got is,
with all of the great programming that you did, and thank you for always inviting
me to those, by the way. I think you could do incredible things.
Six thousand residents registered is really incredible.
What other sort of metrics do you have as a result of those?
I
saw, I walked around the room, right?
And saw the conversations that were happening.
Do you have data from some of the
institutions that were there of loans that were processed or how
many applications from application to
disbursement of funds, if you will.
What's it yielding, all of the engagement-
Yeah
... which is so needed?
So most of the time, the only data we have is from testimonies, which we
have plenty of.
As you know, these partners with us are really volunteer partners,
and so we do ask them for information, but
that's very hard to receive, I'll admit that.
But what we do have, we can see about maybe putting together-- I
know the team has a lot of metrics. They try so hard because
obviously we want to measure ourselves and see what difference we're making.
So I'll see what we have. But I know that because it is the
partnerships that they're kind of doing us a favor per se, sometimes it's hard
to get those metrics.
Yeah. It's a great shared story for them as well-
Yeah
... with their community outreach.
I know having worked at, at one point I worked at a financial
institution.
Oh, you know.
I understand CRA work and-
Yes
... all that sort of stuff.
Yeah.
All of that makes a difference for them.
I would think that they would want to be sharing that type of information-
Yeah
... in terms of
they took the time to partner with you on a volunteer basis, but if they're going
to come back again, they have to be able to go back to their companies too, to say
that, "Here are the results that it yielded.
Here's the new number of customers that we got as a result."
I think the more that we can do in terms of sharing those stories, it is really
powerful stuff that you do. I want to make it easier for you to grow those
and continue to have a big impact.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
And by the way, we were talking earlier, a lot of those banks and
other organizations that partnered with us this year are already signed up for
next year and more because of the impact.
So there is some type of data we'll try to provide.
I know it because the banks got to have something.
We'll just have to see what we can get from them.
But we know of testimonies, and we do have some data that we
have within our office.
Yeah. And I love the whole family sort of approach, like building family wealth.
Yes.
I know that was a focus this last time around.
But I think the more that you can do in terms of really addressing the entire
family-
Oh, that's good
... because you can get everybody involved.
Yep.
Well, with that, thank you for your time.
I don't think there's any other questions.
Thank you everybody in the box for all that you do.
Thank you.
I know how hard you work, especially on those events, because I know you're a small
but mighty team.
Yes.
I saw all of them working very hard.
Yes.
Doing an awesome job.
Thank you for everything.
And thank you again, City Council, for always working with us and supporting us
in every endeavor.
Right. And you'll have words with the chairman about that.
Chairman Ervin, if you're listening, what?
Thank you, everybody. We'll stand at ease until tomorrow morning when we pick up
with more hearings tomorrow with Department of Law and Department of
Procurement
Services. Thank you.