The Civic Federation supports the Chicago Public Schools proposed $5.9 billion budget for FY2012, which is an increase of 1.5%, or $87.0 million, from the year-end estimates of FY2011. The proposed budget is a reasonable short-term plan to…
In its fiscal year 2012 budget proposal, the Chicago Public Schools administration provided for the first time a three-year projection of its future financial situation on…
The Chicago Teachers’ Pension Fund accumulated nearly $5.4 billion in unfunded obligations over the past ten years. This was an increase of over 10,000%, from $5.1 million in FY2001 to $5.4 billion in FY2010. In three years alone, from…
As explained previously in this blog a key indicator the Civic Federation uses to assess the financial health of local governments is the level of unreserved…
The three largest municipal governments analyzed by the Civic Federation are the Chicago Public Schools (CPS), the City of Chicago and Cook County. All three began their FY2011 budget processes projecting large budget shortfalls:…
The Civic Federation analyzes the budgets of nine Chicago area local governments. One important indicator that the Federation utilizes to assess the financial health of these municipalities is their fund balance level. In particular, we…
Illinois Senate President John Cullerton has recently suggested that school districts should begin…
This report analyzes basic financial data on ten major local government employee pension funds in Cook County. It is intended to provide lawmakers, pension trustees, pension fund members and taxpayers with the information they need to make…
In 2010 the Civic Federation blog provided comprehensive information about government and fiscal issues across Illinois for the public, government officials and media. In a range of posts on topics from the…
The Civic Federation's legislative priorities for 2011 include public pension reform, requiring state government to develop and implement a capital improvement plan, the dissolving of the Illinois International Port District, creating a…
