Howard Brookins

Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Tuesday lauded Chicago Transit Authority workers for their "flawless" rollout of a five-month Red Line reconstruction that has shuttle buses replacing train service. So far, they're breathing a sigh of relief at City Hall. The...

Pressured for months by teachers, community leaders and aldermen, Mayor Rahm Emanuel's hand-picked school board is nonetheless expected on Wednesday to approve closing all but a few of the 53 elementary schools the administration wants to shut down....

Aldermen, have your heads stopped spinning over all the details in that McCormick Place/Navy Pier megadeal announced Thursday? If so, we have some questions for you. No, not about that megadeal. About the last megadeal. The one on revising the parking...

Surrounded by kids as he accepted money from a soft-drink company for nutrition and exercise classes, Rahm Emanuel was asked if it might make more sense for children's health to take a harder line on the sale of sugary drinks. "I'm here about making...

More than 100 religious leaders and a handful of aldermen today called for a repeal of the water fee imposed on non-profits by the city last year. "The lake is a gift from God," said Cardinal Francis George said. "We feel sometimes we should charge...

Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Chicago aldermen have proposed a compromise to religious leaders who say that paying their water bill after decades of a blanket exemption will rob them of the resources necessary to provide social services. On Sunday, city...

Democratic ward and township bosses today chose Stanley Moore to succeed convicted former Cook County Commissioner William Beavers despite Moore's $3,000 fine for allegedly campaigning while on the taxpayer dime at his state job. The selection by party...

Cook County Democratic leaders are scheduled to meet Thursday to pick a replacement for Commissioner William Beavers, who was convicted last month of federal tax evasion. Ald. Howard Brookins will lead the meeting at which Democratic committeemen will...

In the wake of the murder of 6-month-old Jonylah Watkins, the ward’s alderman announced Tuesday that he has contacted gang members to ask them not to harbor the killers of innocent victims. Ald. Willie Cochran, 20th, a retired Chicago police...

Mayor Rahm Emanuel gave Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy his “100 percent support” Monday despite complaints from some aldermen fed up with the department’s inability to bring down violence in their neighborhoods. The mayor...

The Chicago Police Department hopes to free up the equivalent of 44 officers a day by no longer dispatching cops for certain crimes, like burglaries and car thefts in which the offender is no longer at the scene and no one is in immediate danger....

Mayor Rahm Emanuel said Thursday that restoring free water service to churches and non-profit agencies as some aldermen suggest would reverse a campaign promise he’s fulfilled. “I pledged in the campaign that we were not going to give away...