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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times file
Some of Chicago’s best-known civic groups kicked off a campaign Tuesday aimed at creating an independent commission to redraw Chicago’s ward boundaries and make a clean break from the City Council’s history of “gerrymandering to protect incumbents.”
By choosing, training and bankrolling a 13-member “people’s commission” with its own “re-districting expert,” Change Illinois and its powerful civic partners hope to create a version of a Chicago ward map capable of attracting the votes of at least 10 aldermen.
Any map that receives at least 10 City Council votes automatically triggers a referendum that would allow Chicago voters to choose between rival maps.
Sun-Times file
The City Council moved Wednesday to preserve affordable housing and slow gentrification that has displaced so many long-time residents of Pilsen and the neighborhoods of Logan Square, Wicker Park, Humboldt Park and Bucktown around the wildly popular 606 trail.
The “anti-deconversion” ordinances championed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot would generally make it more difficult for owners and developers of property on certain blocks to turn their multi-unit buildings into expensive single-family homes that only exacerbate Chicago’s affordable housing crisis.
The 606 protections were approved in conjunction with a two-month extension of anti-demolition rules. That will buy time for the city and local aldermen to finalize a more sweeping protection plan that includes “demolition impact fees.”