While City Hall and Chicago Public Schools put roadblocks in the way of reporting for the Sun-Times and WBEZ series, people who lived near the closed schools opened up with their stories.
Mayor Brandon Johnson says he opposes closing schools and our investigation shows they didn’t help students or communities. We explore the alternatives.
They lease public property to businesses. Many don’t pay their taxes. And the government landlords do little to monitor this, even when the law requires it, a Sun-Times investigation finds.
Other homeowners were given disabled veteran tax breaks which could erase their property tax bills for life even though they didn’t apply and weren’t vets, the Sun-Times found.