Brandon Johnson is pushing Chicago public schools to make a pension payment.

Meanwhile, the race for Cook County Board president has officially kicked off already and a judge has ordered the city to ramp up efforts to make cross walks more accessible here with all that and more is our spotlight politics team Amanda, Vicki Hatter, Sharon and Nick Blumberg.

Hey, everybody.

So as we mentioned, Mayor Brandon Johnson putting pressure on Chicago public schools to cover a 175 million dollar pension payment.

Here's some of what he said this morning.

>> And our investments to help them contribute to the financial security of their employees.

And that's something that obviously my administration is committed to supporting along the way.

We're simply asking them to do their part because inevitably, going to be their responsibility as they become a fully elected independent body.

>> Head of the school board is set to make a decision on this Thursday.

What's at stake that somebody has got to make this pension payment and the city doesn't have the money to do it.

And CPS doesn't really have the money to do it.

But we heard a very long presentation from chief Financial Officer Joe Jaworski this morning that said, look, go ahead and refinance about 240 million dollars in existing debt at a lower interest rate, you'll save some money and that will give you enough money to do almost 3 things you'll pay to make the pension payment.

You'll cover.

The cost is has yet to be finalized.

Chicago Teachers, Union and the contract with the principals union.

That is also still outstanding.

Whether the CPS board will agree to do that is very much an open question.

Any cannot pass with just a simple majority.

It has to be a super majority of the 21 member board and it's not clear that enough members sort of see this as the best option.

Now we did get a report from the border, consultant hired by the board that said, look, there's no easy options here.

If you cut enough to make this pension payment, it would mean furlough days for teachers and students between 10 and 11 days before the end the school year, which would be impossible to overstate as to how destructive that would be for Chicagoans lives.

And that seems to be pretty much a nonstarter for so, you know, I like to say that budgeting is not rocket science.

You've got 3 options.

You can raise borrowing or raise taxes, can't raise taxes on middle of school year.

That's not how all this work or again, you borrow money or you may cut those of the 3 options in front of the school board.

What are they going to do?

Well, no Thursday for city takes it on again is something that says not.

>> The city does not have money to do, but nonetheless, this is a little bit like a hot potato except for like I want potato in the end, in Baghdad, but in buddy want And it sets up this prolonged question.

I mean, this is all just this year.

Yeah.

These budget problems continue into the future.

And this is not going to any of those options aren't solving And of course, the current makeup of the school board is because the mayor had such fundamental disagreement with the district CEO over financial issues like this.

>> And, you know, clearly the board here now, this this handpicked group of people met, you along with the newly elected folks.

>> Asserting some independence, perhaps, you know, they're going to have to make a really difficult decision either way.

first major test, it seems of this brand new board, not just, you know, new people to the board, but an entirely new.

>> Way of getting to our board, obviously because half of its been elected just under half in this West Point header.

It comes at a time when Chicago teachers, union officials are growing increasingly frustrated that it still does not have this contract with CPS settled what are still the sticking money.

Always right.

Ctu, things that veteran teachers are underpaid and they want increases for those teachers.

They also seem to be sort of stuck on this issue of prep time for elementary school teachers.

Now, if you remember all the way back in the Rahm Emanuel era, he extended the school day essentially by slashing prep periods for elementary school teachers seat.

He wants that 30 minutes back.

>> Now they've agreed sort of compromise on 20 minutes.

The district says 10 minutes because if you sort give more teachers, more prep time, you've got to figure out where those kids are going to go and that would mean hiring CTU says more arts and music teachers, which they say would be a win for everyone involved CT or at CPS is sure we agree in theory.

But again, I refer you to our previous coverage so we don't have they would like a deal yesterday.

It is unclear sort of how they're going to resolve those issues.

And it seems like this first little money issue.

The aforementioned pensions is probably something that's going to get.

I know figure it out.

But will they have to figure it out by March 30th because the city's got to close the books on the 2024 fiscal year.

So if the city is going catch this hot potato and it's going to have to probably dip into its reserves or move some other money around, which would require an act by the city Council, which means up times take ticket and everybody and we know that that spring break.

It's a it's coming But of course, the district will still be at work if even though students and teachers are not in the classroom.

Nick, you've been covering the city's efforts to upgrade a crosswalk.

Accessibility for blind and low vision pedestrians.

Federal judge just weighed in on those efforts.

What did they say?

That's right.

So this is, you know, just one of the, you know, long tails of this lawsuit that's been going on for many years.

It was a class action suit filed by.

>> On behalf of blind and low vision pedestrians against the city for essentially failing to make it signalized intersections accessible meaning when someone comes up to them, you press the button.

You hear an audio cue and it alerts you when the walk signal is on.

Otherwise it can be a bit of a guessing game.

Listening for cross traffic, trying to ask someone to help you.

So this is a case that the city has been fighting in court unsuccessfully couple years ago.

A judge ruled that the city had, in fact, violated federal law by not making these, you know, meaningfully useful these intersections, meaningful, useful for folks.

So now, for the past year, we've been waiting on a judge's decision.

The city and the attorneys for those pedestrians.

They filed competing remedial plans, essentially documents outlining how long do we have to fix this problem and how many of these intersections are we going to do?

The city has been ordered now, this is a preliminary order get finalized next month.

But the broad outlines is that the city will have to make 70% of its intersections accessible within 10 years.

And the remainder within a following 5 years.

But this has been, you know, multi-million dollar legal battle.

The city has waged any explanation from the city about why it's taking so long.

Well, they've been doing some of these upgrades kind of as they go.

They're really going to have to pick up the pace in coming years, though.

But these can be really complicated based on.

Is this an upgrade to an existing signal?

Is this something where we're doing it, you know, entirely brand-new.

Oh, and by the way, do we have the money to do these things?

So, you know, let basically just 85 of the city's intersections.

2700 of them.

Have these accessible signals.

They've been planning to about 40 over the course of this year.

But they are going to have to really ramp that up because the judge said you need to start complying with this immediately in 2025.

Amanda, Illinois is the latest state to consider legalized mobile gambling.

They've already permitted 16 casinos.

What is the argument for these online platforms I mean, I think first we just have to establish that people might think you need to go to Vegas gamble.

Despite Chicago, of course, having its temporary casino.

>> But it's not just the casinos.

I mean, there are more video gaming terminals in Illinois than anywhere in the United States.

Saudis restaurants at bars at veterans organizations.

So this is already, you know, capitalizing on what Illinois he's truly dependent on to solve some of its budget woes.

And that is.

>> More people Benton away, their hard-earned cash.

And gets to take some of that right through through Texas.

So this would allow people to just gamble on their cell phones on their tablets.

You've got one right.

There may downloaded program right now that is illegal, that it is not to say that it doesn't go on.

So that's what backers say given people are doing this, there are options.

We've got the World Wide Web.

There are ways to do it.

The Illinois should be able to tax it and get some money from what people are already doing at this 0.

One of the criticisms.

>> Well, it's like I just said there's already so much gambling going on.

It.

Casinos and restaurants that depend on this.

The municipalities, by the way, that get cut from all those video gaming terminals and folks that that at them say he read a second, you're going go instead just using your phone instead of coming to our location and it would hurt presumably new Chicago casino is they're needing as many people to come as possible.

So that's really the argument competition and also, by the way, there is a big problem with gamblers who are addicts and that's a lot tougher to control.

When you have a device that at your fingertips, think about people who are addicted to Instagram.

right.

also don't W Heather Cook County Board.

President Toni Preckwinkle turning 78 on Monday.

78 years Young and celebrated by making a big announcement was she is going to run for a 5th term as Cook County Board president.

Now, this was a little bit of a surprise, I think most observers because back when she ran for a 4th term, that was a surprise because after she lost in 2019 to Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, she said this is my last term.

I'm going to retire.

>> And now apparently she wants to run for a full other term.

Now she says she has to because threats facing Cook County because of the Trump administration are so serious that she doesn't want to leave Cook County sort of in rookie hands essentially.

But this is going to be bad news for the people who are already jockeying behind the scenes, expecting her not around.

They're going to have to find somewhere else to looking at on federal level in terms of this handing on the baton and you that there are leaders who say we need to be here at this crucial time and then younger folks saying, hey, wait, I have to turn.

I'm ready.

And this question of who does that put on get past 2?

Well, it's an especially because so many of Cook County's top leaders have been in their jobs for quite a long time.

You look at Sheriff Tom Dart.

You look at Treasurer Maria Pappas.

>> Certainly President Biden around.

who are still in the game.

So I think that at least run nation.

they're going right.

But, you know, you have to assume that there's some frustration as he pointed out with and, you know, younger members of the Democratic Party that are looking to, you know, to make a name for big questions as well as to other U.S.

Senator Durbin is going to make another younger So Nick, the Illinois Prisoner Review Board being sued for negligence regarding the tragic death last year.

That 11 year-old boy remind us what happened.

That's right.

It was just about a year ago that 11 year-old Jaden Perkins was fatally stabbed.

He was trying to defend his mother from his mother's You know, who had been released from, you know, Illinois Department of Corrections facility and whose mother had a protective order against him that he did did not honor.

He's been making threats against her, went to their home on the North side.

Also present you know, her from another of her children, a 5 year-old.

And of course, the victim was herself pregnant at the time.

So this was just really something that.

>> For very understandable reasons.

A lot of people were up in arms about to see that he had been granted released by the Prisoner Review Board led to the appointment of an executive director there led to a couple of the folks who are serving on the board to step down and, you know, calls for even broader reforms in the way this is done.

But what it did not lead to was passage in reforms.

There have been some changes, but >> a measure that would have required, for example, live streaming of did not pass that got through one chamber but got held up.

That's something that the governor has said he is against.

So there's still questions about how the prb is run and that the students yeah suit you know, accuses folks at every level of, you know, being negligent folks within See the city, the county, you know, the the Prisoner Review board is certainly the focus focal point here.

But a lot of other folks name in this negligence action.

All right.