Mayor Brandon Johnson campaigned on a promise to deliver Chicago from violent crime by making $1 billion worth of “investments in people” bankrolled by $800 million in new or increased taxes that level the playing field between the haves and have-nots.
His supporters will have to settle for a down payment on the spending front. And they’ll need to wait awhile for the tax burden to be shifted to businesses and wealthy Chicagoans.
The $16.6 billion 2024 city budget Johnson presented to the City Council Wednesday will only “begin the critical investments necessary” to deliver on Johnson’s campaign slogan to “build a better, stronger Chicago.”
There’s funding to open two of the city’s six shuttered mental health clinics — and those will be in existing Chicago Public Health Department facilities, to keep costs down.
A pilot program that frees Chicago police officers from responding to mental health emergencies will be expanded, though not enough to provide the citywide alternative Johnson promised.
Young people will get 4,000 more employment opportunities, for a total of 28,000 summer jobs — down 4,000 from 2019 and far short of Johnson’s promise to double the number of summer jobs for young people and make those employment opportunities year-round.
The bottom line, as Johnson was first to admit, is it will take time to “right this ship.”
“It’s one budget. We’re talking about years and years and years of historical neglect,” said Johnson, whose 41-minute budget address was interrupted repeatedly by applause.
“We are well on our way to weaning ourselves off of failed, regressive forms of taxation that, unfortunately, have forced ... particularly working families and Black families overwhelmingly out of the city of Chicago.”
Holding the line on property taxes, hotel room tax
On taxes, Johnson’s supporters also must be patient.
He’s delivering on his campaign promise to hold the line on property taxes and eliminate the automatic escalator that increases property taxes to match the rate of inflation.
But he’s not proposing any of the local tax increases — on jet fuel, hotel rooms and business employment — he touted during the campaign.
Working-class Chicagoans must wait for Johnson to try to level the playing field, one that the mayor claims is tilted in favor of the rich and powerful.
“We’re in the process of doing the real estate transfer [tax increases] to create a permanent source of funding for the unhoused. ... That’s a major addition,” said senior mayoral adviser Jason Lee, who’s in line for an 18% pay raise to $183,804 a year.
“We just established a revenue committee in City Council,” Lee said. “The business community actually wants to participate. They have some ideas. We’re actually in a good place. ... The mayor kind of laying that out ... has compelled many people to realize he was right. We do need sustainable revenue, and they need to participate with ideas.”
Johnson managing shortfall with short-term fixes
With a $538 million shortfall that grows with every arriving busload of migrants, Johnson is hard-pressed to deliver on any campaign promises.
The migrant crisis was “created by right-wing extremists threatened by our values” and “bent on sowing chaos and division in our city,” the mayor said.
But he managed to erase the shortfall, maintain Chicago’s status as a sanctuary city and still deliver for his progressive supporters — even as federal COVID-19 relief funds dry up — by relying on the same one-time revenue Chicago mayors have used for years to postpone the day of reckoning.
He declared a tax increment financing surplus of about $434 million, Chicago’s highest in 15 years. By closing five TIF accounts and siphoning $100 million from the La Salle Street TIF, he’s generating roughly $100 million million for the city and more than twice that amount for Chicago Public Schools. A TIF can be closed out for various reasons, such as when it has expired, or is dormant, with no projects in the pipeline.
The city again will refinance city bonds, generating $89.2 million and carrying over $50 million from last year’s unspent balance.
And there’s $41.5 million in “personnel savings,” presumably from closing out vacant positions, although Budget Director Annette Guzman wouldn’t say where those jobs would be eliminated or whether any are among the 1,700 police vacancies.
The Johnson administration is relying on “improved revenue projections” to generate $186.8 million and stronger “revenue enforcement collections” to add $35 million.
Johnson’s first budget is $200 million higher last year’s. Even after allocating $150 million toward the migrant crisis, down from $200 million in anticipated spending, Johnson’s plan includes 311 new positions and an overall city workforce of 36,729, the highest in years. The budget for the mayor’s office ballooned under former Mayor Lori Lightfoot and increases again under Johnson — this time, by $913,202.
Johnson said he reduced migrant spending by renegotiating staffing contracts he inherited. He once again demanded that state and federal governments do more to take the load off Chicago’s shoulders.
“They have to help set up shelters. We need help staffing. We need help at the border for better coordination,” he said.
“The responsibility cannot just be on the city of Chicago alone. It’s a welcoming state.”
How Johnson plans to deliver on campaign promises
During a virtual briefing with reporters Tuesday, Guzman outlined $26.6 million in new investments serving as a down payment on Johnson’s formidable campaign promises. Besides a $303 million pension prepayment and $53 million for lead pipe replacement, the budget includes:
- “Reimagining public safety” by adding 398 civilian positions to the Chicago Police Department; creating 440 “promotional opportunities”; adding 100 detectives; returning 70 patrol officers assigned to the Office of Public Safety Administration to street duty; and adding “data analytic support” to evaluate police and fire response times.
- Creating a Department of Environment and a Department of Innovation and Technology.
- Bolstering funding by roughly $2.5 million for the bureaus of forestry and rodent control.
- Creating an Office of New Arrivals within the Department of Family and Support Services; adding staff at the Office of Emergency Management and Communications; and bolstering funding for homeless shelters and “wrap-around services” by $6.8 million.
Will Johnson cut police department funding?
A key question leading up to Wednesday was whether Johnson would cut any of the 1,700 police vacancies — or instead honor his campaign promise to cut “not one dollar” from the Chicago Police Department.
The answer to both questions was yes. There’s a “slight increase” in the police budget, to $1.74 billion, from the corporate fund. But some vacant police positions will not be filled.
A review of the police budget shows the community policing section is more than doubling, while the bureau of patrol will drop by 294 officers, to 9,402. Narcotics, gang intelligence, vice, SWAT, traffic and asset forfeiture also take hits. The Office of Constitutional Policing gets a 44% increase, to 65 employees, with a $6.7 million budget.
“With all the crime and robberies going on, we need to figure out how we can do a mass recruit and hiring of police officers. The longer we wait, the longer it’s gonna take to get officers on the street,” said Far South Side Ald. Anthony Beale (9th).
“It’s very disturbing that we didn’t talk about filling the police vacancies. ... To totally ignore that ... sends the wrong signal to the people of Chicago who are afraid,” he said.
Johnson pushed back hard.
The “civilianization of positions” at the police department will “give others an opportunity to serve ... without necessarily being a police officer,” he said.
“All over the country, hiring police officers has been a difficult task,” he added.
“Investing in people is the new way. People of Chicago have been waiting for that. So those who are having a tough time with it — they have to get used to it because I’m going to invest in people,” the mayor said.
Will Johnson’s progressive supporters grow restless?
Although Johnson’s first budget makes only a down payment on his campaign promises, Lee said he firmly believes Johnson’s liberal base will be realistic about the political power of the possible.
“People always want as much as they can get. That’s human nature. But I think most people are patient. They know that we didn’t get here in a year. We got here over a matter of decades with some of the challenges this mayor was elected to address,” Lee said.
Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa (35th), the mayor’s floor leader, expects smooth sailing in the Council after two weeks of budget hearings, starting Monday.
“There’s no question that this is a great budget that really reflects our city’s progressive and liberal values. It’s a balanced budget that isn’t balanced on the backs of working-class Chicagoans,” he said.
Many progressive revenues Johnson championed “required Springfield to take action,” Ramirez-Rosa said. Without legislative action, the new mayor had “limited options,” he said.
“But progressives have always asked for an increase in TIF surplus. We’ve always said, ‘Before you raise taxes on working-class people, look to TIF to help balance the budget,’” he added.
Kennedy Bartley, executive director of United Working Families, sounded more than satisfied with Johnson’s pledge to reopen two mental health clinics and expand the nonpolice response to mental health emergencies.
“While this is a generational project that will not be solved in one budget alone, this year’s budget blueprint is an important first step toward transforming Chicago into a city that cares for everyone and abandons no one,” Bartley was quoted as saying. United Working Families is a group affiliated with the Chicago Teachers Union that helped elect Johnson.
The CTU that Johnson served as a paid organizer applauded its “brother” for “beginning to heal a generation of cuts, closures and harm from previous administrations.”
Contributing: Mitchell Armentrout
