It's up to the city — not reporters — to take the lead in recouping Chicago's unpaid bills

Unlike the “scrub” Destiny’s Child sang about in their 1999 hit “Bills, Bills, Bills,” many sports teams, concert promoters and event planners say they are ready and willing to pay up when they hire city employees to help with traffic control.

They aren’t trying to pull a fast one, the groups, including Live Nation and the NFL, insisted to the Sun-Times. The problem, they say, is that the city doesn’t send invoices on time, so they can’t send the checks right away.

Some organizations have been waiting for a statement from the city for a few years, which leaves Chicago out millions of dollars it could pretty easily recoup, if it just had the will.

This outstanding cash-collecting quandary didn’t start with current Mayor Brandon Johnson. Municipalities, including Chicago, have historically struggled to acquire money they are owed, as we pointed out in December after reporters Tim Novak and Mitchell Armentrout uncovered that the city has amassed $6.4 billion in unpaid fees, fines and other debts since 1990.

The problem also isn’t unique to local government. Businesses and other entities can drag their feet about submitting bills, but pervasiveness isn’t an excuse. In a city like ours, which could use the money for any number of purposes, including helping the unhoused and other people, every dollar counts.

Novak and Armentrout were instrumental in recouping some of the city’s money by working their magic with just a few inquiries, as they reported in a story published in Sunday’s Sun-Times.

After they placed calls to the businesses responsible for $1.3 million in unpaid traffic control bills — Voila! — most of the payments were turned in to the city.

Journalists’ pressing questions can always lead to corrective action, since being branded as delinquent is not the kind of branding companies yearn for, and they certainly don’t want that broadcast. As Novak and Armentrout’s reporting chops prove, the city could quickly put together a plan to ensure that unpaid bills are taken care of.

The pressure just needs to build from within City Hall itself. Not from the media.

The staffing issues Comptroller Chasse Rehwinkel cited for the bills not being sent out faster? OK, fair enough. And yes, there are institutions that no longer exist, including the televised weight-loss competition, “The Biggest Loser,” which used traffic control for races but hasn’t yet paid for those services.

So realistically, not all the money the city is owed can be recovered. Some of it is chump change. But it adds up, and if there isn’t a concerted effort to at least go after larger corporations that can pay up, the biggest losers will be Chicagoans — when they’re called on to make up the difference.

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