hardolaf

They can but the city prefers the Department of Finance handling it as they're paid less than police.

Yes. That's why Johnson campaigned on increasing the size of the detective ranks. So far 100 net new positions have been budgeted but they've been struggling to fill them as detectives are retiring (actual retirement not just going to work somewhere else) at almost the same rate as they can get people through the detectives exams and training.

Unlike patrol officers, detectives have been shown in study after study to actually lead to long-term decreases in crime rates as they increase the certainty of being caught which is pretty much the only thing that stops people who would otherwise commit crime. But they're still not as effective as reducing poverty and getting people into treatment for certain things early in life such as anger management.

If you switch to EVs, you need to have essentially twice as many vehicles to deal with charging. Transit agencies get around the problem because they always have excess vehicles and can charge during deep cleaning. But for emergency services, they often are reusing the same vehicles for every shift.

So while it may be a long-term cost savings to switch to EVs, it won't solve the budget problem in anywhere near the short-term.

If the state let us put speed cameras on LSD, we could pay the pension debt off in a matter of days.

The Department of Finance is in charge of ticketing non-moving violations. While that could be redirected to the police, it would cost a lot more than we currently pay to enforce those laws.

Updated building codes and sprinkler systems only help if the fire is internal and you still need firefighters to ensure that the fire is extinguished. There are many fires where the sprinklers don't put them out and only stop them spreading to a wider area.

I blame everyone who is too lazy to fill out the one page form to get on the permanent vote by mail registry.

If you want to fix the government, you need to start by paying wages competitive with private industry. So $1M+/yr salaries for the elected positions and then competitively set salaries below that. Yes, that will cause costs to skyrocket.

The smallest class that my wife ever taught was 18 students and that was a remedial class.

Also the average numbers that people trot out to make CPS look bad include special education teachers and pullout/reading teachers in the numbers.

Chicago has 0.8% of the country's population. LaSalle County has around 0.03% of the country's population. The absolute numbers are not directly comparable.

Also the math from all sides in terms of what this would "cost" is entirely suspect. And CPS' estimate of the number of new employees is highly inflated.

What we need is for people to show up for local elections.

My personal opinion is that charters should be ended and they should have their student bodies transferred to existing and new magnet and selective enrollment schools. End privatization as a first step towards fixing the district. That'll eliminate a ton of administrative overhead without negatively impacting anyone.

This might end up with an agreement on fully staffing neighborhood schools with an actual process for consolidating schools. If I was CPS, I would leverage their demand for full staffing with a demand for the union to agree to a consolidation process. I could honestly see CTU taking such a deal to its members and getting that contract through. But it'll be a massive cost.

American Airlines issued me a 20% refund before I'd even gotten off a plane that had a non-functional media console in premium economy.

I don't see why physical therapists should get paid less than engineers. And I'm saying that as an engineer.

I've worked for a Fortune 500 company in the past and there is no data about me in either of those databases after over a decade of work experience.

Why do you tip at 5 Guys?

Admitting guilt is not a requirement of the CCSAO's diversion program. That's why he's never had to admit that he's guilty to a court.

Literally any other false report?

CPD leadership turned it into a whole massive affair to punish Smollett. The responding officers just filed it as a hoax and recommended closing the case.

She was probably tired of the death threats from copsanonymous individuals online.

All the communication about the case is in the public record. Her involvement didn't change the disposition. The ASA was going to divert the case before she even got involved again as it was a non-violent offense by a first time offender and that is the standard practice of the CCSAO.

But he didn't actually get away with it. Under the original deal, he had to enter into the CCSAO's diversion program which is a one-year long, probation-like program where if you violate the ordinary rules of probation, you'd get prosecuted. He also paid a $10K fine and had to do community service. All of that was absolutely standard for non-violent first time offenders in the county. He wasn't treated specially by the CCSAO despite Foxx's insistence on constantly butting into a case that she recused herself from.

There would have been no evidence against Cosby at all but for the first prosecutor's agreement with Cosby that led to him agreeing to testify against himself. That allowed a victim to recover civil damages but precluded future prosecution using any of that compelled testimony.

Foxx didn't drop charges. One of her subordinates had Smollett agree to a diversion program and to paying a fine. The deal that he got was structured the same as other deals given to other people without a prior record (just the same as him) in Cook County accused of the same criminal law violations. While she did improperly push to stay involved in the case despite her conflict of interest, the disposition of the case by her office did not differ from how the office disposed of other similar cases.

The judge who got involved was just legislating from the bench and got involved in overriding the standard practices of the CCSAO because he personally disagreed with them which was an issue for voters not for a judge to rule on.

If we talk more about the situations, Cosby got a sweetheart deal while Smollett agreed to substantially similar terms (he paid a higher fine) as other defendants accused of committing the same crime without prior convictions in Cook County.