2026 City Budget News
As many of you know, the Mayor has rejected the alternatives City Council members proposed weeks ago, via a response he sent this week.
Our alternative budget best protects Chicago’s financial future and working families. Many of the 26 colleagues who signed onto the alternative budget will be meeting with the mayor's staff this weekend to discuss the budget. We are in a time of fiscal distress, self-imposed by the mayor, but we are providing options, many that came from the EY report paid for by city taxpayers. We are not cutting back on public safety, nor closing schools as the mayor contends. In fact, under our budget approach, CPS will still be getting the full amount they are entitled to from the roughly $1 billion TIF surplus.
We are facing very difficult choices and must put ourselves in the best financial footing possible. The Mayor's budget is anti-business and anti-working family. The head tax alone would do damage to small, medium and large businesses throughout our city and is opposed by many businesses we talk to.
Other aspects of the budget like borrowing hundreds of millions for operating expenses, is bad governing and something we did away with years ago. The Mayor's budget borrowing plan is also putting hundreds of millions more in repayments directly on the backs of our children. These and other bad financial practices would cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars more in future interest through additional credit downgrades.
As City Council members representing Chicago’s 2.7 million residents, it is our obligation to stand up against Mayor Johnson's budget that will hurt working
families today and our children tomorrow. Our kids will inherit his irresponsible borrowing that leads to greater long term costs. We will be burdened for decades by a plan that damages economic growth, undermines required pension payments, takes away tools to spur neighborhood development, and lacks needed structural efficiencies, spending, and revenue options.
Our alternative proposal touches a small portion of the City budget, yet will keep the city standing. We could do much more by implementing every possible option in the Ernst and Young (EY) report and including ideas from aldermen who have provided other options. We have been very consistent while the Johnson Administration has been holding budget information hostage and blocking efforts at real cooperation and collaboration. It is not democratic and not good governing for our city.
We will meet with the Mayor’s budget team to reset the budget and will work to pass a budget that protects the residents and businesses of Chicago. We must pass a budget by December 31st, so we will continue our efforts to collaborate where we can and keep our local government running into the new year.