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Path To Destruction: Cook County's Property Tax System Is A Cause For Concern As It Mimics The Defunct Taxing Procedures That Led To The Detroit Foreclosure Crisis, Robert Romano
Chicago-Kent Law Review
For decades, Cook County, Illinois, has had one of the highest property tax rates in the country, and as a result the County has begun to experience unprecedented foreclosure rates which has contributed, in part, to the State’s significant population decline. Residents are forced to endure a property tax system that disproportionately burdens low-income homeowners, while providing tax breaks to higher-income individuals and commercial owners. The primary causes and characteristics of Cook County’s defunct property tax system are strikingly similar to those that sent the City of Detroit spiraling into bankruptcy in 2013.
This note provides a comparative analysis of …
Dignity Restoration And The Chicago Police Torture Reparations Ordinance, Andrew S. Baer
Dignity Restoration And The Chicago Police Torture Reparations Ordinance, Andrew S. Baer
Chicago-Kent Law Review
A recent municipal ordinance giving reparations to survivors of police torture in Chicago represents an unprecedented effort by a city government to repair damage wrought by decades of police violence. Between 1972 and 1991, white detectives under Commander Jon Burge tortured confessions from over 118 black criminal suspects on the city’s South and West Sides. Responding to the needs of affected communities, a coalition of torture survivors, their families, civil rights attorneys, and community activists pushed the reparations bill through the City Council on May 6, 2015. Representing the holistic approach favored by survivors, the $5 million reparations package awarded …
Creating The Urban Educational Desert Through School Closures And Dignity Taking, Matthew Patrick Shaw
Creating The Urban Educational Desert Through School Closures And Dignity Taking, Matthew Patrick Shaw
Chicago-Kent Law Review
Closures of urban open-enrollment neighborhood schools that primarily serve students of color are intensely controversial. Districts seeking to economize often justify closures by pointing to population shifts in historically densely populated urban areas. They argue that net reductions in a neighborhood’s school-aged population result in underutilized schools, which do a disservice to students at higher cost to districts. Students and their families and communities counter, pointing to histories of district neglect of their schools and recent school expansions in more affluent neighborhoods of similar population density as belying district claims of utility-based downsizing. In this article, I use a critical …
Second Chances For The Second City's Vacant Properties: An Analysis Of Chicago's Policy Approaches To Vacancy, Abandonment, & Blight, Elizabeth Butler
Second Chances For The Second City's Vacant Properties: An Analysis Of Chicago's Policy Approaches To Vacancy, Abandonment, & Blight, Elizabeth Butler
Chicago-Kent Law Review
Addressing the externalities of vacancy and blight is a major challenge for the Chicago metropolitan area. While neighborhoods on the South and West sides of Chicago struggle with blight, neglect, and abandonment, downtown Chicago and the northern neighborhoods and suburbs experience stronger market conditions. This crisis has amplified entrenched socioeconomic divisions and ultimately burdens the entire region by perpetuating a cycle of poverty, violence, and physical and social disorder that tarnish Chicago’s image.
This Note outlines Chicago’s vacant property challenge by discussing the history of urban decline in Chicago. It examines factors that led to a high level of vacant …