Chicago aldermen today began weeks of hearings on Mayor Johnson's proposed budget for next year ... and outside City Hall, progressive advocates called for changes in a controversial part of that plan to help increase the city's support for child care services.
"The way that we Trump-proof Chicago is to invest in our children," said Chatham alderman Will Hall (6th Ward) during an appearance with union and progressive leaders before the start of budget hearings Tuesday morning at City Hall, 121 N. LaSalle.
He suggested that wealthier Chicagoans can afford to help the city make that investment: "In this city, there are over 127-thousand millionaires."
Advocates today called on the Johnson Administration to boost spending on child care in next year's budget to $20 million, which would be paid for in part by increasing the mayor's proposal to collect a "head tax" on companies with more than 100 employees in the city.
The proposed budget would ask those companies to pay $21 per worker per month. Progressive advocates called for the mayor to increase that proposed tax to $40 per worker per month.
Ishan Daya with the Institute for the Public Good compares it with Chicago's original corporate head tax of $3 per worker from 1973: "Correct that for inflation, correct that for the corporate tax rate, and you get to $40 per person per month."
But City Council critics of the mayor have said the proposed head tax is "dead on arrival," following criticism from business groups who describe it as a job-killer. Pilsen alderman Byron Sigcho-Lopez suggested those critics are not acting in the best interests of the people in their wards.
"They represent those billionaires that pay their campaign contributions," said Sigcho-Lopez (25th Ward). "They're not representing their constituents."