Mick Dumke was a reporter for ProPublica. His work focused on politics and government, including investigations of local and federal gun policies, secret police databases and corruption at Chicago City Hall. Mick came to ProPublica after two years on the Watchdogs team at the Chicago Sun-Times, where he reported on civil liberties, the war on drugs and the dismantling of public housing. Before that, he spent almost a decade as a politics writer and editor for the Chicago Reader. He has also worked as a reporter and editor at the Chicago Reporter, taught social studies at an alternative high school, and studied religion at Northwestern University and McCormick Theological Seminary.
Despite the padded figures it gave to federal regulators, the Chicago Housing Authority is not finished fulfilling its obligations to build homes and redevelop communities where its high-rises once stood.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot has pushed a plan to lease public housing land to the Chicago Fire soccer team. But as the deal awaits federal approval, the Chicago Housing Authority has kept key details hidden from the public and other officials.
Despite being years behind on obligations to build more homes, the city’s public housing agency gets permission to sell, lease and swap its property in gentrifying neighborhoods.
A zoning committee initially rejected the mayor’s plan to lease public housing property to the Chicago Fire. Less than 24 hours later, a new vote reversed a rare mayoral defeat.
The ultrawealthy poured money into a successful campaign to defeat a graduated state income tax. For the first time, we can reveal the scale of their return on this investment.
More than 30,000 people wait for homes from the Chicago Housing Authority. Meanwhile, a site that’s gone undeveloped for two decades is set to become a Chicago Fire practice facility.
As Black-owned banks disappear, politicians are under increasing pressure to save them. Big deposits are a ready solution, but sometimes they burden the banks more than they help.
In 1963, a Black politician named Ben Lewis was shot to death in Chicago. Clues suggest the murder was a professional hit. Decades later, it remains no accident authorities never solved the crime.
Wallace’s Catfish Corner, a fish and soul food restaurant on Chicago’s West Side, was a neighborhood staple. Now the building is boarded-up and unused. Its messy history shows the challenges of rebuilding an area devastated by disinvestment.
A half-century after Chicago’s uprisings in 1968, a once-thriving retail strip in East Garfield Park still suffers from broken promises, bad policy and neglect.
Chicago’s mayor held secretive calls with the City Council and claimed they weren't “public business.” We asked the state attorney general’s office to review whether she and the council violated the Open Meetings Act. Its ruling: Yes.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot has repeatedly ordered Chicago’s river bridges raised to keep people out of downtown. She said the move was to protect businesses and residents. But it is also a symbol of the city’s divisions.
The patchwork system of well-being checks in some of Chicago’s public and subsidized housing was not enough to prevent deaths in heartbreaking circumstances.
Internal communications show CHA officials waited weeks before hastily drawing up plans that could reduce the risk of coronavirus exposure for staff and residents.
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