Editorial: CPS must come clean on school closings
There are endless reasons why Chicago teachers say they went on strike. Pay, charter school growth, unfair evaluations, teacher recall, the over-use of standardized tests, the “privatization” of public education, poor teaching and learning conditions, anger toward Mayor Rahm Emanuel and on and on. But …
Editorial: The strike is over: Now ratify the deal
Teachers and students should keep one key fact in mind as they return to school on Wednesday: The new contract is an unequivocal win for students and for the thousands of top-flight teachers in Chicago. It bears repeating again and again because while the strike …
Editorial: City can’t afford to pay healthy people not to work
Public employees who are permanently injured in the line of duty deserve disability payments. We would never want to turn our backs on those who sustain serious harm while keeping our streets safe or carrying citizens out of burning buildings. But it’s important to keep …
Editorial: Read the fine print, then end strike
As Chicago teachers spend the next two days studying the fine print of their proposed contract, they’ll discover something that was painfully obvious on Sunday: Not only did Chicago teachers get a fair deal, the contract is the very best they are going to get. …
Editorial: Call off the strike
At 3 p.m. today the Chicago Teachers Union should call off the strike. The deal released late Saturday is a win for both the teachers and the schools. It represents the outer limits of what the Chicago Board of Education can do, both on salary …
Editorial: Past time for an honest debate on drug laws
Last week, the Mexican Navy nabbed one of the world’s biggest drug kingpins, a man said to be responsible for billions of dollars in drugs flowing into the United States and for tens of thousands of deaths. Score one, you might say, for the war …
Editorial: Stop ‘straw buyers’ of guns
For three years Chicago and Cook County officials have been pushing a law that would help close the spigot of guns flowing illegally into the city. So, far the National Rifle Association has blocked the law in Springfield, but officials here should keep pushing. The …
Editorial: Nail property tax cheats
About 1,000 times a year, the Cook County assessor’s office gets a tip saying someone is unfairly lowering his or her property taxes by claiming an unwarranted exemption. If the tip turns out to be true, the violator is told to pay up, right? Actually, …
Editorial: Rahm is wrong about the Boston teachers union contract
If only Chicago teachers could be more like those enlightened educators in Boston. They settled their thorny conflicts over teacher recall, teacher evaluations and pay without a strike, Mayor Rahm Emanuel told reporters at City Hall on Wednesday. And Boston teachers agreed to only a …
Editorial: Stand up to teachers, but don’t demonize them
Allow us today to come to the defense of the striking Chicago teachers in a way that will fully please almost nobody, certainly not the teachers. We don’t think the teachers are greedy. We don’t think the teachers are in this just for themselves. They …
Editorial: Teachers risk losing a lot if strike drags on
It may be hard to believe, but the Chicago Teachers Union has already won big. The union leadership doesn’t talk about it much, but Chicago teachers should seriously chew over all that the CTU has already gained — and what they risk losing if this …
Editorial: Berrios should stop practicing nepotism
Remember when Cook County government was known for honesty and efficiency? Neither do we. So it’s unfortunate that County Assessor Joseph Berrios is carrying the banner for nepotism at a time when real efforts are under way to transform county government. Do voters need to …
Editorial: Election 2012: To tax the wealthy or not?
When all is said and done, one touchy disagreement lies at the heart of this presidential election and the dysfunction in Washington: Should the wealthiest Americans pay more in taxes to help fix a country that is in desperate need of fixing? President Barack Obama …
Editorial: Teacher union’s unwise ‘strike of choice’
Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis has taken her members over the edge. Monday starts Chicago’s first teachers strike in 25 years. It didn’t have to be. The Chicago school system this weekend put a good — not perfect — but good offer on the …
Editorial: Making crosswalks safer for pedestrians a good goal
Can a city that Carl Sandburg called “a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft cities” really be expected to start tiptoeing around pedestrians? Can we actually take space away from our cars to make it safer and more comfortable to walk? It …