Before he left office, former Mayor Rahm Emanuel warned that Chicago was facing a financial abyss.The city could not afford to pay the escalating costs of its pension bills and keep providing crucial services to Chicagoans, including police and fire protection, Emanuel said.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot has often recounted the shock she felt when she took office in 2019 and got a complete look at the city’s budget, which included a deficit of $838 million. The city’s financial stability — already precarious — suffered a significant blow when the COVID-19 pandemic triggered an economic collapse that the city is still struggling to recover from.
In 2019, Chicago paid more than $1.31 billion to its four pension funds benefitting police officers, firefighters, municipal employees and laborers. Despite that, the city’s pensions will remain a major expense for its corporate fund, which officials use to pay for discretionary expenses. That $478.5 million bill — up $149.3 million from 2021 — will be covered in part by the $40 million from Bally’s in return for the City Council’s approval of their plan to build a casino and resort in River North the green light and a temporary casino set to open at the Medinah Temple next summer.
The firefighters’ fund has the lowest funded level of the four, at 21%; the laborers’ fund has the highest funded level, at 46%, according to the city’s annual financial report.
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