KCM Desk

Open Air Chicago's 277 non-regulatory sensors, read from the program's daily file: 102,907 sensor-days from July 26, 2025 through August 20, 2026, a median day at 9.02 micrograms of PM2.5 per cubic meter, half of sensor-days Good and most of the rest Moderate by the file's own AQI column - and July 16 and 17, 2026, when the network-wide mean hit 133 and 168 inside a stretch the state EPA and the city flagged for wildfire smoke. Provider-calibrated values, UTC days, no compliance finding.

Chicago reversed its river in 1900 - and MWRD's own posted log shows the district has released waterway water back into Lake Michigan 36 times from 1985 through 2025: 52.5 billion gallons, 41 percent of it in the September 2008 and April 2013 storms, the last in July 2023, none in 2024 or 2025 - with the district's own definition of a 'reversal' and its note that TARP reduced them.

The Deep Tunnel from the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District's own records: 1.55 trillion gallons pumped back out of TARP to the Stickney and Calumet plants in the 28 years the district's daily logs carry in full, 2018 the record year; $3.856 billion in contract dollars; 110.4 miles and 15.15 billion gallons of reservoirs - and a last reservoir stage the district's own documents moved from 2029 to 2032, with an 18-month hole in the posted logs stated, not filled.

The Skyway lease from the city's posted documents and the owners' own filings: $1.83 billion up front in January 2005 for 99 years, $446.3 million of it refunding Skyway bonds; three reserve funds whose schedules show two drawn to $134,000 and $4,000 by 2016; $11,977,992 in deal fees; and $1,441,818,000 still unrecognized at the end of 2025, counted $18.5 million a year through 2103. Control of the concessionaire has changed twice; the city's record stops at 2016.

The ten largest department labels in Chicago's 2026 Budget Ordinance file: Finance General - not an operating department - leads at $8.19 billion, 44 percent of the $18.67 billion total, ahead of police at $2.11 billion. Appropriations, not spending, summed by the file's own labels.

Chicago's administrative-hearings violation file at honest grain: 841,271 charge-line rows describing 144,837 dockets, every one issued by the Buildings department despite the general name. Hearings collapsed in 2020 and 2025 was the busiest year since 2010; 44 percent of dockets carry a fine; the file records no disposition.