Chicago publishes what lobbyists report being paid, quarter by quarter, and the ledger since 2014 just recorded its biggest first half: $15.0 million filed for January–June 2026 periods, ahead of record-year 2024’s $13.6 million. Bally’s Corporation tops the client list both years. Every figure as filed, with the co-filing ambiguity quantified, never smoothed.
The Near North Side had 196 permitted sidewalk cafés in the 2025 season — the most of any Chicago community area, and down from 227 in 2019. The top ten hold 81 percent of the city’s 1,169 permitted cafés, with the Loop at 75 percent of its 2019 count while four North Side areas run above theirs. From the city’s own permit file.
Lake View holds 77 premises with an active Tavern license — the most of any Chicago community area, and down from 100 in 2003. The twelve leading areas, through a three-way tie at 18, hold 58 percent of the city’s 758 licensed taverns — and only Rogers Park sits above its 2003 count. From the city’s own license file.
Chicago’s individual-landmark register credits Frank Lloyd Wright on 11 of its 412 entries — 10 as sole architect, plus the Charnley House’s shared credit — from an 1891 house on Astor Street to a 1917 pair on South Hoyne. All 11, in construction-date order, with the register’s own dates and designations.
The oldest standing building on Chicago’s individual-landmark register is an 1833 farmhouse in Norwood Park — three years older than the Clarke House. The twelve oldest register entries, through a four-way tie at 1869, with the commemorative sites and one stone marker kept apart and every date the register’s own.
Chicago’s ledger of vacant-building cases against financial institutions: 5,012 violations across 4,175 hearing dockets, most from the early 2010s — and four in five ended in “City non-suit,” the city ending its own case. $1.53 million assessed at the docket grain the file itself uses, $1.26 million paid. Read in full, with the double-counting trap the file sets explained.
Chicago’s register of individually designated landmarks holds 412 entries, and more than half were designated in one mayor’s 22 years — about 10.4 a year under Richard M. Daley against roughly 6.5 under the next two administrations, with the pace back near Daley-era levels since 2023. Mapped area by area, with the register’s 1990s-built civic monuments included.
Chicago’s $1.89 billion ARPA grant is 98.6 percent expended, with $27.2 million left across 22 program lines as of the city ledger’s July 31 refresh — the largest balance on the CARE alternative-response program, and one broadband line showing $695 spent of $4 million. Counted from the city’s own files, with Treasury’s December 31 deadline reported as Treasury’s rule.
Chicago keeps two rolling 90-day lists of vehicles it has moved: tows to the pound, and relocations — cars moved without being impounded. We archived both on August 8: 5,396 recorded tows, 95 percent to two pounds, and 4,259 relocations, more than half labeled with city work reasons — and 72 percent of relocated cars record a different drop street than where they started.
Ten falls of CPS’s own 20th-day files: district-run schools under 250 students went from 56 to 115 — 22 percent of the district’s schools — while the median school shrank from 498 students to 396, and 19 traditional schools crossed under the line in fall 2025 alone. Counted with the bands stated plainly: descriptive, not a CPS standard.
