Chicago Task Order Approval Times And City Auction Revenue

Chicago’s Department of Procurement Services took an average of 40.9 days to approve a task order request in 2026 through September 13, by this desk’s weighting of the department’s own weekly file — more than six times the 6.2 days of 2023. The file lists a target of 14 days, and its description, which presents the average approval time, still gives the target as 7. In 2025, not one week with task orders had an average at or under 14 days; this year, 3 of 30 have. The file is one of only two among the data portal’s 52 “Performance Metrics” datasets still updated every week, and the other, the city’s auction scoreboard, shows $4.13 million raised by September 13, more than it records for any earlier year.

Performance Metrics — Procurement Services — Task Order Request (nfhf-cbk5), 807 weekly rows from April 4, 2011, and City Auctions (s9wg-6is6), 806 weekly rows from April 11, 2011, both through the week of September 7 to 13, 2026, retrieved and last updated September 16, 2026 · the portal’s catalog, read the same day, for the 52 datasets whose names begin “Performance Metrics” · yearly averages are this desk’s weighting of weekly figures · the files record counts, dollars and days, not which contracts, vendors or items · no cause is assigned to any change

From six days to more than forty

Yearly averages weight each week’s average by its number of task orders, this desk’s calculation. The target column compares each week’s average with that week’s target, as the file’s description pairs its target with average approval time, counting only weeks with task orders. One week filed twice with identical figures, October 22 to 28, 2018, is counted once.
Year	Task orders	Weeks with any	Average days to approve	Target in the file (days)	Weeks whose average met the target	Dollars requested
2011 (from April 4)	425	36	9.2	7	13 of 36	$486.1 million
2012	550	50	6.6	7	37 of 50	$77.2 million
2013	543	51	7.4	7	28 of 51	$93.2 million
2014	556	51	6.1	7	41 of 51	$146.8 million
2015	652	52	6.5	7	41 of 52	$88.7 million
2016	436	52	7.8	7	24 of 52	$123.6 million
2017	371	52	6.6	7	38 of 52	$124.8 million
2018	391	51	7.4	7	30 of 51	$128.3 million
2019	357	50	9.8	7	16 of 50	$114.1 million
2020	288	41	11.1	7	13 of 41	$146.0 million
2021	379	41	10.8	7	16 of 41	$189.3 million
2022	289	45	5.4	7	34 of 45	$134.6 million
2023	195	39	6.2	14	36 of 39	$134.3 million
2024	216	43	24.8	14	13 of 43	$153.2 million
2025	228	49	39.3	14	0 of 49	$378.9 million
2026 (through Sept. 13)	155	30	40.9	14	3 of 30	$175.9 million

For 13 years the weighted average stayed between 5.4 days, in 2022, and 11.1, in 2020. Then it climbed: 24.8 days in 2024, 39.3 in 2025 and 40.9 so far in 2026. The target in the file had already doubled: 7 days in every week through December 19 to 25, 2022, and 14 days from the first week of 2023, though the file’s description still says the current target is within 7 days. The slowdown came as the count stayed near its low: 195 task orders in 2023, the fewest of any full year in the file, then 216 in 2024 and 228 in 2025.

Weekly averages in 2025 ran from 17 to 97 days and weekly medians from 15 to 72, so no week with task orders came in at or under 14 by either measure. This year three have, by both: January 26 to February 1 (an average of 10 days, on two task orders), April 27 to May 3 (14 days, on 12) and May 4 to 10 (10 days, on one). The most recent week with any, August 31 to September 6, had three task orders, an average of 65 days and a median of 69. The file does not say why approvals slowed, which contracts were involved or which departments asked for them; it shows when the slowdown came, not what caused it.

The auction scoreboard passed its goal in May

Year-to-date revenue as the file records it each week; “by September 13” is the last week ending on or before that date. The file’s percent column equals revenue divided by the goal column on all 805 weekly rows this page kept; one week filed twice with identical figures, May 26 to June 1, 2014, is counted once.
Year	Raised by September 13	Raised in the year	Goal in the file	Share of goal at year end
2011 (from April 11)	$2.44 million	$3.63 million	$2.2 million	165.1%
2012	$2.67 million	$3.60 million	$4.6 million	78.2%
2013	$1.96 million	$3.15 million	$2.2 million	143.3%
2014	$1.64 million	$2.66 million	$2.2 million	121.1%
2015	$1.60 million	$2.10 million	$2.2 million	95.6%
2016	$1.38 million	$2.15 million	$2.2 million	97.9%
2017	$1.26 million	$1.87 million	$2.2 million	84.8%
2018	$1.25 million	$1.86 million	$2.2 million	84.6%
2019	$1.11 million	$1.53 million	$2.2 million	69.4%
2020	$0.31 million	$0.88 million	$2.2 million	40.0%
2021	$2.95 million	$3.56 million	$2.2 million	161.9%
2022	$1.34 million	$1.93 million	$2.2 million	87.7%
2023	$1.31 million	$1.76 million	$2.0 million	87.8%
2024	$1.04 million	$1.36 million	$2.0 million	68.0%
2025	$1.05 million	$1.62 million	$2.0 million	81.0%
2026	$4.13 million	—	$2.0 million	206.5% so far

This year’s auctions passed the $2 million in the goal column in the week of May 4 to 10, and by September 13 had brought in $4,130,475.75, 206.5 percent of it. No earlier year in the file ended that high — the largest total was 2011’s $3.63 million, counted from April 11 — and much of this year’s came at once: the weeks of April 27 to May 3 and May 4 to 10 added $1.99 million between them. What was sold, the file does not say; its description lists surplus equipment, vehicles, furniture, office equipment and other goods and materials.

The goal has moved, and its labels have not kept up. The goal column reads $2.2 million for 2011 and for 2013 through 2022, $4.6 million for 2012 and $2 million since 2023. The description still cites the $4.6 million target, and the percent column’s field name still carries “2.2 million.” Against the goal column, the year-end total reached the goal in 2011, 2013, 2014 and 2021 and fell short in the other 11 years through 2025.

Fifty-two scoreboards, two still running

The portal’s own rows-updated dates for every dataset whose name begins “Performance Metrics,” as its catalog listed them on September 16, 2026. The last column shows the most recent date among each group’s files.
Department or program, as named in the file titles	Files	Updated since 2020	Latest update in the group
Procurement Services	2	2	September 16, 2026
Business Affairs & Consumer Protection	3	1	October 6, 2025
Transportation	6	0	April 5, 2019
Housing & Economic Development	5	0	March 21, 2019
Public Health	4	0	June 12, 2017
Family & Support Services	6	0	November 9, 2016
311 Call Center	1	0	August 9, 2016
Innovation & Technology	5	0	March 16, 2015
Buildings	4	0	August 4, 2014
Chicago Park District	5	0	August 3, 2012
Streets & Sanitation	5	0	July 26, 2012
City Colleges of Chicago	2	0	July 9, 2012
Ethics	4	0	April 16, 2012
All Performance Metrics datasets	52	3	—

The files date from the portal’s early years: 51 of the 52 were created in 2011. Forty-nine of them, including two of the three Business Affairs and Consumer Protection files, were last updated between September 27, 2011 and April 5, 2019. A third file, Business Affairs and Consumer Protection’s business-license scoreboard, ran weekly until the week of September 29 to October 5, 2025. Only the two Procurement Services files have been updated this year. A scoreboard that stopped updating is not evidence the work stopped: the requests behind several retired ones are still logged in the city’s 311 service-request file, updated September 16, 2026, where requests created so far this year include 68,839 filed as “Graffiti Removal Request,” 52,450 as “Pothole in Street Complaint,” 32,649 as “Rodent Baiting/Rat Complaint” and 26,788 as “Street Light Out Complaint” — the file this desk timed in its 311 response-times analysis.

What the files confirm, and what they cannot tell you

Confirmed, as filed: each week’s number of task orders, their requested dollars, the average and median days to approve them and the week’s target; and each week’s year-to-date auction revenue and goal. Not shown: which contracts, vendors or departments the task orders involved; why any week was slow; and what the auctions sold, to whom or for how much apiece. The files also contain inconsistencies. In each, two week labels name a year that disagrees with the filed year — “Dec 5 – 11, 2001” filed under 2011 and “Dec 21-27, 2021” under 2020 among the task orders, “Dec 14-20, 2021” and “Dec 21-27, 2021” under 2020 among the auctions. Each file repeats one week, the task orders show 7 places and the auctions 5 where the weeks do not run exactly seven days apart, and auction revenue fell once, by $3,352.50, in the week of August 31 to September 6, 2020.

Where the record lives

The Task Order Request and City Auctions scoreboards sit on the city’s data portal alongside the 50 other Performance Metrics datasets. Both were last updated September 16, 2026. The task-order and auction figures here were computed from them as retrieved that day; the family’s dates come from the portal’s catalog and the 311 counts from the city’s 311 service-request file, both read the same day.

The bottom line

By this desk’s weighting of the department’s weekly file, Chicago’s procurement department took an average of 6.2 days to approve task orders in 2023 and 40.9 days so far in 2026. Its file lists a 14-day target, and in 2025 no week’s average met that target. Its auction scoreboard passed its $2 million goal in May and reached $4.13 million by September 13. They are the only two of the portal’s 52 Performance Metrics datasets still updated every week.

Three questions the files can answer

When did the task-order target change? With the first week of 2023, from 7 days to 14. What does the most recent week show? The week of September 7 to 13, 2026 has no task orders; the week before had three, with an average of 65 days and a median of 69. When did this year’s auctions pass the goal? In the week of May 4 to 10, when year-to-date revenue reached $2,582,592.82.

Sources: the Department of Procurement Services’ Task Order Request (nfhf-cbk5, 807 rows) and City Auctions (s9wg-6is6, 806 rows) scoreboards, retrieved September 16, 2026 with every row analyzed; the portal’s catalog, read the same day, for all datasets whose names begin “Performance Metrics”; and the 311 service-request file (v6vf-nfxy), read the same day, for 2026 counts of four request types.
Weeks: week labels are text, so each was read for its first day; the filed year column decides the year, and a week running from December into January is that year’s first week when its label names the filed year, and its last otherwise. One exact duplicate week in each file is counted once.
Averages: each year’s average days to approve weights every week’s average by that week’s number of task orders.
Target: each week with at least one task order is compared with that week’s target by its average, because the file’s description presents the average approval time with its target. The file does not say whether the target applies to the average or the median; counted by weekly medians instead, the results are the same in 2023, 2025 and 2026.
Same-date comparison: auction revenue in the last week ending on or before September 13 of each year.
Last updated: the portal’s own rows-updated date for each dataset; the business-license scoreboard’s last week is read from its rows.
Not here: no contract, vendor, department or item is named, no cause is given for any change, and no claim is made that the city stopped measuring anything.

Computed by KCM Desk from the Department of Procurement Services’ Task Order Request and City Auctions scoreboards, the city data portal’s catalog and its 311 service-request file, retrieved September 16, 2026. Human-guided and edited — about this desk. If you spot an error, corrections come first.