Good morning, Chicago. ✶
🔎 Below: With few properties on sale, Chicago is seeing serious bidding wars, with homes selling for up to hundreds of thousands over the asking price.
🗞️ Plus: Parents salvage supplies dumped by Acero schools, courts decide pet-custody disputes for unmarried couples and more news you need to know.
📝 Keeping score: The Cubs beat the Dodgers, 5-1; the White Sox fell to the Red Sox, 14-2.
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⏱️: A 7-minute read
CHICAGO JIGSAW PUZZLE 🧩
Piece together history to reveal more about today’s photo from the Sun-Times archives.
TODAY’S WEATHER 🌧️
Mostly cloudy with a chance of showers and thunderstorms and a high near 79.
TODAY’S TOP STORY 🔎
With few properties on sale, Chicago homebuyers are having bidding wars
Reporting by Abby Miller
Realty check: According to Chicago homebuyers and real estate agents, there are bidding wars for the few homes hitting the market, especially in neighborhoods like Lake View, Lincoln Park and Northalsted.
Who benefits?: The battle among buyers has been great for home sellers as properties close for up to hundreds of thousands of dollars over their asking price. And some buyers — to help sweeten the deal — have been waiving certain contingencies like inspections.
Asking price: Neighborhoods with strong retail corridors, like Andersonville, Lincoln Park and Wicker Park, are seeing high demand, one real estate broker said. But across the city, homes have sold for $100,000 to $200,000 — sometimes even $300,000 — above their asking price, the broker said.
WATCH: HOME BIDDING WARS ▶️
EDUCATION 🍎
- School supplies tossed: Parents, teachers and community members have been diving into dumpsters outside of now-closed Acero charter schools in Avondale and Ukrainian Village, where books and school supplies have been trashed. CPS officials said the materials were supposed to be recycled.
- Ex-CPS exec charged with fraud: Crystal Cooper, a former top Chicago Public School official, was charged with defrauding pandemic relief programs, nearly three years after the school system found she had lied about her income in order to receive loans.
- Mayor pushes for CPS funding: If the Illinois General Assembly fails to approve a $150 million increase in funding built into the nearly $10 billion CPS budget, Mayor Brandon Johnson said he is prepared to use city money to stave off classroom cuts.
SPRINGFIELD 🐶
Under new law, courts can decide pet custody disputes for unmarried couples
Reporting by Isabela Nieto
Rosie’s law: People who part ways with each other but share a pet will be able to go to court to fight for custody of their furry companion under a new Illinois law. Rosie’s Law creates a legal framework for unmarried people, like separated couples or roommates, to fight to keep their dog, cat or horse when they no longer live with the person with whom they shared it.
How it works: The new law, which takes effect in January, will let judges consider the physical and emotional well-being of the animal, who financially supports it and the environment the pet would live in.
Key context: Rosie’s Law takes its name from a puggle that was the subject of a custody battle last year. Tameer Siddiqui is a clinical psychologist from Chicago who pushed for the new law. She cared for Rosie, originally her ex-fiancee’s dog, during their relationship. She said she saw the animal’s “under-met” needs.
MORE NEWS YOU NEED 🗞️
- E-scooter rider fatally struck: Alex Blacio, 16, was fatally struck by a truck in North Center while riding home from work Monday. He is the third teen to be killed in traffic on e-scooters this year.
- Man charged after fatal crash: Juan Ruiz-Huerta, of Aurora, was in custody Tuesday after prosecutors alleged he drove the wrong way on the Dan Ryan Expressway to “scare” a Chicago woman who was pleading for her life moments before she died as a result of a five-vehicle crash.
- Cop accused of sex assault: Douglas Lee, an Illinois State Police trooper, was charged this week with sexual assault. Prosecutors alleged he drugged and assaulted a bartender last year in Tinley Park.
- Pritzker talks Springfield scandal: Springfield’s latest sexual harassment scandal has revealed “holes in the system,” according to Gov. JB Pritzker — but not necessarily any missteps by Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch in responding to allegations of misconduct by a now-disgraced ex-state representative.
- Lawmakers decry prison conditions: Illinois lawmakers are calling for changes at the Joliet Treatment Center after a Marshall Project, Sun-Times and WBEZ investigation exposed an epidemic of fires that resulted in two deaths at the prison.
- 10 arrested at Lollapalooza: Some are facing charges for selling rain ponchos without a permit, illegally flying a drone and punching a backstage security guard with a pocketful of drugs.
- Hospital ownership could change: Lawyers for one of the owners of West Suburban Medical Center and Weiss Memorial Hospital are pushing to sell the hospitals for $1 to Insight Health Systems and demote the other owner and CEO into a temporary consulting position.
ON WBEZ 91.5 FM 📻
In the Loop with Sasha-Ann Simons, 9 a.m.
- March on Marquette Park: Sixty years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and a coalition of Chicago residents and community leaders marched through Marquette Park to demand an end to segregation and racist housing policies — and were met by a violent white mob. Modern organizers join the show to reflect on the history.
- Grant Park Music Festival: Giancarlo Guerrero, principal conductor and artistic director of the Grant Park Music Festival, stops by to discuss this summer’s standout performances
Say More with Mary Dixon and Patrick Smith, 10 a.m.
- Parks Superintendent: Carlos Ramirez-Rosa of the Chicago Park District sits down to answer callers’ questions.
FROM THE PRESS BOX ⚾🏈🏀
- Remembering Drew Williams: A star athlete at Lane who was paralyzed after suffering a catastrophic brain injury during a game in 2013, Mr. Williams died July 22 at age 30.
- Sox’ good vibes: New White Sox players Brenton Doyle and Joey Bart said they noticed the team having fun from afar. “It’s hard to miss,” Doyle said.
- Taking on Tarik: The Cubs got their first crack at the Dodgers’ Tarik Skubal, the grand prize of baseball’s trade deadline, on Tuesday. Will they see him again in October?
- Bears outlook: Coach Ben Johnson now has three premium talents at tight end — and his offense is about to get wild, writes Jason Lieser.
- High school basketball review: Here are the players who made their presence felt in some way or fashion and the storylines that followed this summer.
CHICAGO MINI CROSSWORD 🌭
Today’s clue: 6A: 2015 Cameron Crowe movie flop that was advertised on a Logan Square billboard for over a year.
BRIGHT ONE 🔆
Program gives city’s youth chance to explore career interests
Reporting by Elijah James
William Slaughter has spent more than four years mentoring other young people through Project Exploration, an educational nonprofit that, among other things, helps students explore career possibilities through its summer programs.
Positive community programs like that have a real impact, Slaughter believes, and last week at Columbus Park, that impact was on display.
During a showcase at the Columbus Park Refectory, students got to show off what they’d been doing this summer. Some got a taste of a range of career interests. Others worked on projects in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
Among many other projects, students explored environmental science, gardening and the culinary arts. Some even took care of incubating eggs — and looked after the baby chicks, once the eggs hatched.
“If you give us other places to have fun that encourage positivity, structure, and discipline, we’ll be good. We’ll be powerful,” said Slaughter, who just graduated from Illinois State University.
YOUR DAILY QUESTION ☕️
If you had 24 hours left in Chicago, what would you do?
Reply to this question via email (please include your first and last name). We may run your answer in a future newsletter or story.
For some answer inspiration, check out Tuesday’s episode of Say More with Mary Dixon and Patrick Smith.
Thanks for reading the Sun-Times Morning Edition!
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Written and curated by: Matt Moore
Edited by: Michael Lansu and Esther Bergdahl
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