Anyone who regularly drives a car in Chicago knows that it’s easy to get a ticket. The City issues millions of vehicle-related tickets every year. The majority are for non-moving violations totally unrelated to unsafe driving. This is a big money maker for Chicago, which collects hundreds of millions of dollars every year (7% of the City’s entire operating budget) from parking tickets.

For those without the means to pay right away, the financial burden associated with tickets can quickly balloon and become unmanageable as fines double and additional fines accrue. As reported by ProPublica, this cycle of debt results in suspended driver’s licenses, lost jobs, missed employment opportunities, and even bankruptcy for thousands of Chicago residents.

A new report from the Woodstock Institute shows that tickets are issued disproportionately to drivers who reside in Chicago’s low-income and minority communities, and that the residents of these communities are disproportionately suffering the consequences.

The report, entitled The Debt Spiral, analyzed data obtained through public records requests to the City and the State and found that in 2017, tickets were 40 percent more likely to be issued to drivers from low- and moderate-income zip codes than drivers from higher-income zip codes, and 40 percent more likely to be issued to drivers from minority communities than drivers from non-minority zip codes. Not surprisingly, the report also found that drivers from and lower-income and minority areas were more likely to have their driver’s licenses suspended for failure to pay than other ticket recipients, and twice as likely to file for bankruptcy.

Recently, the Sun-Times referred to people whose lives have been upended by aggressive ticketing and collection practices are as “scofflaws.” But the Debt Spiral report lays bare the reality that the City’s punitive policies are unfairly squeezing those who can least afford it.

One sensible step toward stopping the “debt spiral” created by ticket debt is to limit the practice of suspending people’s driver’s licenses for failure to pay tickets and other non-moving violations. That change, which was recommended in Woodstock’s report and endorsed in a recent Chicago Sun-Times editorial, could become a reality if the Illinois General Assembly passes SB 2411 (Aquino/Ammons). That measure, also known as the License to Work Act, passed the Senate in May but still needs House approval and the Governor’s signature to become law.

For more information about the License to Work Act, please click here.

Statement of Rachel Murphy, Staff Attorney, At the Coalition for Police Contracts Accountability Press Conference.

Good Morning.  My name is Rachel Murphy, and I am an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois. The ACLU is proud to be a part of the Coalition for Police Contracts Accountability to advocate for much-needed changes to the CPD contracts.

For decades, the Chicago Police Department has had a “code of silence” that allows officers to cover up misconduct. The CPD contracts effectively take this implicit code of silence and make it official department policy.

Until these provisions are fixed in the CPD contracts, true police accountability and reform will remain out of reach.  To reiterate – the reform we are all seeking is only possible by fixing the flaws in these contracts. 

Working with community members and experts, CPCA is publishing reports outlining the problems with the contracts.

Our first report – available on our website, CPCAChicago.org – discusses the provisions that make it too hard to identify misconduct.

First, the City will not investigate a complaint against an officer unless and until the complainant provides a signed sworn affidavit. In plain terms, between 2011 and 2014, the City agreed not to investigate nearly 60% of complaints filed against officers.

The City also agreed it would not investigate anonymous complaints against police officers, and that it would provide the names of people who complain about officers to the officers before questioning them.

This system of police discipline protects bad police officers at the expense of Chicago residents. People harmed by officers rightly fear that if they sign an affidavit they could be charged with perjury, and that if an officer learns their name, the officer may retaliate.

Additionally, the contracts discourage officers from reporting the misconduct of other officers, making it easier to continue the code of silence rather than break it.

Not only do these provisions prevent the City from learning critical information about its employees, but the City routinely pays out large sums of money for misconduct claims that it cannot investigate.

The Mayor’s Task Force and the Department of Justice both acknowledged that the expired police contracts are a barrier to reform. As a coalition of concerned community and policy stakeholders, we demand that the Mayor and the City Council repeal the provisions of the police contract that make it too difficult to identify police misconduct.