Today’s editorial, includes “Chicagoans can remember the days when we were dubbed ‘the Second City’ because we had more people than any place but New York. Then we fell behind Los Angeles, and Houston is expected to surpass us in population in the next decade. But in one respect, Chicago is still the first runner-up. It ranks just behind Gotham for the worst municipal finances in the country. That’s the conclusion of the independent organization Truth in Accounting in its ‘Financial State of Cities 2021,’ the latest in an annual series. The report may sound like a total snooze fest, but the implications of its analysis are more likely to induce panic than slumber.
… Cities are almost universally required to balance their budgets. The point of this mandate, according to the Governmental Accounting Standards Board, is ‘to require financing and spending practices that enable governmental entities to avoid financial difficulty and to live within their means.’ But municipal governments are good at getting around the rule. …”
Read the full article on: Chicago Tribune