28 Chicago aldermen oppose Mayor Johnson's 2027 budget proposal

Dead on arrival. That's what 28 alders announced today when it comes to Mayor Brandon Johnson's proposed budget. 28 alders signed on to a letter saying that the mayor does not have the votes to pass his budget. Brett Boganski is live at City Hall and Brett, we heard from one of the alders who signed on to that letter. We're talking about Alderman Scott Wagsbeck, who appeared on Chicago Live earlier today, and he explained why he was one of the 28 alders who signed on to this letter to Mayor Brandon Johnson, explaining why they do not support his budget. The first thing that they brought up They said those 28 alders cannot support the mayor's proposal to raise taxes on those big businesses. But they also talked about how they can't support the PPLT tax. That's the Personal Property Lease Transactional Tax. And this could apply to you at home. Let's say you're renting some equipment. Let's say you get a bouncy house for your kid's birthday. This tax would apply to you. And under the mayor's proposal, they would raise that tax from 15% to 20%. And this also impacts small businesses as well. Well, let's say they have a A cloud-based service that they do their business on. This is something that some of these alders say is just a job killer. And they say this is raising taxes on just average working people here. So they were also talking about why they were also against it. They wanted to have more government efficiencies. And they said they've also been critical of the mayor using that one-time money and the borrowing to help close that $882.4 million budget gap. One example that they brought up was that $75 million One time payment, the transactional payment to the city of Chicago from Stone Peak after they bought the city's parking meters. However, we heard from Mayor Brandon Johnson today who said this budget calls for investing in affordable housing, but also investing in the homelessness situations, investing in libraries, adding more to streets and sanitation, as well as investing in mental health clinics, which he argues is something that Chicagoans want. The blue wave was not about cuts, consolidations, efficiencies and neoliberal policies and austere budgets that caused the fascist regime that we are experiencing now. The blue wave was about making sure that we are improving the quality of life for everyday people. We're talking about basic human needs that people are calling for. Really a lot of those costs that 20% hike is going to hit you as a consumer in the pocket. So If you were looking at replacing a sink or if you were looking at renting that bouncy house for a kid's party or something, you're going to be paying a lot more through this mayor's budget. It's all about the letters today. Mayor Brandon Johnson also sent a letter to the 28 Alders signaling that he would like to work with them to find some common ground here. And there seems to be some sort of wiggle room when it comes to that PPLT, that personal property lease transaction tax. It seems like there might be some wiggle room there where they could work together to find some common ground. And within the last 90 minutes, I spoke with Alderman William Hall, who talked about some of his solutions. You're going to hear some of that. Tonight on the Chicago Report, do not miss it. But for now, we're live at City Hall tonight. Brett Boganski, Fox Chicago.