Mayor Brandon Johnson presents FY27 Chicago budget

CHICAGO - Mayor Brandon Johnson is expected to present his plan Wednesday for addressing Chicago’s $882 million budget deficit, setting the stage for a contentious debate at City Hall.

Wednesday's budget presentation comes as candidates for mayor and aldermen are submitting their paperwork for the upcoming 2027 municipal elections.

Chicago budget deficit plan

What we know:

The Chicago City Council is scheduled to hold a special meeting at 10 a.m. to discuss the city’s financial challenges and Mayor Brandon Johnson’s budget proposal, which he is calling the "Chicago’s Fair Share Budget."

The mayor was expected to make the case for his budget plan before aldermen on Wednesday.

"My 2027 budget ensures every Chicagoan receives their fair share of the investments, services, and opportunities that define our city, funded by responsible spending cuts that protect essential services and by asking wealthy corporations to pay their fair share," Johnson said, in prepared remarks. "A Fair Share Budget means delivering for our people in the ways that matter most in their everyday lives."

The mayor’s office recently released results from a budget engagement survey involving nearly 600 residents. The report found that 88% of participants supported taxes on large corporations to help close the deficit.

A corporate head tax proposal, which is a monthly per-employee tax on large corporations, was rejected last year by alders during that budget cycle. A group of alders opposed to Johnson's head tax proposal created their own spending plan, which raised a series of other taxes, while the mayor neither signed nor vetoed that budget.

This year, Johnson tweaked his proposal to include a monthly $25 per employee tax for companies with more than 125 workers, Fox Chicago's Brandon Pope reported. He's also proposing to apply the tax only to corporations "outside of Socio-Economically Disadvantaged Areas."

The mayor argued in his remarks that corporate profits have been on the rise, while the share of those profits going to workers has fallen.

"Today, we face a choice," Johnson said. "We can invest in our people, strengthen our neighborhoods, and build an economy where working families have a fair chance to share in the prosperity they help create. We can confront inequality and make the investments our communities need to thrive. Or we can accept the status quo. We can allow the same inequities to deepen, the same communities to be overlooked, and the gains of our economy to flow to those who already have the most. We can keep asking working people to do more with less while expecting our city to thrive without the investments its people need."

Johnson is also proposing increasing the Personal Property Lease Tax, aimed at large tech companies, expecting to raise about $234 million next year.

The mayor's budget proposal also includes more money for crews to trim 15,000 trees in the city in preparation for severe weather and hiring 40,000 young people for city jobs.

The other side:

A group of 29 alders is calling for government "efficiencies," political speak for spending cuts, before the city considers property tax increases or a corporate head tax.

The group has criticized tax increases but has not presented specific alternatives, according to the mayor’s office. The administration is calling on the alders to bring concrete solutions to the budget debate.

Ald. Matt O'Shea (19th Ward) criticized the proposed corporate tax, saying it could hurt Chicago’s economy.

"All the mayor’s done here is repackaged it, rename it," O'Shea said. "This is a head tax, this is a tax on jobs, this is a tax on economic growth."

O'Shea said businesses could leave Chicago for nearby suburbs if the tax moves forward.

What's next:

The budget debate is expected to continue through a December deadline.

Wednesday’s special meeting marks the beginning of what is expected to be a difficult negotiation over taxes, spending and how the city will address its budget gap.

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