Fran Spielman is a City Hall reporter at the Chicago Sun-Times. With over 50 years in the Chicago media landscape, she has covered every mayoral administration since Richard J. Daley, focusing on themes such as government, politics, and public policy, as well as issues related to transportation and real estate. Fran's work has been featured in notable outlets including Fox 32 Chicago, NBC Chicago, and ABC 7 Chicago.
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Chicago, United States (Local)
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Fran Spielman's coverage is heavily focused on local government and politics, particularly within Chicago and Illinois. She extensively covers governmental announcements, legal policy regulations, city council proceedings, corruption cases, police matters, and migrant issues. If you are looking to reach out to Fran Spielman with a pitch or as a potential source for an article related to these topics in the specified geographic areas of focus (United States, Illinois, Chicago), make sure it provides unique insights into local political developments or offers expert commentary on legal and regulatory matters impacting these regions.
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By: Fran Spielman
The outgoing state comptroller said the next mayor of Chicago needs to have a “come to Jesus moment” with union leaders and demand the concessions needed to prevent city employee pension funds from going bankrupt and dragging the city under.
By: Fran Spielman
Kenneth Gunn said he got his “first introduction to hate crimes” as a kid growing up in Englewood when his brother was “beaten by the neighborhood bullies” for refusing to go right home from school on the “white side” of Ashland Avenue.
By: Fran Spielman
Brandon Johnson wants the City Council's Committee on Workforce Development to meet Monday to consider an ordinance that would essentially reverse the Council's decision to allow video gambling in the city.
By: Fran Spielman
The decision to lift the Chicago ban on video gambling terminals has divided the City Council and exacerbated tensions between alderpersons and Mayor Brandon Johnson.
By: Fran Spielman
The social media tax was expected to raise $31 million during all of 2026. But the city has collected $16.4 million during the first four months alone from the ten social media companies to which the levy has applied. At that rate, the first-year take would be $49.2 million, 58.7% higher than anticipated.
A former alderman-turned-commissioner of the Cook County Board of Review, George Cardenas is flooding the zone with position papers aimed at convincing voters that he has the ideas, experience and guts to confront Chicago's $1 billion budget shortfall and $36 billion pension crisis.
By: Fran Spielman
Ray Lopez (15th) says a mere street renaming or monument would not be grand enough to honor the Chicago-born leader of the Catholic Church.
By: Fran Spielman
Ray Lopez (15th) plans to use a parliamentary maneuver at Wednesday's City Council meeting to not only resurrect the ordinance that received a “Do Not Pass” recommendation in the Committee on Public Safety, but to substitute a new version of it with even stronger consequences for parents whose kids…
Chicago Fire FC owner Joe Mansueto has been widely praised for bankrolling his own $750 million soccer stadium on the South Loop parcel known as The 78. But taxpayers would be subsidizing that development to the tune of $425 million, thanks to a plan proposed Wednesday.
By: Fran Spielman
Ald. Anthony Beale (9th) had hoped to outlaw the roughly 7,000 sweepstakes machines operating in Chicago to maximize revenues from video gambling terminals and eliminate competition for those machines.
