Latest News - Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts

Advocates Urge Delay for Public Act 101-0255

Chicago Council of Lawyers and Chicago Appleseed have joined with the Cook County State’s Attorney and many advocates for people who have experienced domestic violence and sexual assault to urge a delay in implementation for Public Act 101-0255. Public Act 101-0255 is scheduled to take effect on...

License to Work Act Passes

License to Work Act: SB 1786, the License to Work Act, passed in the Illinois legislature veto session on Tuesday, October 29. Chicago Appleseed is proud to have worked as a member of the Transit Table Coalition on this important legislation to end the practice of suspending driver’s licenses as...

After years of advocacy, the recording systems in Chicago’s eviction courtrooms are officially operational as of October 25, 2019.

Chicago Reader columnist Maya Dukmasova published an article on Wednesday, October 30, exposing the fact that, “for the first time in 16 years, Chicago eviction court is on tape.” Chicago Appleseed & Chicago Council of Lawyers established a coalition that has continuously advocated the court...

Early Resolution Program in Domestic Relations Courts: Survey & CLE

Chicago Appleseed and Chicago Council of Lawyers had the pleasure of working with some fine interns this summer. Two of them—Amelia Piazza from Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law and Melanie Yeames of University at Chicago Law School—did a preliminary survey of the new Early Resolution P...

Summer 2019: Violence was down and Homicides were at their lowest in five years

Now that October has come and the summer is decidedly over, policy makers and journalists alike are engaging in a yearly, grim calculus: How bad was the gun violence in Chicago this summer? Did it get worse? Is it getting better? And most importantly, why? This summer, however, has been unusually p...