Afternoon Briefing: What’s fueling the CPS budget standoff?

Good afternoon, Chicago.

Chicago Board of Education President Sean Harden challenged the district’s new proposed budget yesterday, expressing doubts about its heavy reliance on revenue from special taxing districts to close a $734 million deficit.

The hesitancy repeatedly expressed by Harden, who was appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson, during two public hearings signals further growing tension within the school board over how to address the district’s deepening fiscal crisis.

Chicago Public Schools’ fiscal road map , backed by interim CEO Macquline King, runs counter to the agenda of Johnson, a former Chicago Teachers Union organizer, who has advocated both now and in the past for borrowing to address budget woes.

Here’s what else is happening today. And remember, for the latest br