Embattled CPS CEO touts West Side schools who benefit from recent TIF funding

CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) - While the Chicago Teachers Union wants the City to use TIFs to prevent cuts, the beleaguered head of Chicago Public Schools (CPS) visited some West Side schools Tuesday to show off their use in STEAM programming.

CEO Pedro Martinez watched students at Collins High School work with Play-Doh, skeletons and computer models. His trip was to celebrate the City Council’s recent approval of $10 million in tax increment  financing (TIF) funds for it and two other North Lawndale schools.

CPS will add more lessons in STEAM or science, technology, engineering, arts, and math as well as building renovations.

“The STEAM partnership we celebrate today will become the crown jewel of the North Lawndale community, and it’s happening because we chose to work together,” Martinez said. “Leaders from CPS, the North Lawndale Community and City government made a deliberate choice. The choice was to unite around any students in this community [with] the resources they need.”

Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates told the Chicago Tribune Martinez is late to the conversation about TIF surpluses, and that the union has proposals for staffing and resources focused on science, technology, engineering, arts, and math beyond TIF money.

She added that the CTU is happy to agree to more staffing for such programs, but that would require Martinez to be a leader on something other than what she calls his “own media tour.”

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