Alders were set to debate several pressing issues at a lengthy Chicago City Council meeting on Thursday.

The agendas for the last few City Council meetings were 70 to 80 pages long, while the agenda for the meeting on Thursday is 114 pages.

One of the most serious discussion items involved a $90 million payout to settle nearly 200 police misconduct lawsuits tied to a corrupt former police sergeant accused of framing hundreds of people on drug charges.

The City Council Finance Committee advanced the settlement last week. The full City Council gave the settlement final approval on Thursday.

City attorneys have said that taking the lawsuits to trial would have cost the city far more — up to $500 million — to resolve the avalanche of wrongful conviction cases tied to former Sgt. Ronald Watts.

The deal will close out 176 lawsuits involving 180 wrongfully convicted people, nearly all of whom have received certificates of innocence from the courts. City lawyers said the plaintiffs spent nearly 200 years behind bars combined before they were vindicated.

Watts resigned from the force before pleading guilty in 2012 to stealing from a homeless man who posed as a drug dealer as part of an undercover FBI sting. He admitted to regularly extorting money from drug dealers, and was sentenced to 22 months in prison in 2021. He has been accused of frequently planting evidence and fabricating charges.

Dozens of men and women have said Watts and his team terrorized them in or near the former Ida B. Wells housing project in Bronzeville between 2003 and 2008. Watts and his officers have been accused of planting drugs on suspects and falsifying police reports.

Prosecutors have said Watts and the officers under his command time and again planted evidence and fabricated charges in order to further their own gun and drug trade.

Walter "Red" Burnett confirmed as new 27th Ward alderman

Alderpersons on Thursday also unanimously confirmed Mayor Brandon Johnson's appointment of Watler Redmond Burnett to fill the 27th Ward seat on the City Council vacated by his father, former Ald. Walter Burnett Jr.

Burnett, 29, becomes the youngest member of the City Council. Better known by his nickname, Red, the younger Burnett was picked from ten applicants, only seven of whom submitted complete applications by the mayor's deadline.

Burnett grew up in the 27th Ward, and after spending five years in New York working as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs, returned to Chicago in 2022 to take a job as principal of Hannibal Valley Company, where he consults on real estate, hospitality, and entertainment projects.

While Burnett is now filling the City Council vacancy left by his father, Mayor Johnson's bid to reorganize City Council committee chairmanships stalled as he failed to win over enough votes.

The elder Burnett had also served as vice mayor and chair of the powerful Zoning Committee. Johnson had been seeking to replace him with Ald. Emma Mitts (37th) as vice mayor and with Ald. Daniel La Spata (1st) as chair of the Zoning Committee. Ald. Andre Vasquez (40th) then would have replaced La Spata as chair of the Pedestrian and Traffic Safety Committee, Ald. Jessie Fuentes (26th) would have taken Vasquez's chair leading the Immigrant and Refugee Rights Committee, and Ald. David Moore (17th) would have replaced Mitts as chair of the License and Consumer Protection Committee, according to multiple published reports. However, that reorganization plan did not come up for a vote after the beginning of Thursday's council meeting was delayed nearly three hours while the mayor's office tried to line up enough votes to pass the plan.

Multiple affordable housing measures on agenda

Meanwhile, multiple measures related to affordable housing were also on the City Council agenda on Thursday. One ordinance up for a vote would set aside vacant lots near the Obama Presidential Center to be used for affordable housing at some point.

Residents of the nearby South Shore neighborhood have raised concerns for years that they will be priced out of their community when the Obama Center opens.

The council unanimously approved the measure on Thursday.

More affordable housing is also the goal of the so-called "granny flats" ordinance, which is also up for discussion Thursday.

In July, the City Council Zoning Committee advanced the proposal that would allow Chicago homeowners to build basement, attic, garage, and coach house apartments on their property without obtaining special permission from their alderperson.

The 13-7 vote in July came after supporters of the "additional dwelling unit" ordinance agreed to a number of safeguards aimed at preventing a deluge of such apartments from being built in neighborhoods where most existing housing is single-family homes.

Chicago has largely banned the construction of additional dwelling units since 1957.

Mayor Brandon Johnson has thrown his support behind the measure, arguing it will help drive down the price of housing in Chicago.

Alder to introduce ordinance that would allow dogs in restaurants

Also at the City Council on Thursday, Ald. Timmy Knudsen (43rd) will introduce an ordinance allowing dogs inside restaurants.

Knudsen said the proposal would allow dogs inside restaurants only if individual business owners choose. Restaurants that do not wish to allow dogs inside would not be required to do so.

Restaurants already are allowed to establish "dog-friendly areas" in outdoor patios, but Knudsen's proposal would allow dogs inside as well. No restaurant would be required to permit dogs inside.

Only one dog would be allowed per table, dogs must be vaccinated for rabies and kept on leash, and they couldn't be served food or table scraps, though they could be given water.

Knudsen said the ordinance is meant to help restaurants who have to turn away customers who want to bring their dogs with them.