Mayor Brandon Johnson and three Progressive Caucus allies filed a one-year Data Center Moratorium Ordinance last Wednesday.

New builds and material expansions will pause while the mayor’s task force (from his August EO) writes rules on energy, water, air, and neighborhoods.

The bill went to Rules.

At the same time, Alderman Bill Conway put out a competing ordinance that bans data centers from some corridors without a zoning process and skips the yearlong freeze. One drawback is that it treats data centers of all sizes the same.

A complete freeze is the easy politics. The harder path is making sure residents feel a win when a data center shows up.

So the real question is: How do we make data centers work for Chicagoans?

Some potential ways:

Conway’s bill treats every rack like a special project that needs a hearing and a floor vote. Clear MW tiers and planned development for the big ones is enough.

More process on top of existing permits delays the infrastructure that keeps power costs from eating the city.

Yesterday we ran the third [vibe coded] creator hackathon at Drive Capital. About 200 Chicago creators and founders. Build-your-tech-stack edition.

We had workshops throughout the day from partners like NEAR Foundation, ElevenCreative, Claude, PromptHaus, and GrokBot.

Every participant left with credits and ideas for how to build products for their communities and audiences.

The thesis of the series is simple: creators already have distribution. Our goal is to teach creators how to build their own products for their communities and audiences.

Our partners unlocked a ton for this group.

ElevenCreative helped show how to turn one workflow (hook, voice, cut) into variants you can A/B the same afternoon instead of waiting a week on a freelancer.

NEAR taught the group how to go beyond vibe coding into something you own. A portfolio or product surface you control, then agents that can touch chain without pasting keys into a chat.

Last week, Governor Pritzker signed an EO creating the Illinois Artificial Intelligence Cabinet, a cross-agency body tasked with coordinating how the state prepares for and governs AI.

The cabinet brings together DoIT, IEMA, IDFPR, the ICC, the Illinois State Police, DCEO, IEPA, and the Department of Public Health.

In his statement, Pritzker outlined three priorities:

That last point could reshape how the state competes for AI demand, specifically on turning incentives into leverage.

The order builds on this summer's AI Safety Measures Act, which already requires the largest model developers to undergo audits and report safety incidents.

I had an op-ed in Crain’s last week: Chicago moved grain, then futures, now digital money.

Chicago built contracts, options, and clearinghouses so risk could price and settle.

Braintree bought Venmo here, then PayPal bought Braintree.

Stripe is more than doubling River North. Adyen made Chicago its North American tech hub in Fulton Market.

Zerohash, Coinflow, and a Zerohash–Marqeta card spend partnership are the next pipes for dollar value moving as tokens and back again.

This summer’s Future of Money summit put Tom Sosnoff, Edward Woodford, and Michael Busch on the same afternoon: three generations of Chicago money movers.

What’s been missing is claiming it out loud. When the country looks at who owns the rails of value, they should see Chicago on the pipes.

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