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Mayor Emanuel names Forrest Claypool as new CPS CEO

Published  July 15, 2015 9:26pm CDT
Education
FOX 32 Chicago

CHICAGO (AP) - Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel has selected his chief of staff to head the city's struggling school district.

Forrest Claypool is a longtime friend of Emanuel who headed the city's transit agency before he was named Emanuel's chief of staff earlier this year. He will now lead the nation's third-largest school district.

Claypool succeeds Barbara Byrd-Bennett. She resigned last month amid a federal probe of a $20 million no-bid contract between Chicago Public Schools and an education company where Byrd-Bennett once worked. She has not been charged with any crime.

Earlier this week CPS officials said dozens of schools would have to cut about $200,000 from each of their budgets without pension help from state lawmakers. The district has already made budget cuts in the wake of ballooning pension payments.

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