City of Chicago attorneys at work
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RSSCollections, Ownership & Administrative Litigation
The Collections and Ownership Division includes four sections: collections, liens and acquisitions, ownership and administrative hearings.
Collections
The Collections section works for multiple City departments to collect money owed to the City and recover costs owed to the City. Collections attorneys handle litigation related to cost and debt collection in the Department of Administrative Hearings, Circuit Court and Federal Court. Collections attorneys also supervise outside counsel handling these cases.
Liens and Acquisition
The Liens and Acquisition section handles the foreclosure of City demolition liens, board-up liens, sanitation liens, and some Department of Housing (“DOH”) loans in both Chancery and Housing Court, as well as all ancillary property tax litigation. In addition, Liens and Acquisitions attorneys defend many of the City's interests in outside foreclosures; negotiate subordination agreements; acquire abandoned buildings for DOH and work on cases involving Housing Court judgments.
Ownership
The Ownership section prepares Municipal Code violation cases for the Department of Buildings and Department of Streets and Sanitation by identifying the parties responsible for violations and determining proper service addresses for those parties.
Administrative Hearings
The Administrative Hearings attorneys prosecute municipal ordinance violations at the Department of Administrative Hearings. These cases include violations cited by the Chicago Police Department, animal control cases, and cases involving impounded motor vehicles. The Vehicle Impoundment Program provides administrative hearings for individuals whose vehicles have been impounded because they were used in connection with offenses involving prostitution, narcotics, weapons, illegal dumping, loud music, curfew, and graffiti violations. Attorneys in this section also prosecute cases under the Employee Indebtedness Program, which authorizes wage garnishment of employees of the City and other agencies who owe past due parking and water debts.
