City contractors Friday largely gave the cold shoulder to Mayor Brandon Johnson’s request for a 3% price cut, forcing Chicago to look elsewhere for much of the $8.4 million in anticipated savings.Of the 250 responses from contractors returned by the close of business Friday, 62 agreed to cut their already-negotiated prices by 3%, while 59 others rejected the mayor’s request. The remaining 129 want to have “more conversations” with Chief Procurement Officer Sharla Roberts.At least 750 others did not respond at all within the five-business day deadline Roberts established.The mayor’s office had no immediate comment when asked what Johnson planned to do to make up the difference between the price cuts achieved and the $8.4 million he anticipated saving. Related Mayor Johnson defends 3% trim off of invoices from city contractors Asked earlier this week what would happen if the city doesn’t meet its $8.4 million savings target, Budget Director Annette Guzman said top mayoral aides don’t “give lip service to what we put in our budget.”“If we have an initiative and the City Council is expecting us to meet our budgets, then we’re going to implement and be held accountable,” she said.The tepid response was not surprising.Ald. Gilbert Villegas (36th), chair of the City Council’s Committee on Technology, Economic and Capital Development, had urged contractors to reject the mayor’s request and hold the city to the prices included in their legally binding agreements.“When you’re a low-bid contractor, you’re already putting as much savings as possible into it. When you’re talking about 3%, you’re potentially talking about half of someone’s profit,” Villegas said. Related Mayor Brandon Johnson asks for 3% price drop from city contractors, cites tough times “Why would someone want to do business with the city — spend thousands of dollars, and in some cases tens of thousands of dollars, putting together proposals — only to have the city… pull the rug out from under you and say, ‘You know that fair contracting opportunity you had? We want 3% of it.'”Leaders of three powerful groups — the Hispanic-American Construction Industry Association, the Illinois Road and Transportation Builders Association and the American Council of Engineering Companies — had joined forces in condemning the city’s cost-cutting maneuver.In a March 14 letter to Roberts, the organizations expressed their “shock and dismay” at an after-the-fact ask that would wipe out profits, lead to significant business losses and potentially jeopardize federal funding to Chicago.HACIA Executive Director Jacqueline Gomez said her 350 members are already “struggling with rising costs” for construction materials affected by President Donald Trump’s tariffs “not to mention payment delays” on city contracts that can drag on for six months.“When they’re asking for a 3% cut, the numbers just don’t work out. They’re essentially putting small businesses out of business with this ask," Gomez told the Sun-Times.During a City Hall news conference earlier this week, Johnson was asked why he was suddenly putting the arm on city contractors.The mayor said the request was no different than the cuts imposed on city departments and all 50 Chicago alderpersons. City Council members were well aware that a similar request would be made of city contractors during the marathon budget stalemate, Johnson said.“We’re asking everyone to look deeper into their budgets to make sure that we’re balancing a budget and we’re not laying people off and cutting services. This has long been a part of our conversation," the mayor said.Guzman noted then that City Council members “challenged us to look for ways to reduce costs — to look for efficiencies within our budgets — without having to raise property taxes or lay off workers.”“We went back to each of our department heads and asked them, `What ideas do you have? What are ways we can cut our costs?’ This is one that Commissioner Roberts brought to the forefront… We worked this into the budget analysis that we briefed alders on… This was before them when they voted on the budget,” Guzman said.The mayor’s squeeze on city contractors — and the cool response to it — creates yet another potential budget gap for the mayor to fill. It's already crunch time for the city and the Chicago Board of Education.If the partially elected, partially appointed school board does not reimburse the city for a $175 million pension payment for non-teaching school employees by March 30, Chicago will close the books on 2024 with a shortfall that could leave City Hall with no choice but to dip into its reserves.That would risk a second costly drop in Chicago’s already reduced bond rating, which determines city borrowing costs. ...read more read less