Hi Ken
While I don't do any 'design' work in Chicago, I've interviewed a number of local architects and plan reviewers and there is a lot of information on the web regarding the self certification program (http://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/bldgs/supp_info/an_overview_of_theself-certificationprogram.html) as well as a list of several hundred architects who have gone through the training to be able to self certify. My understanding from casual conversations is that this program was created in response to something of a crisis situation in backlog - but that it has remained in place even after the 'crisis' that led to it's creation subsided.
Other cities with self certification programs include New York (perhaps the oldest such program); Charlotte/Meckelenburg county, Pheonix, and Austin Texas - where a program was instituted just a couple of years ago in collaboration with the local AIA component to reduce a very large backlog in residential permit applications (so large that it was said to take as long to get a permit as to build a house).
Cheers
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Michael Malinowski AIA
AIA Director - California Region
Applied Architecture, Inc.
Sacramento CA
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