SPRINGFIELD — The city of Chicago may be known as "The City That Works," but one legal group released a study today that said "The City That Settles" would be a more fitting nickname based on the amount of money Chicago spent on litigation last year.

Illinois Lawsuit Abuse Watch (I-LAW), which was formed in 2002 with the mission of being the state's legal watchdog group, examined Chicago's lawsuit- related expenses over the past few years and today released its results, as well as a few recommendations, in a study titled, "Chicago: The City That Settles."

The 17-page study shows that the city has been hit with 900 lawsuits in the past three years and spent $85 million in 2010 to defend itself against lawsuits.

That dollar amount figure, which combines judgments, settlements and costs associated with hiring outside legal counsel, is something I-LAW focused on in its study to bolster its stance that if the city didn't spend so much fighting and settling lawsuits, it could save taxpayer dollars, help the city to close its budget deficit and avoid personnel cuts.

"I want to emphasis the fact this report is not intended to be an indictment of the city of Chicago," said Travis Akin, I-LAW's executive director. "Our purpose is to really showcase the fact that the city is often a target of litigation and that a tremendous amount of money is going toward fighting litigation when it could be used for other things."

Akin said I-LAW's study was based on figures provided on various city of Chicago websites as well as information he obtained through Freedom of Information requests made to the cities of Naperville and Los Angeles.

These cities were used in the study to make comparisons to Chicago's litigation costs. For instance, the study shows that even though Los Angeles has 1.4 million people more than Chicago, it spent $6 million less on litigation in 2010.

Jennifer Hoyle, director of public affairs for the city's law department, said the Chicago-related figures provided in I-LAW's study appear to be accurate, though she said she believes the city spent closer to $80 million on litigation costs last year than the $85 million figure cited in the study.

Hoyle said the city has already begun taking steps to do what I-LAW recommended in its study and is in the process of trying to cut costs associated with hiring outside counsel.

In its study, I-LAW recommended that the city expand a 2009 policy that urged the law department to take police claims less than $100,000 to trial rather than settling them.

According to the study and confirmed by Hoyle, this policy has resulted in a nearly 50 percent reduction in the number of lawsuits filed against the Chicago Police Department from 2009 to 2010.

Known as the bulk case program, Hoyle said the law department retains outside law firms to handle nonmeritoriously police lawsuits that have a value of less than $100,000 and are defensible. The city pays these firms a flat fee of $35,000 a case and gives them a $15,000 bonus if they win.

Fighting these lawsuits rather than settling them, as well as paying outside firms a flat fee instead of an hourly rate, has helped save the city money, Hoyle said.

In addition, Hoyle said the city has a "robust risk management program" to identify any risks or exposures the city has to lawsuits and is in the process of initiating a private-public partnership to reduce outside counsel costs by having some of the city's law firms handle certain litigation and transactional matters on a pro bono basis.

Hoyle said it should be noted that as a large city, Chicago is often viewed as an entity with deep pockets, which makes it a target for lawsuits.

She also said I-LAW's study used "a lot of hyperbole to get attention for the report," a statement that Jerry A. Latherow, president of the Illinois Trial Lawyers' Association, said he couldn't agree more with.

Latherow said he doesn't consider I-LAW's study a study at all.

"They are far from studies. They are not factually based," he said of I-LAW's study as well as its previous ones dealing with so-called judicial hellholes. "You need to consider the source.

This is a tea party kind of group that is always blasting any court filings in Illinois."

He said I-LAW cited other reports that were conducted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Tort Reform Association (ATRA), a pair of groups that he said have agendas that typically fall more within the business community than the legal arena.

Akin said I-LAW receives some money from ATRA, but gets donations from other groups and individuals.

While Latherow said he is used to these types of studies taking jabs at trial lawyers, "it still bugs us, but we always consider the source."

More information about I-LAW can be found on its website at illawsuitabusewatch.org.