The Spin: City Council compromise on Lake Shore Drive name change? | CTU’s Sharkey blasts Lightfoot over teacher layoffs | Douglas Emhoff heading to Chicago as part of White House vaccine push

Mayor Lori Lightfoot and members of Chicago City Council are at least talking about reaching a compromise over a controversial proposal to rename Lake Shore Drive for Chicago’s Black founder Jean Baptiste Point DuSable.

My Tribune colleague John Byrne is reporting that one compromise idea being floated would rename the road “DuSable Lake Shore Drive” in a bid to avoid another racially tinged City Council floor fight at tomorrow’s City Council meeting.

While a group of aldermen have pushed the idea to rename “the Drive,” Lightfoot has proposed naming the city’s Chicago Riverwalk for DuSable and finally get to work on a decadeslong plan to develop and name a waterfront park for him.

Meantime, the newest battlefront between Lightfoot and the Chicago Teachers Union is over hundreds of layoffs in the school system. Union officials are questioning why the 400-plus teachers and support staff are being laid off by Chicago Public Schools officials — who report to the mayor. They “questioned why the city was cutting jobs in underserved communities during the pandemic, as nearly $2 billion in federal education funds were awarded to Chicago Public Schools,” the Tribune’s Karen Ann Cullotta writes.

And second gentleman Douglas Emhoff, Vice President Kamala Harris’ husband, will be in Chicago tomorrow when he’ll visit a COVID-19 vaccine clinic and Black-owned barber shop, a representative of his office tells The Spin. He’s serving as a White House envoy of sorts to promote COVID-19 vaccinations efforts in pockets of the country where rates are particularly low. President Joe Biden is pushing for at least 70% of Americans to be partially vaccinated by Fourth of July.

About 54% of Chicago residents have received at least one dose of the vaccine, according to the most recent Chicago Department of Public Health data. Broken down, the statistics show just over 60% of white residents have received at least a single shot while 37.4% of Black residents and just under 45% of Latino residents have received at least one dose.

The city’s Englewood neighborhood has some of the lowest vaccination rates, according to city statistics (H/T Alice Yin for her expertise on tracking the numbers).

Welcome to The Spin.

More about those discussions on a possible compromise to name LSD ‘DuSable Lake Shore Drive’

From the Tribune’s John Byrne: An ordinance to strip out “Lake Shore Drive” and rename the outer drive solely for DuSable from Hollywood Avenue to 67th Street “is set for an up-or-down vote at Wednesday’s council meeting, after opponents delayed it last month. Supporters and opponents of that controversial idea were working right up until the meeting to try to shore up their positions.”

Moore, sponsor of the ordinance to rename the drive for DuSable, said he might consider the compromise, but only if other backers of the name change are on board and the measure is approved at tomorrow’s City Council meeting.

A proposal to send the plan back to committee, to package the new street name with Lightfoot’s idea to also christen the downtown Riverwalk and a nearby park for DuSable would be an unacceptable delay, Moore tells Byrne.

“Lightfoot’s Riverwalk plan does not have enough support in the council by itself to defeat Moore’s ordinance, setting the mayor up to either take the loss or use a mayoral veto to try to defeat it, unless another idea emerges,” Byrne notes. Full story here.

Also on tomorrow’s Chicago City Council agenda: Chicago paramedics in line for $1.83 million sexual harassment settlement, Byrne reports. The settlement stems from a federal suit, in which the women said they were groped, stalked and forced to endure repeated sexually explicit remarks from Fire Department superiors. More here.

CPS laying off 443 teachers and support staff. CTU vows to fight cuts.

The Tribune’s Karen Ann Cullotta writes, “Outraged by the layoffs of more than 440 teachers and support staff, Chicago Teachers Union officials on Monday questioned why the city was cutting jobs in underserved communities during the pandemic, as nearly $2 billion in federal education funds were awarded to Chicago Public Schools.”

CTU President Jesse Sharkey blasted Mayor Lightfoot in a statement yesterday: “On Friday, she declared racism to be a public health crisis in many Chicago communities disproportionately burdened with poverty, unemployment, housing insecurity and violence. Today, she’s destabilizing those same communities by laying off educators at neighborhood schools.”

The highest number of the 443 layoffs by ZIP code, said Sharkey, were in North Lawndale and Little Village, which were disproportionately affected by COVID-19 infection and death.

Last week, CPS officials described the layoffs as part of its yearly staff adjustment and hiring process ahead of next school year, Cullotta notes. More here.

Child tax credits arriving next month, but study finds pandemic likely erased post-recession gains for Illinois families

Cullotta also writes that as the Biden administration launches a public information campaign to get the word out about the new child tax credit slated to begin next month, a study released this week notes that post-recession financial gains for struggling Illinois families could be erased by issues triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.

That’s according to the just-released Annie E. Casey Foundation’s annual KIDS COUNT Data Book. The report ranks states from 1 to 50 in terms of child well-being on the eve of the pandemic and “shows how the COVID-19 crisis exacerbated inequality, with Black and Latino kids and families struggling the most,” foundation officials said. More here.

Sign up for The Spin to get the top stories in politics delivered to your inbox weekday afternoons.

Douglas Emhoff to visit Chicago in White House push to boost vaccinations as Lightfoot administration announces expansion of inoculation efforts

Second gentleman Douglas Emhoff will make several stops in Chicago tomorrow as part of the Biden administration’s “We Can Do This” vaccination bus tour. Mayor Lightfoot and Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s press offices did not respond to questions about whether they will be there.

While Vice President Kamala Harris is leading the vaccination effort, focusing her visits on the South, Emhoff and first lady Jill Biden have been assigned to travel to areas of the Midwest where inoculation rates are low — though the second gentleman has traveled to other parts of the country to get the message out. Vaccination rates have fallen off overall, but concerns have been raised about lower rates among Black and Latino residents, so officials have been taking their message to vaccine sites and barber shops, hair salons and other businesses in those communities.

President Biden set a goal of getting at least 70% of adults partially vaccinated by Independence Day. He’s said it’s essential to returning the nation to something approaching a pre-pandemic sense of normalcy this summer. With less than two weeks to hit that mark, he just may make it. My full story here.

Meantime, as city detects 70 Delta variant cases, at-home COVID-19 vaccination with $50 Grubhub gift card incentive opens to all Chicagoans 12 and older: “Starting Tuesday, people can book appointments at (312) 746-4835 or chicago.gov/home to register for a team to visit their home and vaccinate them and their families, public health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady said in a Tuesday news conference.” My Tribune colleague Alice Yin has more here.

Ex-Markham Mayor David Webb Jr. gets 2 years in prison in bribery scheme that included cash-filled coffee cups

The Tribune’s Jason Meisner writes: “Former Markham Mayor David Webb Jr. was sentenced Tuesday to two years in federal prison for taking nearly $300,000 in bribes, including from one developer who left coffee cups stuffed with cash in the mayor’s office.

“The sentence handed down by U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman capped an unusual public corruption case that began when Webb himself went to federal authorities and admitted he was on the take. His testimony later led to indictments against two contractors and their companies.

“In announcing the sentence, which was below the 4½ years requested by prosecutors, Gettleman acknowledged Webb’s extraordinary cooperation and said he appreciated that the mayor had a significant gambling addiction at the time he was secretly taking money.” Full story here.

Thanks for reading The Spin, the Tribune’s politics newsletter. Sign up here to have it delivered to your inbox weekday afternoons. Have a tip? Email host Lisa Donovan at ldonovan@chicagotribune.com.

Twitter @byldonovan