The Spin: Pritzker, Lightfoot sound ‘alarm’ on COVID-19 surge | Lightfoot likely to face controversy over her 2021 budget | Mayor says she was not told of ex-top cop’s ‘improper relationship’
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It all sounds and feels very familiar: A chill in the air, the unknowns of a deadly pandemic and Gov. J.B. Pritzker announces he’ll be holding daily news conferences about rising case counts while Mayor Lori Lightfoot warns the spike will not only hurt families and communities but also the economic engine that supports the residents here.
But it’s not March or May. It’s mid-October and the governor said this afternoon he’s imposing a new round of restrictions on bars and restaurants in southern Illinois and that it could soon expand to Chicago’s suburbs.
At a separate news conference, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said,"Make no mistake, we are in the second surge."
Pritzker over the weekend was on CNN and pinned some of blame for the increase in cases on President Donald Trump’s “allies in our state, all across the state who are simply saying to people don’t pay any attention to the mitigations don’t follow the rules.” Trump, who contracted the virus, has sent mixed messages about mask-wearing and social distancing.
The governor took the swipe at Trump on Sunday after the president campaigned in neighboring Janesville, Wisconsin, on Saturday night and said “Illinois could use a new governor” and called for schools to reopen. The governor-appointed Illinois State board of Education gave local school districts the flexibility on remote and in-person learning amid the pandemic. Trump largely played down the pandemic in his campaign stop in Wisconsin, a crucial swing state, Tribune’s Bill Ruthhart reports.
And we’re just 48 hours from Lightfoot announcing her 2021 budget plan, The Tribune’s Gregory Pratt and John Byrne were first with the details on Sunday: She’s expected to roll out a $94 million property tax increase, more than 300 city worker layoffs and a gas tax hike.
Welcome to The Spin.
‘Sounding the alarm’ in Chicago as COVID-19 cases surge
As cases soar across the state, Gov. Pritzker was in Murphysboro this afternoon and announced he was tightening coronavirus restrictions on southern Illinois bars and restaurants.
As Jamie Munks reports: “Two other regions appear on the brink of seeing some businesses limited and gathering caps halved. The region that includes DuPage and Kane counties had surpassed an 8% positivity rate for two consecutive days, with public health officials reporting an 8.5% positivity rate for the region on Monday.” Read more here.
And, the governor said he’ll be resuming the state’s daily COVID-19 briefings as he held during the pandemic’s opening months.
“We are sounding this alarm because the increase is real,” the city’s top public health official, Dr. Allison Arwady said during a news conference earlier in the day with the Chicago mayor.
Data points: Chicago’s seeing 500-plus cases daily. That’s a jump from the 300 daily cases seen when bars reopened and restrictions on restaurants and retailers were eased last month. Statewide, 3,113 new known COVID-19 cases were announced along with 22 additional deaths: Read more here.
City officials threaten to return to stricter times when restaurants were only allowed to serve diners in outdoor areas or at indoor tables close to open windows. And they could do it before Chicago reaches the crucial 8% positivity threshold; right now the city and state’s 7-day rolling positivity rate is at 5.4%.
Pritzker said on CNN yesterday that the state enacts restrictions on a region-by-region bases, but he didn’t rule out the possibility that all of Illinois could return to tighter restrictions if the trend doesn’t change.
'Broad problem’: My colleagues Gregory Pratt and John Byrne write: “Lightfoot said she doesn’t believe the decision to ease business restrictions — including allowing bars that don’t serve food to reopen for indoor drinking — last month has led to the current spike. She said the health department has been analyzing the increase to help understand its causes so that the city can use a ‘surgical’ approach to its response, but so far, the problem seems broad.”
A difference of opinion or geography? In Southern Illinois this afternoon, the governor said as he announced tightened restrictions there said, “well, the first thing I’d say (is) it is an unfortunate fact that the research — and there is a lot of it — shows that bars and restaurants are places where there is a lot of spread of the virus. That’s an unfortunate fact,” he said noting that small businesses are important job creators.
Pritzker’s rural disconnect? On CNN, the governor said of Trump: “He doesn’t wear a mask in public, he has rallies where they don’t encourage people to wear masks in public. This is now rhetoric that what people understand is, particularly the rural areas, ‘well, the President doesn’t wear a mask, we don’t need to wear a mask, it’s not that dangerous.’ ”
During two news conferences today Pritzker was asked about that comment — in one case specifically whether there’s a disconnect between the governor, who calls Chicago home, and rural downstate residents heeding his orders. The Democratic governor reiterated that the cavalier message was coming from the Republican White House and Illinois is seeing spikes in rural communities.
Lightfoot gets a letter from elected leaders on reopening schools later this fall: “Sharing many concerns of the Chicago Teachers Union, dozens of elected officials from Chicago and Illinois sent a letter over the weekend to Mayor Lightfoot, Chicago Public Schools leaders and the Board of Education listing their demands about remote learning and an eventual return to school,” the Tribune’s Hannah Leone writes.
The mayor says data shows public and private institutions — open for in-person classes since September — near CPS schools aren’t a source of virus spread lending some optimism to the gradual reopening plan. If the surge continues, this may all be a moot point. Read the full story here.
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Preview: Lightfoot’s budget likely can’t avoid controversial solutions
Most of the tools Lightfoot can use to balance the city’s budget is going to generate some controversy, the Tribune’s Pratt and Byrne write. You can read the breakdown here.
Consider: "If the mayor borrows to plug the shortfall, she likely will be criticized for putting the current financial burden on future generations. If the city refinances its debts then uses the money to shore up finances in the short term, she’ll likely be criticized for relying on one-time fixes.
"If the mayor raises property taxes, she could face backlash from residents whose finances already have been walloped by the pandemic-fueled economic downturn.
"If Lightfoot raises fines or fees, she could be criticized for walking back on her promises to end what she has called the city’s ‘addiction’ to fines and fees.
“Dipping into the city’s rainy day fund could negatively affect the city’s already dismal credit rating.”
Mayor Lightfoot declined to comment today on sexual assault allegations against ex-top cop Eddie Johnson by his former driver, saying she can’t talk about pending litigation, the Tribune’s Gregory Pratt writes.
In a lawsuit filed late Wednesday, Cynthia Donald said Johnson raped and abused her repeatedly for more than three years, and later destroyed evidence of that abuse on his cellphone when the city Inspector General was investigating his conduct. Johnson has denied any sexual misconduct.
The lawsuit also alleges that Lightfoot “worked to deflect blame” from the city over the incident and ordered Johnson to “dump” Donald from his security detail.
Asked about the allegations, Lightfoot said, “Eddie Johnson, obviously common sense tells you, never told me he was engaged in any kind of improper relationship with Ms. Donald, he never of course told me he was taking her into his office and sexually assaulting her on a regular basis.”
“Why would he tell his boss something that outrageous and beyond the pale? Because if he had said something like that to me, I would have ordered that he be arrested on the spot,” Lightfoot said.
In a year of unexpected tragedy and turmoil, Chicago police Superintendent David Brown sought to reshape his department: My Tribune colleague Jeremy Gorner takes a deep dive here.
Rockford police officers will pair with mental health experts to respond to crisis calls: The Associated Press has the story here.
We’re 15 days out from the election.
Early voting expands with opening of more polling places in suburban counties: The Tribune’s Kelli Smith has the details here.
Mayor Lightfoot voted in person on Saturday afternoon at an early voting site in Chicago’s Avondale neighborhood. It was a family affair, with wife Amy Esheleman also casting a ballot and the couple’s young daughter Vivian also on hand.
‘Vote. Vote. Vote. Vote. Vote.’ Women’s March holds mix of smaller in-person, virtual events amid pandemic and widening political gender gap: The Tribune’s Joe Mahr has the details here.
Steelworkers union shines Biden, Harris ‘bat light’ on Chicago’s Trump Tower: The Tribune’s Katherine Rosenberg Douglas has the story here.
Man who dangled from Trump Tower for more than 13 hours, pulled to safety: He had demanded to talk to Donald Trump or the media. Read the Tribune story here.
Presidential candidate Joe Biden’s Illinois campaign is hosting a virtual early voting rally today with a smattering of local Democrats on the ballot including Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly, of suburban Matteson, and 3rd Congressional District Democratic candidate Marie Newman along with a message from U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin. Also on hand: Quentin Fulks, who chairs the “Vote Yes for Fairness” campaign; the organization that supports Gov. Pritzker’s signature top-of-the-Illinois-ballot initiative to change the state’s mandatory flat income tax to a graduated income tax that levies higher rates as income rises.
Freshman U.S. Rep. Lauren Underwood is hosting a “drive-in rally” tonight at the Kane County Fairgrounds in St. Charles, part of the suburban and exurban 14th Congressional District she represents, to mark the start of expanded early voting across the suburbs. She’ll speak at 5 p.m., which will be livestreamed, followed by a screening of the film “Surge” which documents her 2018 campaign.
For first time in nearly 20 years, Cook County opens suburban housing voucher waitlist
From the Tribune’s Alice Yin: At least 10,000 people have applied to join suburban Cook County’s housing voucher program since officials announced on Monday morning its waitlist will open up for the first time in nearly two decades.
The program subsidizes rent for households living in private rentals by using funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The revival was neither spurred by the coronavirus pandemic nor a change in federal funding for affordable housing, which Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle said has been at most stagnant for decades. Housing Authority of Cook County Executive Director Richard Monocchio said there was simply a “huge supply and demand issue” with getting through a waitlist of about 70,000 from 2001 without significant additional help from HUD.
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