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Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Dr. Allison Arwady from CDPH will have a call with reporters at 1 p.m. I'll live tweet it. Follow for updates and let me know if you have questions.
Our latest story here: https://blockclubchicago.org/2020/04/21/coronavirus-in-chicago-city-could-reopen-slowly-face-more-restrictions-than-other-parts-of-illinois/
Our latest story here: https://blockclubchicago.org/2020/04/21/coronavirus-in-chicago-city-could-reopen-slowly-face-more-restrictions-than-other-parts-of-illinois/
Lightfoot: DCASE had to cancel major events.
More on that here: https://blockclubchicago.org/2020/04/21/chicago-blues-fest-house-fest-memorial-parade-and-more-canceled-because-of-coronavirus/
More on that here: https://blockclubchicago.org/2020/04/21/chicago-blues-fest-house-fest-memorial-parade-and-more-canceled-because-of-coronavirus/
Lightfoot: City rewarded $7.5 million to street outreach groups. They previously had been entirely funded through philanthropic dollars.
They're supporting de-escalation services, crisis intervention, violence interruption work, etc.
They're supporting de-escalation services, crisis intervention, violence interruption work, etc.
Lightfoot: The city has authorized Hilco to clean up demolition debris. "It remains in a dangerous condition. There's debris really scattered throughout the southern end of the property. ... The remaining parts of the building were structurally unsound. This is a safety hazard."
Lightfoot: "... Because of the public safety hazard that this poses, we are allowing Hilco, with a new demolition contractor, ... to clean up that site and mitigate ... ." They don't want scrap there to attract scavengers.
Lightfoot: "... We set up a $100 million Resiliency Fund for small businesses. And we received applications from, really, all of the city. Those allocations and moneys are still available. We pushed out over 120 different loans as of last Friday. That work is ongoing. So those...
"funds are available. We're very well aware of the fact that the SBA loans appropriated through the CARES Act, that those moneys have run out. ... There were a number of challenges through that funding, not the least of which" was that they were distributed through "large banks."
Lightfoot: "... A lot of our small businesses are unbanked, meaning they don't have longstanding relationships with banks ... . And, of course, an obvious problem those federal funds are not available to undocumented owners of businesses. That's why the $100 million fund that...
"we set up will remain important and crucial. We continue to talk to members of City Council and members of our finance team about other ways we can help small businesses. And that work is ongoing."
Lightfoot: Department of Housing "is hard at work on these issues. Obviously, there were easy solutions, we would have come up with them." That includes the governor, General Assembly, etc. Mayors across the country are facing this. "You've got not only renters, who are ...
"definitely under siege and feeling the stress of not having liquidity of being able to pay for basic expenses, rent top among them, but you also have landlords." Most landlords are not "big, commercial lenders. ... These are individuals who own a building or two and are ...
"relying upon that income to pay a mortgage. ... If we did as Ald. Martin's ordinance suggested, which is forbear rent for a year, many rental contracts are only for a year. So what happens at the end of that year? ... The reality is ... most landlords will go out of business ...
"well before a one-year time period. The biggest issue, as I see it, is the mortgages and getting the big banks that hold these mortgages to forbear those mortgage requirements during the course of this pandemic. ... Really, they key in all of this are the banks. So far, they ...
"have, for the most part, not been willing to give any relief on a widescale basis."
Lightfoot on Hilco: "Keep in mind that the permit for demolition of the site was issued several years ago."
Building Commissioner Judy Friedland: "There isn't a specific permit for an implosion. There was a review process for it." There was a permit back in summer 2018 and another permit March 30.
Lightfoot: Hilco "utterly failed to execute. I think we all know that at this point."
Lightfoot: "Nothing about aldermanic prerogative changed a single word in the building code. The alderman, the previous one, had deep involvement with this project from the very beginning. That didn't change. And it didn't change under Mike Rodriguez. I think the record was ...
"very clear that, really starting in early March this year, Mike Rodriguez had extensive contact both with the developer and various city departments. And up until literally the night before, and then he was on site that day. It's easy to say things, but the record of his ...
"engagement and active engagement is really quite clear."
Lightfoot: She thinks debris removal at Hilco site will begin sometime later this week. "That site is incredibly dangerous ... . There's a lot of debris that's scattered throughout the site, and the remaining structures are incredibly unsound." They're sagging and "jagged ...
"pieces" are hanging off. "That's why we believe it's important the developer to really clean up that site."
Dr. Allison Arwady of Chicago Department of Public Health: Results of testing at Hilco site are in the final stages of being validated. Some have come through. Once it's all validated, they'll disclose it.
Lightfoot: "Aldermen always push back. That's part of what their job is. ... I don't want a rubberstamp City Council. They had a lot of questions and we took additional time to make sure we were being as responsive as possible."
Lightfoot: "June 30, no, I wouldn't attach much meaning to that. That will be kind of an outside date. But I certainly hope that we'll have a better view of what the future looks like before then. But I've made no secret of the fact that April 30 is, I think, no longer a ...
"viable date. I would expect an extension of the stay at home order and the other orders that were put in place ... to go through sometime in May. It certainly could go into June, but June 30 is just kinda an outside marker." They'll be guided by CDPH.
Lightfoot: "We've been very clear that we have to see a lot of things in place" before people can congregate. Cases need to "decrease dramatically ... . We have to see a substantial drop in the number of overall ICU cases ... . We want to see much more widespread testing ... .
"And we need to build an infrastructure so that we can do extensive contact tracing. Those are the bare minimum, and we're not there yet on any of those metrics. ... We're still not even close to being out of the woods."
Lightfoot: "Obviously what we're trying to do is make sure we manage our overtime spend. It's a priority for this administration from Day One. Before COVID, we were holding extensive conversations with departments, giving them overtime budgets and helping them get into ...
"compliance regarding overtime. In the light of the pandemic, some of those issues were challenging to obtain because we need to make sure we have a ready and able workforce ... . We also want to make sure that, as we have been, we are making sure that our workforce is healthy...
"and strong. Some of that means working in longer shifts so they can have longer time off."
Arwady: "We are definitely seeing the great majority of people — not just city workers but across the whole city — the majority recover ... . Part of what's tricky here is the timeframe for growth for this outbreak has been so fast ... ."
Arwady: Plenty of people who were sick have returned.
Lightfoot: "This is just related to cleaning up the debris from the demolition and making sure the buildings are structurally sound. The demolition ... we have not authorized that yet."
Lightfoot: "Our contact tracing, this has really gotta be done at the local level. I know the governor has spoken about it but in Chicago we're fortunate enough where we can build our own infrastructure, and we're well at work on plans related to that."
City is encouraging ...
City is encouraging ...
people to wear masks when going out, especially if they can't easily socially distance. "I think you're aware of the fact that we have purchased and are providing cloth masks to all city essential workers, first responders, sanitation workers and the like. And we will continue...
to emphasize to them that wearing cloth masks when they're out doing their daily duties ... ."
Arwady: "I want to clarify that contact tracing is actually the bread-and-butter work of public health. It's what we do in the health department every day, all year round, for any infectious disease ... . The issue has been where you see this enormous rise in cases ... we ...
"don't have the capacity to do the very in-depth, prolonged and in-depth interview ... ." In early days, they could do that easier. "We've already been doing an expansion of that with the existing city workforce and we have some really good plans, I think, for how to expand ...
"this in a major way." She's had "really robust conversations" about tracing and has talked with the state, feds, etc.
Arwady: "We've got a lot of ideas. There's lots of conversations that are happening at all levels ... but we're not waiting for any of that. We're moving ahead, expanding and, I think, thinking in thoughtful and creative ways ... ."
Lightfoot: "... The U.S. EPA has been engaged" to help with air quality monitoring. She says she's heard from many people in Little Village and, while no one thinks what happened was appropriate, some still support the project.
Arwady: CDPH "regularly works with the Illinois EPA, particularly on issues like air monitoring ... . But then because of the major concerns, the egregious effects that we saw a couple weekends ago, in this case the U.S. EPA has definitely been engaged ... ."
Lightfoot re: removing Hilco from the project: "There's a whole lot of reasons why that would be highly problematic."
Friedland: "Heneghan is the contractor that's going to be completing the demolition."
Friedland: The third-party consultant will be paid by Hilco.
Lightfoot: The selection of that consultant hasn't been made yet. Once it's made, they'll say it.
Lightfoot: The selection of that consultant hasn't been made yet. Once it's made, they'll say it.
Call with reporters over.
