The Vice President visits 75th Street on Tuesday

 Kamala Harris is a former U.S. Senator from California and recently made history as the first woman of color to become Vice President of the United States under the 46th President Joe Biden. It was in the news recently that she spent a little bit of time on 75th Street on Tuesday to visit Brown Sugar Bakery.

Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx and Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton met up with the new vice president at Brown Sugar Bakery on East 75th Street after Harris visited a nearby vaccination site. https://t.co/qvjvpYshis

— Chicago Sun-Times (@Suntimes) April 7, 2021

Multi-phase plan to reopen the state

[VIDEO] Im glad to see this plan from Gov. J.B. Pritzker as far as reopening this state. Illinois is a far more diverse state and there is a lot more to our state than the Chicago area. Chicago and Cook County - also certainly the collar counties - are more of a hotspot that other parts of the state. And 97 of the state's 102 counties have reported cases so far

I would recommend you check out the governor's remarks from Tuesday as he discusses his regional phased reopening plan.

There were some challenges by two downstate legislators and another by a pastor challenging the governor's' new stay-at-home order which went into effect on May 1, 2020. Here it is in full. There was a ruling by a federal judge on Monday declaring the governor's executive order as constitutional which involved the lawsuit by a pastor in Illinois

I do want to address this video many of you seen from Saturday afternoon in the parking lot at the shopping center on 87th street that contains a Jewel. It was a crowd of people standing outside and congregating and evidently a full parking lot. On a typical day with all stores open - although Burlington Coat Factory had recently closed - the lot wouldn't be that full.

I could see this as an act of defiance and the weather is getting warmer people will get restless. However, if encouraging people to stay home will help to get Chicago reopened then I'm definitely for it.

Here's the video below.

Today's #COVID19 update

Here are today's count of coronavirus cases 461 with 8 deaths. The current totals so far is 5057 cases with 73 deaths. Via Chicago Tribune

According to a press release from the Illinois Dept of Public Health four of those 8 deaths announced earlier today is from Cook county

Also noted in the Tribune:

At his daily press briefing, Pritzker also announced that a COVID-19 field hospital at McCormick Place will have 500 beds available by the end of the week. The alternate care facility will hold 3,000 beds for patients, mostly with mild symptoms who do not require intensive care, the governor said. Construction began on the sprawling convention center over the weekend.

Additionally, Chicago Public Schools’ hundreds of thousands of students will receive daily learning activities as part of a new remote learning plan that is due to start on April 13, the Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s office announced Monday. Officials have laid out a goal of delivering 100,000 electronic devices to its neediest students.

While I know it could be a while before we can be clear of this pandemic, I was rather hoping the executive order enacted earlier this month could be lifted. Unfortunately as with many things during these difficult times an extension is possible according to NBC Chicago:

Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Monday it's something he's considering.

"It is something that we need to consider, whether to extend and if we did, how long," he said during his daily briefing, though he did not indicate when a decision would be made.

Pritzker's press secretary said Sunday the governor "can only do disaster proclamations 30 days at a time."

"I think he's mentioned that he'll follow the experts on extending them," Jordan Abudayyeh said.

Bear in mind it was announced by President Donald Trump over the weekend that federal social distancing guidelines will be continued through the end of April. It's expected that we will hit the peak nationally next month. 

And as always be safe out there.

 

#COVID19 resources

I'm sharing some basic links to information regarding the coronavirus aka COVID-19, I encourage you to click these various links to educate yourself on this. I'm sharing federal, state, and local resources as it pertains to the whatever is available local to us.

If you have any resources, especially for health care or social services please let us know. Send an email write a comment or even hit us on our social media to make this as comprehensive as possible.

And as always we'll keep you updated on any announcements with regards to this virus.

City of Chicago Coronavirus Response Center.

BTW, as of March 22, 2020 there have been 490 coronavirus cases in the city of Chicago while there are 1,049 cases throughout the state of Illinois. You see that information on the above link from the city.

Cook County Resources and Response to Coronavirus (COVID-19)

Also there's from the county Dept. of Public Health on Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19)

According the county Dept. of Public Health as of March 21, 2020 there are 548 coronavirus cases throughout the county which also includes the city of Chicago.

From the State of Illinois Dept. of Public Health Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Very comprehensive and encourage you all to check out the information on here. They note the number of cases throughout the state which as stated above under city of Chicago is 1,049 coronavirus cases. There have been nine deaths statewide and 8,374 have been tested for this virus so far. These stats were updated as of March 22, 2020.

I also want to note that the Gov. J.B. Pritzker has been consistently holding press conferences to announce any updates especially any increase in coronavirus cases and deaths from those cases. Medial professionals primarily from the state Dept. of Public Health are often on hand to talk about the state's response to these cases. Usually they will be covered by our local news stations CBS 2, NBC 5, ABC 7, WGN, FOX 32 or even WTTW. You can also check out the Illinois Channel fb page for any press conference from the Governor.

Finally from the US Government from the Centers for Disease Control on Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19)

And again as far as the US Government response President Donald Trump has also been holding frequent press conferences with regards to the federal response to this virus.

The most recent update nationally as far as coronavirus cases as of March 20, 2020 is 15,219 reported coronavirus cases with 201 total deaths. All 50 states and 4 US territories such as Guam, Puerto Rico, Washington, DC, and the Virgin Islands are reporting cases so far.

THE CDC cases page is only updated starting at 12:00 Noon Monday through Friday.

Of course if you know of any resources we should be following to enable you all to continuing taking care of yourselves or even if you know of somewhere to be tested. We need your help with that. Please share with us any resources that you think the public should know about.

And as always be careful out there. 

Rod Blagojevich is released from prison

When our former governor was impeached and removed from office I was all over this back then. So I hope you'll indulge this blast from the past.

As a result of his activities while governor which helped get him impeached he was sent to federal prison were he served close to 8 years until President Donald Trump granted Blagojevich a commutation of his federal sentence.

After more than one false alarm raised and dashed the hopes of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, President Donald Trump finally answered his pleas and commuted Blagojevich’s 14-year prison term Tuesday, springing the Chicago Democrat from prison more than four years early and writing a stunning new chapter to one of the state’s most notorious corruption cases.

The federal Bureau of Prisons released a statement after 7 p.m. saying that Blagojevich “is no longer in the custody” of the agency and was released from a prison in Colorado.

The controversial move came more than a year after Trump first revealed he was considering ending Blagojevich’s time behind bars, saying he believed Illinois’ 40th governor had been treated unfairly.

“Yes, we commuted the sentence of Rod Blagojevich,” Trump said in Maryland on Tuesday. "He served eight years in jail, a long time. He seems like a very nice person — don’t know him.”

As an aside, it was mentioned by many out there that after his removal from office Blagojevich was a participant on Celebrity Apprentice and certainly that occurred before he served his sentence for corruption in federal prison.

I wonder if his time in prison caused him to think about what got him there. I wonder if he plans a political comeback although in early 2009 the state Senate also voted to bar the former governor from running for any office in Illinois. I don't know if that includes running for a federal office such as a member of the US House of Representatives where he was a former member.

Either way I believe this AP video was circulated among Illinois bloggers when he was arrested by the FBI years ago. Blagojevich was still governor and was going to work as usual and we get a glimpse of his two young daughters. Surely this whole episode took its toll on his daughters and his wife Patti. [VIDEO]

Capitol Fax: President Trump “I’m thinking about commuting [Rod Blagojevich’s] sentence very strongly”

While Rich Miller is actually on break right now he's been following the major news stories affecting Illinois. I felt the need to mention this since we did follow Blagojevich's impeachment and removal from the office of Governor.

Who knows how popular this might be for most of you, but would you be OK with President Trump possibly commuting Blagojevich's federal sentence for corruption?

President Trump “I’m thinking about commuting [Rod Blagojevich’s] sentence very strongly” https://t.co/kmGHKpMiSP

— Rich Miller (@capitolfax) August 8, 2019

A former Alderman hit with a federal search warrant

Former Ald. Michael R. Zalewski retired from the city council over a year ago, unfortunately, he's another alderman (well former Alderman) who's been hit with federal search warrants. You can find more articles on this if you click through to Newsalert.

From the reports I've seen it's not known why the feds are looking into former Ald. Zalewski, however, what's noted especially by the Sun-Times is that he's had some issues with the I.R.S.

Now I wonder if anymore current or former Aldermen are under the eye of federal authorities.

What are the feds looking for in #Ward34?

I found this through CapFax this evening, Crain's political writer Greg Hinz looks into the executive of a search warrant by federal authorities on Ald. Carrie Austin's Ward 34 offices.

According to a knowledgeable source close to the matter, the feds are not looking at alleged official misuse of the office as they were with Ald. Edward Burke, 14th, who has been accused of racketeering and extortion of builders and others. Rather, the current probe relates to use of campaign money, of which Austin had plenty as (until recently) chairwoman of the powerful City Council Budget Committee.

The feds specifically are examining business deals, in both the city and suburbs, involving Austin and members of her staff, my source says. The investigation has been going on for “many months,” is said to be “very solid” and may head in some directions that have not yet become public.

My source says Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who pushed Austin out as Budget Committee chair when the new City Council handed out leadership slots last month, was not specifically aware of the coming raid or charges. If Lightfoot had known, she might not have worked to get Austin the chairmanship of another, if lesser, committee, on contract oversight and equity.

I just had to share this CBS 2 video on the "office raid" on Ald. Austin that aired earlier in the afternoon on the 5 PM broadcast. [VIDEO]

Sun-Times: FBI agents raid ward office of Ald. Carrie Austin #Ward34

I was shocked to see this to be honest:

FBI agents executed a search warrant Wednesday morning on the Far South Side ward office of Ald. Carrie Austin (34th).

The search marks the latest step in ongoing, widespread federal investigations of Chicago aldermen.

Three aldermen who were once the City Council’s most powerful — Edward M. Burke, Danny Solis and now Austin — have either been charged or implicated in the biggest scandal in the City Council’s sordid history of corruption.

So far, Burke (14th) has been indicted on political corruption charges, and former Ald. Solis (25th) has cooperated with the investigation by wearing a wire for the feds and secretly recording conversations. Burke has denied any wrongdoing, and Austin has not been charged with any crimes. Austin, 70, is second in seniority on the City Council after Burke.

After the Sun-Times first reported that Solis was wearing a wire, Austin told reporters: “Not about Danny. I might cry,” Austin said. “You don’t do that. You just don’t.”

I was hoping there was any video anywhere on this raid. All I could find was this video on twitter from CBS 2's Megan Hickey who was outside of Ald. Austin's offices as federal authorities executed their search warrant

Several federal agents just left Carrie Austin’s Ward office with boxes of evidence. @cbschicago pic.twitter.com/B84HsnkEMA

— Megan Hickey (@MeganHickeyTV) June 19, 2019

Since we hit upon her response to knowlegde that now former Alderman Danny Solis was wearing a wire to cooperate with federal authorities I see this from fellow Aldermen regarding Ald. Austin:

Austin’s fellow aldermen — including veterans who have served alongside her for years—were keeping their heads down Wednesday afternoon and their mouths shut about the raid on Austin’s ward office.

Aldermen privately complained that the raid on Austin’s office has strengthened the mayor’s hand when it comes to her new drive to strip aldermen of their iron-fisted control over zoning and create an independent commission to redraw Chicago’s ward boundaries to coincide with the 2020 U.S. Census.

Hours after taking office, Lightfoot signed an executive order ending aldermanic prerogative over zoning and permitting. She needs City Council approval to implement a similar change over zoning. Until Wednesday, the City Council was expected to put up a fight.

Not to make a prediction because who knows how these search warrants, informants wearing a wire, indictments and other parts of the justice system process shakes out. However, I got to say if this sticks and Ald. Austin has some dirt for an indictment in addition to whatever Burke and Solis might face once they go through their trials we're going to have a city councils shake-up! 

Ald. Ed Burke pleads not guilty

[VIDEO] Let's start with last week when the press seems to be abuzz of the new Mayor Lori Lightfoot's smack down of the longtime powerful Alderman Ed Burke during the first council meeting she presided over as mayor. And then the wily Alderman gets indicted and Mayor Lightfoot comes out and states he needs to leave Chicago's city council once he was indicted in federal court.

We shouldn't be too surprised that Burke is pleading not guilty in a case that has charges of racketerer

Federal probe on Gov. Pritzker #twill

Rich Miller digs as far as the new federal investigation with regards to property tax breaks for our current Gov. JB Pritzker. It's the funny story about removing toilets from a residence in Chicago's Gold Coast near downtown to make that house not only uninhabitable, but eligible for tax breaks. Our ineffective former Governor Bruce Rauner tried to make this a campaign issue during his unsuccessful bid for re-election last year.

More on the reported Pritzker probe https://t.co/0w1gG9lAED

— Rich Miller (@capitolfax) April 24, 2019

Corruption? #ChiMayor19 #twill

Corruption with a question mark since there are no charges or indictments in these two pieces from Rich Miller's blog for your reading pleasure today.

Both pieces involve outgoing Alderman Danny Solis who it was revealed had worn a wire that helped the charges against Ald. Ed Burke. Another revelation that has come out that Solis had worn a wire to record powerful state house Speaker Michael Madigan.

So the piece about Madigan is Miller's syndicated column

Patience, please https://t.co/OZIAWlYeUw

— Rich Miller (@capitolfax) February 4, 2019

And the second involves what appears to be attempts at solicitation directed towards Ald. Solis by a local power broker

“How about anything, Danny?” https://t.co/5XL8hgYksj

— Rich Miller (@capitolfax) February 4, 2019

Re: Wiretaps...

I suppose that with the revelation of Ald. Danny Solis wearing a wire effectively helping the feds in their investigation of Ald. Ed Burke, Newsalert wonders who else Solis might have wore a wire with. Even shows a pic of Mayor Rahm Emanuel and former Congressman Luis Gutierrez. That pic was found via Ald. Solis' fb page.

I don't think the soon to be outgoing Mayor and the former Congressman are corrupt, but now I start to wonder who else might have been recorded. It makes you wonder if anyone else has been caught in corrupt actions...

The plot thickens with Ald. Burke #ChiMayor19

[VIDEO] So Ald. Danny Solis (Ward 25) was wearing a wire for the feds and that helped them get search warrants and an indictment for Ald. Ed. Burke (Ward 14). Even worse Ald. Solis was on Chicago Tonight last year and wondered aloud if Burke should run for re-election. I'll quote an article where I saw this but you'll see the segment itself later.

Capitol Fax: Burke finally busted cold

Yesterday after returning from his holiday break Rich Miller of Capitol Fax takes a look at the feds finally busted ward 14 Alderman Ed Burke. He resigned from his longtime chairmanship of the city council committee on finance after the feds finally charged the longtime alderman with extortion.

Burke finally busted cold https://t.co/Vi5qkfzKRQ

— Rich Miller (@capitolfax) January 7, 2019

Also I wanted to share this video with you, I think you might have seen jokes about the charges involving some Burger King franchises. Specifically if you remember what happened with LaQuan McDonald what happened with that young man over four years ago happened not far from a Burger King on Pulaski near the Stevenson Expressway. [VIDEO]

EDITORIAL: Ed Burke scandal presents Chicago with a grand opportunity for reform

After the search warrants executed on Ald. Burke's ward & city hall offices last year, federal authorities have finally charged thenow former finance committee chairman with corruption. I would like to share some stories about this at a later time. Meanwhile, how about an editorial:

On Friday, after Ald. Edward Burke resigned his chairmanship of the Finance Committee, Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced that Ald. Patrick J. O’Connor, as acting chairman of the committee, will lead an effort to reform how the city runs its secretive $100 million-a-year workers compensation program.

Most basically — and this is an excellent development — the mayor wants to strip the program from the Council’s Finance Committee, where Burke apparently ran it as a personal political favor bank, and move it to the city’s finance department, where it belongs.

We enthusiastically support this reform, for which we made a case just two weeks ago, with one big caveat: The city inspector general should be granted full oversight over the management of the program. For that matter, the inspector general should be granted true oversight over all agencies under the mayor’s control, along with the ability to defend its subpoenas in court.

As things work now, the IG must rely on the mayor and city law department to defend its subpoenas.

Tribune: Race, poverty and fair housing: Chicago's landmark Gautreaux case winds down

Just wanted to share this with you. Housing and real estate has been a frequent topic of this blog over the years. And this is probably something you might not know much about.

A federal judge, several lawyers and representatives of the Chicago Housing Authority on Friday formalized a special date: July 31, 2024. If all goes as planned, that last Wednesday of July more than five years from now will close out one of the nation’s longest and most impactful housing discrimination cases.

Dorothy Gautreaux, an Altgeld Gardens resident and lead plaintiff when the case was filed in 1966, died two years later at age 41. But her activism had helped launch a movement extending beyond the landmark legal battle that originated in Chicago: Her cause, housing fairness, also had broadened the goals of the civil rights movement. The anti-discrimination marches of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. had come to embrace equal access to housing as a national cause.

For more than 40 years and with countless twists and turns, CHA has been trying to reverse what the U.S. Supreme Court determined in its 1976 Gautreaux ruling: Federal and local housing authorities in Chicago were violating the constitutional and civil rights of public housing tenants by concentrating and isolating them in low-income neighborhoods.

Over time, the court’s ruling slowed the purposeful crowding of black tenants in concentrated high-rise developments and accelerated the distribution of housing vouchers to integrate black families into communities throughout the city and suburbs. That remains the case today.

The Supreme Court decision also spurred CHA to build and renovate thousands of units and scatter them in more prosperous areas of Chicago. And it nudged a housing revolution, led by former Mayor Richard M. Daley, that included the teardown of the notorious Cabrini-Green public housing complex and others comparable to it.

BTW, the Sun-Times also wrote about this recently.

What's going on with Ald. Burke?

I wanted to cover the events of this week as I saw this on twitter from Carol Marin

Confirmed! FBI re-raided Alderman Ed Burke’s office in City Hall this afternoon!

— Carol Marin (@CarolMarin) December 14, 2018

If you want to know what's up here's an article we still don't know why the feds are interested in the long-time chairman of the city council's finance committee.

Federal agents returned to the City Hall offices of Ald. Ed Burke on Thursday, two weeks after they carried out unprecedented raids on the longtime alderman’s downtown and ward offices, sources said.

Federal investigators were looking for information they didn’t find during the first raid, sources said. The nature of the information sought was unknown.

On Nov. 29, federal investigators descended on Burke’s ward and City Hall offices and covered the windows with brown butcher paper. At City Hall, investigators spent at least five hours inside and left with boxes of records and computers.
They also showed up at the home of political operative Peter Andrews Jr., the longtime head of Burke’s ward organization. They seized Burke’s cellphone.

Sources at the time told the Sun-Times that the initial raid was not triggered by Burke’s administration of the city’s $100 million workers compensation program, nor was it tied to Burke’s property tax appeals work for the Trump Tower.

Speaking of which there were moves to take away the administration of worker's comp away from Burke's finance committee.

A plan introduced before the City Council on Wednesday would strip Ald. Edward Burke of his control of the city workers’ compensation system, nearly two weeks after federal agents raided his offices.

The ordinance sponsored by Ald. John Arena and other progressive aldermen would place the $100 million-per-year program under the control of the corporation counsel, who is appointed by the mayor. The corporation counsel would have the power to designate people to oversee the fund and to approve payment vouchers.

If you want to watch a video talking about this from CBS 2 [VIDEO]

 

What's this? An allegation against Ald. Burke? He's using his political muscle with regards to the dealings of a city department?

Former Chicago Aviation Commissioner Ginger Evans is laying out a bill of particulars against Ald. Edward Burke (14th), alleging that he worked repeatedly behind the scenes to inappropriately pressure her and her staff on airport business.

In a memo to the Sun-Times, Evans, who resigned earlier this year, gave five examples of Burke or his staff allegedly interfering or overstepping.

 Well, time will tell what the feds are looking into with the powerful Alderman.

10 years ago the FBI arrested a sitting Illinois Governor

We're going back to something we covered over a decade ago on this blog. We also followed some of the ensuing consequences of what happened with this story.

 

This was on the CapFax on Tuesday. We're approaching the 10 year anniversary where Rod Blagojevich was arrested by the feds. In this post, we see an article from Chicago Magazine where we see the thoughts of the two FBI agents who came to arrest Blago.

Blagojevich after arrest: “How does my hair look?” https://t.co/ma1zZHkftF

— Rich Miller (@capitolfax) December 4, 2018

Here's the most incredulous part of this:

After a couple of minutes, Dan knocked on the door and told Blagojevich that we needed to go. He came out with a toothbrush in his mouth. We repeated that he needed to get dressed right away and come with us.

The governor picked out a blue Nike jogging suit, white socks, and running shoes to wear. As we prepared to leave, he turned and asked: “How does my hair look?”

“You look fine,” we told him, astonished by the question. It was as if he were preparing for a press conference. As we brought him downstairs, his daughters remained asleep, for which we were grateful. You never want a child to witness a parent being arrested.

I appreciate the consideration of the FBI agents on the scene. While I know Blago still has his supporterss, how selfish to put his own daughters into this situation.

Ultimately he would be impeached by the Illinois House of Representatives and removed from office in a impeachment trail by the Illinois Senate. Later he was convicted on corruption charges in federal court and is currently serving his 14-year sentence.

Capitol Fax: Ed Burke round-up

Well we're still talking about the federal raid on Ald. Burke's offices and I read somewhere at his law firm also. The national media is following his work for the President on property tax matters until earlier this year, but now we hear the raid has little to do with that work.

Read more at Rich Miller's Capitol Fax blog.

Ed Burke round-up https://t.co/iAWGIe91yt

— Rich Miller (@capitolfax) November 30, 2018

BTW, this aired on CBS Chicago last night, almost reminds me of the Kavanaugh hearings. Very lawyerly response to the raid simply repeating the same statement to different questions. [VIDEO]