chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Chicago won’t cancel Halloween; Mayor Lori Lightfoot unveils pandemic rules for the holiday

While the state said “ the safest way to celebrate is to stay home , ” IDPH said trick-or-treaters this @ @ @ @ @ other members of their household .
And , both trick-or-treaters and those passing out candy @ @ @ @ @ a 6-foot distance at all times .

Halloween in Chicago isn’t canceled after all.
Wearing a black and red outfit with a cape emblazoned with “Rona Destroyer,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Thursday unveiled a series of COVID-19 rules for the upcoming holiday that she said will allow people to celebrate safely, including a requirement that everyone wear masks.
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People handing out candy also are asked to leave a light on or hang a sign in their window letting others know whether they’re participating in the holiday while following social distancing rules and providing hand sanitizer, Lightfoot and public health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady said.
Trick-or-treaters are asked to stay on the move in groups of six people or fewer, avoid sticking their hand into candy bowls and wait until they get home and wash their hands to eat candy, they said.
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The city doesn’t want to see any haunted houses this year and also forbids house parties “large or small,” they said.
Telling people not to trick or treat would be unrealistic, Lightfoot said, so the city’s emphasis is on creating public health guidelines.
“This year more than ever it is important to celebrate Halloween safely and responsibly,” Lightfoot said.
The city also will host what it calls “Halloweek” activities, including programs from the Chicago Park District and Chicago Public Library, which will be available at chicagohalloweek.org.
Earlier this year, the idea of a Halloween that in any way resembles pre-COVID-19 times would have been hard to imagine. Lightfoot last month said she doesn’t expect to see “mass crowds of trick-or-treating like we have in years past.”
But the city recently has been touting its gains against the coronavirus while relaxing stringent pandemic guidelines.
Last week, Lightfoot announced the city would be loosening pandemic rules to allow bars that don’t serve food to welcome patrons inside.
Lightfoot has been eager to showcase Chicago as America’s most open big city during the pandemic, while also pledging to heed scientific advice on how much leeway to give businesses and other public places where people congregate.
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On Wednesday, the Illinois Department of Public Health released state guidelines for trick-or-treating this Halloween, which falls on a Saturday this year.
While the state said “the safest way to celebrate is to stay home,” IDPH said trick-or-treaters this year should only travel with other members of their household. And, both trick-or-treaters and those passing out candy must wear masks and maintain a 6-foot distance at all times.
Cook County residents also should heed the state’s advice, Rachel Rubin, senior medical officer and colead for the Cook County Department of Public Health, said at a Wednesday news conference announcing mask distribution.
“No haunted houses. No haunted houses,” she said. For trick-or-treaters, she said “the idea is to use common sense. Maintain the social distancing, only trick or treat with your own household, wash your hands when you come home before you enjoy the treats and wear a mask at all times while you’re out.”
If the county department hears about a haunted house skirting those rules, officials will notify law enforcement and ask it to cease operations immediately, Rubin said.
Haunted houses are prohibited under Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s phase four reopening plan, but one-way haunted forests or walks are allowed in Illinois as long as 6-foot distance is maintained. State guidelines also allow for adult or bar parties have to follow the limit of 50 people or under 50% of the building’s maximum capacity, whichever is fewer.
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“No haunted houses, at least not traditional ones," Arwady said. “They are truly spooky and dangerous this year.”
gpratt@chicagotribune.com
ayin@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Ex-Chicago police sergeant who fled prosecution sentenced to 13 years in federal prison in drug rip-

Ex-Chicago police sergeant who fled prosecution sentenced to 13 years in federal prison in drug rip-off scheme

After one of the raids turned up only $ 1,500 in cash and no drugs , Hicks could be heard @ @ @ @ @ drug dealer and trucking firm owner Arthur “ Pete ” Veal , that he was @ @ @ @ @ a better hit than this , ” according to one recording played in court .
@ @ @ @ @ Hicks told Veal he was concerned that the target could be “ a fed guy @ @ @ @ @ be cooperating with federal authorities .

Nearly two decades after he absconded on the eve of trial, former Chicago police Sgt. Eddie Hicks was sentenced Thursday to 13 years in federal prison for running a rogue crew of cops who robbed drug dealers and stash houses, and resold stolen narcotics on the street.
In handing down the sentence, U.S. District Judge Joan Lefkow told Eddie Hicks that he had “dishonored the badge” and should stand as an example to current members of the force that corruption will not be tolerated.
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“There are other officers out there who also have the opportunity to do what you did, and they need to get the message that the punishment will follow the conduct,” Lefkow said.
The judge also noted that Hicks has “never really taken any responsibility.”
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Former Chicago police Sgt. Eddie Hicks. (FBI)
Before the judge imposed the sentence, Hicks, 71, decried the fact that prosecutors were asking for 20 years behind bars, saying he was an otherwise law-abiding citizen and “not an individual who is out there looking for any kind of crime at this point.”
He added, “For anyone to even suggest that I would be able to make a 20-year sentence ... is a little bit beyond the realm of reality.”
The sentence brought to an end a nearly 20-year path to justice for Hicks, who was arrested in 2017 living in Detroit under a stolen identity. A jury deliberated just two hours before convicting him in March 2019 of eight counts, including drug trafficking conspiracy, using a gun in furtherance of a drug crime, theft of government funds and bail jumping.
In asking for a 20-year prison sentence, prosecutors cited the value that society places on the integrity of police officers and the devastating consequences that result when it is lost.
“Not only did Hicks fail to arrest drug dealers, he became a drug dealer himself, robbing drug dealers and turning around and selling the drugs for profit,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Morris Pasqual wrote in a recent court filing. “Hicks made a mockery of his badge. His betrayal of the public trust was staggering.”
Hicks' attorney, John Beal, asked for the mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years, citing Hicks' advanced age and medical conditions that place him at elevated risk for COVID-19 while behind bars.
Beal also argued that Hicks' crimes occurred far in the past, and, even though his flight from prosecution caused the delay in justice, he spent his time on the run living “a very isolated life.”
“It is not as if he was living a high life in a country without an extradition treaty,” Beal wrote. “And when the offense took place and in the interim period, the Black Lives Matter movement has brought to the fore that a great deal of atrocious law enforcement conduct was occurring for which no one was paying any price.”
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The 2001 indictment accused the veteran narcotics officer of running a rogue crew of cops who robbed drug dealers of thousands of dollars in cash and resold dozens of kilograms of stolen narcotics in a series of off-the-books raids from 1993 to 2001.
In Hicks’ 2019 trial, prosecutors told the jury that Hicks thought robbing drug dealers was the perfect crime. The only witnesses were criminals who weren’t about to call the “honest police,” Pasqual said. Hicks had informants who tipped him off to stash house locations, a Police Department mechanic who had access to the keys to unmarked squad cars and a designated crew member who typed up phony search warrants in the car on an old manual typewriter.
If they encountered any law enforcement, the crew simply flashed their badges and got a pass, Pasqual said. And when a raid was done, there were never any arrests or paperwork — all that was left to do was go back to a crew member’s house, put the cash and drugs on a dining room table and divide up the loot.
“They used the power of the badge and the power of the gun to do their searches and street stops,” Pasqual said. “Any money they found was theirs. It went into their pockets.”
Hicks' attorneys, meanwhile, argued much of the government’s case relied on the testimony of Larry Knitter, the former police mechanic who cut a deal with prosecutors to lower his own sentence.
Among the damning evidence presented by prosecutors, however, were secret video and audio recordings made during two FBI stings in late 2000 and early 2001 at South Side apartments that were set up to look like drug stash houses in order to catch Hicks' crew in the act.
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After one of the raids turned up only $1,500 in cash and no drugs, Hicks could be heard telling his longtime tipster, drug dealer and trucking firm owner Arthur “Pete” Veal, that he was “kinda looking forward to a better hit than this,” according to one recording played in court. In another recorded conversation, Hicks told Veal he was concerned that the target could be “a fed guy,” meaning he might be cooperating with federal authorities.
In reality, it was Veal who was cooperating with the FBI at the time, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors said that Hicks liquidated several insurance policies and annuities worth tens of thousands of dollars in the weeks leading up to his scheduled trial in June 2003. By the time he made a final court appearance just days before jury selection was to begin, he’d withdrawn almost $40,000 in cash from his bank account. A warrant for his arrest was issued on June 9, 2003 — the day he failed to appear for his trial.
It wasn’t until 15 years after he’d vanished that Hicks' time on the run ended in Detroit after authorities found him in September 2017 living under the name David Rose.
At trial, prosecutors displayed the driver’s license in Rose’s name that Hicks had on him at the time of his arrest, as well as a photo taken by law enforcement that day showing Hicks in a Detroit Tigers baseball cap and T-shirt emblazoned with the word “Bermuda.”
jmeisner@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Person injured in possible paintball shooting near Burger King in Englewood

Chicago Fire Dept .
spokesman Larry Langford said there was a report of someone shot with a paintball but no @ @ @ @ @ hospital by a city ambulance .

A person was injured in a shooting or possible paintball shooting Thursday afternoon near a South Side Burger King, officials said.
The attack happened about 2 p.m. in the 6900 block of South Halsted Street, according to Officer Jessica Rocco, a Chicago police spokeswoman.
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Chicago Fire Dept. spokesman Larry Langford said there was a report of someone shot with a paintball but no one was taken to a hospital by a city ambulance.
Police responded to multiple calls of a "person down'' and one call of a person shot, said Rocco, who was citing preliminary information.
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Check back for details.
rsobol@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Chicago ‘Tamale Guy’ Claudio Velez discharged from hospital after more than a month due to COVID-19

“ COVID has been such a surreal time for us , ” said Glazer .
“ Usually patients leave the @ @ @ @ @ in the hospital for a long time .
Sometimes we don ’ t see them @ @ @ @ @ .
The ones we get to do a clap out for , it ’ s @ @ @ @ @ a new person .
It ’ s just really nice to see .
”

Claudio Velez, in wheelchair, is applauded by hospital staff as he leaves Rush University Medical Center in Chicago Thursday, Oct. 1, 2020, after being treated for COVID-19. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune)
Claudio Velez, owner of the Tamale Guy Chicago restaurant, previously known as the patron saint of late night drinkers at bars across the North Side of the city, was discharged Thursday afternoon from Rush University Medical Center hospital.
Velez was hospitalized with COVID-19 on Aug. 27, and placed on a ventilator in the intensive care unit. He had opened his long-awaited namesake restaurant just two weeks earlier, with lines 10 blocks long and with two-hour waits.
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Rush hospital held a “clap out” Thursday to mark Velez’s release. Many of the staffers who cared for him for over a month lined the halls, standing to applaud.
“I feel very good now,” Velez said when reached at home after the hospital fanfare. He was tired, though, because he had to go up the stairs, said his son, Osmar Abad, laughing with relief.
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Jenny Glazer, an ICU nurse at Rush who helped care for Velez, spoke about Velez’s time in the hospital. “Our COVID patients, for the most part, have been our sickest patients lately,” said Glazer. Velez spent three weeks in ICU. “I was one of the many, many nurses who took care of him. It really requires a huge team effort to care for these patients.”
Glazer knew Velez and his tamales long before he became her patient.
“I’m not the only nurse who had his tamales out at night,” she said, laughing. “We were all reminiscing about how delicious they were, and also how heartbreaking it was, because he just opened up his restaurant.”
As Velez recovered, they were able to share much-needed memories.
“Because COVID is so dark, and requires so much energy from our staff, to have a connection with a patient is an escape and gives us something to talk about,” said Glazer. “I was like ‘Oh my God, it’s been 10 years since I saw you!’”
A clap out is as much for the staff as it is for the patients and their families.
“COVID has been such a surreal time for us,” said Glazer. “Usually patients leave the ICU, but still stay in the hospital for a long time. Sometimes we don’t see them for weeks or months later. The ones we get to do a clap out for, it’s really like they’re a new person. It’s just really nice to see.”
Originally Rush had planned to do the clap out in the “healing garden” said spokesperson Charles Jolie, but moved inside due to rain in the forecast.
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“The hospital started receiving a lot of inquiries,” said Abad. “People in the community were calling and asking how he was, but they weren’t able to give out information. They wanted to celebrate the fact that he overcame COVID, and to provide acknowledgment to all the medical staff that were there to help in his recovery.”
“The recovery process is still really, really long,” said Abad. “He’s on the other side now, so he’s out of danger, but he’s still pretty seriously sick.”
Velez will receive home care from his family with occasional visits from medical technicians.
A GoFundMe for Velez’s medical expenses has raised more than $56,000 to date. His family had planned to close the fundraiser. They decided to keep it open until Velez could decide for himself as his condition improved.
The restaurant in the Ukrainian Village neighborhood, with Velez’s signature red coolers in the window, had opened with help from a previous fundraiser. Partners Pierre and Kristin Vega closed the business for more than a week. All staff tested negative for the coronavirus. They cleaned and disinfected the space according to city guidelines before reopening Sept. 9.
“He’ll probably visit the restaurant sometime next week, but we’re not sure,” said Abad.
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He had brought the familiar warm zip-top bags of his father’s pork, chicken and cheese tamales to the hospital, and plans to bring more in gratitude.
“My father is so loved in the community,” said Abad. “An entire community came together supporting a homegrown immigrant.”


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Watch live: Lightfoot announces city’s Halloween COVID-19 guidelines

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Chicago Department of Public Health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady announce the city ’ s Halloween @ @ @ @ @ updates on the coronavirus in Illinois here .

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chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Christkindlmarket cancels outdoor holiday markets in Chicago and Milwaukee, will begin selling onlin

Christkindlmarket cancels outdoor holiday markets in Chicago and Milwaukee, will begin selling online instead Nov. 1

“ We are planning on opening up our entire back stock of mugs from all past markets .
So we @ @ @ @ @ our mugs that we have left .
We really want to give people a chance @ @ @ @ @ and remember all of the good times , and mugs , from the past , @ @ @ @

Chicagoans won’t be able to sip on gluhwein while strolling through Daley Plaza or buy an annual keepsake mug at Christkindlmarket after organizers of the popular outdoor holiday market canceled the event.
German American Events, the event organizer and a subsidiary of the German American Chamber of Commerce of the Midwest, has scrapped Christkindlmarket in Chicago and Milwaukee and moved it online as the coronavirus pandemic continues to hamper large-scale events and international travel.
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The market, which typically draws 1.2 million visitors to shop and drink hot spiced wine from keepsake mugs at Daley Plaza and in Chicago’s Wrigleyville neighborhood, will be virtual this year from Nov. 1 through Dec. 31.
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There will be no 2020 edition of the annual keepsake mug, said Kate Bleeker, director of expansion and market development for German American Events.
“Since we are not able to gather this year (in-person), we are celebrating memories and selling mugs from past years,” she said.
The mugs, whose design, style and color vary each year, have been a staple of Christkindlmarket since 1996. Because of the uncertainty clouding large events during the pandemic, organizers held off ordering new mugs in the spring, Bleeker said.
Instead, organizers are selling gift boxes online with products from different vendors and mugs from previous years. The gift boxes are available now, and a wider set of products will be posted on the site beginning Nov. 1.
“We are planning on opening up our entire back stock of mugs from all past markets. So we will be selling all of our mugs that we have left. We really want to give people a chance to fill out their collections and remember all of the good times, and mugs, from the past,” Bleeker said.
Bleeker said travel restrictions were a big factor in the decision to cancel the outdoor market because most Christkindlmarket vendors come from Germany and other parts of Europe. About 60% of vendors are international, she said. The virtual event will feature 36 vendors, she said.
[ No boots or mugs or kettles for 2020: But here’s a look back at 24 years of Christkindlmarket keepsakes ]
Several vendors will ship products to the organizers’ warehouse in Chicago to ensure customers' orders are fulfilled as quickly as possible, Bleeker said. Some vendors will ship directly to shoppers, she said.
Bleeker said the organizers wanted to keep the tradition of Christkindlmarket going by opening the virtual marketplace.
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“We really hung on to hope for a really long time. But with everything going on, our top priority was the safety of our vendors, staff and visitors,” she said.
abjimenez@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @abdel1019


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--COVID-19 in Illinois by the numbers: Here’s a daily update on cases, positivity rate and hospital da

COVID-19 in Illinois by the numbers: Here’s a daily update on cases, positivity rate and hospital data in your area

Among the metrics ( see below ) tracked under guidelines set by Gov .
J.B. Pritzker are the percentage of @ @ @ @ @ , the number of people hospitalized for COVID-19-like illnesses , and the capacity of hospitals @ @ @ @ @ state will decide how much or how little to restrict activities based on these metrics @

Note: With Chicago and Illinois moving into phase 5, the Tribune is no longer updating this data. If the state moves back into bridge phase, the Tribune we reassess. Daily metrics on COVID-19, like cases, deaths and hospitalizations, can be found here. And Daily metrics on the vaccination effort can be found here. More on where the coronavirus stands nationally and around the world can be found here.
To assess how different parts of Illinois are handling the COVID-19 pandemic, officials look at the state through the 11 regions of Emergency Medical Services. The city of Chicago is one region, for example, and the rest of Cook County is another.
Among the metrics (see below) tracked under guidelines set by Gov. J.B. Pritzker are the percentage of coronavirus tests that return positive, the number of people hospitalized for COVID-19-like illnesses, and the capacity of hospitals to take in new patients.The state will decide how much or how little to restrict activities based on these metrics. (Cases, deaths and tests data is as of Dec. 31).
• Check out the Tribune’s coronavirus coverage.
• Remembering the lives of those in Illinois who died from coronavirus.
• Other Chicago, suburbs and Illinois COVID-19 metrics.
• See how the governor’s plan to manage the regions works.
Source: Illinois Department of Public Health
Created by the Chicago Tribune dataviz team. On Twitter @chitribgraphics


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--COVID-19 cases in Illinois by ZIP code: Search for your neighborhood

Search below by street address , ZIP code or city , then click on the map to see the number @ @ @ @ @ state is not providing data for any ZIP code with five cases or fewer .

Note: With Chicago and Illinois moving into phase 5, the Tribune is no longer updating this data. If the state moves back into bridge phase, the Tribune we reassess. Daily metrics on COVID-19, like cases, deaths and hospitalizations, can be found here. And Daily metrics on the vaccination effort can be found here. More on where the coronavirus stands nationally and around the world can be found here.
Illinois releases the number of positive COVID-19 cases by ZIP code daily. The map below shows the cumulative cases for each area as well as other analysis of the data.
• Check out the Tribune’s coronavirus coverage.
• Tracking daily Illinois coronavirus deaths, cases and tests.
Search below by street address, ZIP code or city, then click on the map to see the number of confirmed and probable cases. The state is not providing data for any ZIP code with five cases or fewer.
Data as of June 10.
The map search tool above works best in Chrome or Firefox and may not perform consistently in Internet Explorer.
Note: Because of a coding error this map was displaying the incorrect rates for new cases in the last 7 days per 100,000 people — the issue should now be resolved.. The Tribune adjusted the data shown on the map below to focus on new cases, those the state tracked in the last 7 seven days. The totals for the entire pandemic are still available, but in the pop-up after tapping or clicking on a ZIP.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Daily Illinois coronavirus graphs: 25 new deaths, 2,166 new confirmed cases and 65,615 new test resu

Daily Illinois coronavirus graphs: 25 new deaths, 2,166 new confirmed cases and 65,615 new test results

Illinois announced 2,166 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 Thursday for a total of 295,440 .
The state also announced 25 @ @ @ @ @ of 8,696 and 65,615 new test results for a total of 5.69 million .

Johns Hopkins University & Medicine tracked coronavirus cases, deaths and test totals from Jan. 22, 2020 through March 10, 2023, but is no longer providing this data. These charts will no longer be updated.
Check the Illinois Department of Public Health for the most up-to-date data for Illinois.
[ Remembering the lives of those in Illinois who died from coronavirus ]
Can’t see these charts? Go here.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Former Crystal Lake cello instructor sentenced to 3 years in attempted sexual assault of 14-year-old

Former Crystal Lake cello instructor sentenced to 3 years in attempted sexual assault of 14-year-old student

He came to the United States in 1993 to provide for his son and daughter , his attorney Adam Sheppard @ @ @ @ @ an array of letters from former students and parents attesting to his good character and @ @ @ @ @ was , Sheppard said .

A cello instructor who taught in Crystal Lake was sentenced to three years in prison for the attempted sexual assault of a 14-year-old student, prosecutors said.
A jury last month found Kenneth Kang, 70, of Palatine, guilty of 10 counts of attempted criminal sexual assault. Kang was acquitted of more serious charges of criminal sexual assault.
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The assaults occurred weekly during lessons at the Dole Mansion from September to December of 2015, when, prosecutors said, he stuck his hand down the student’s pants.
The former student reported the assaults in 2019, after she heard of other allegations against Kang. Kang still faces charges of sexually abusing four other people.
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Kang had been the principal cellist for the South Korean National Symphony and the Taiwan Symphony Orchestra, according to the McHenry County Music Center in Crystal Lake, where Kang taught.
He came to the United States in 1993 to provide for his son and daughter, his attorney Adam Sheppard said. The defense introduced an array of letters from former students and parents attesting to his good character and what a great teacher he was, Sheppard said.
Judge Robert Wilbrandt could have been sentenced him to probation or up to seven years in prison. Kang, who has a history of throat cancer, is due to be released after serving about half his sentence.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Column: Let’s toast the architecture of Chicago’s beer buildings, even if this isn’t happy hour for

Column: Let’s toast the architecture of Chicago’s beer buildings, even if this isn’t happy hour for some of them

From the mansions of brewing magnates to former taverns built by marquee brands like Schlitz , beer buildings brighten nearly @ @ @ @ @ .
They provide a visible link to the immigrants from Germany , Ireland , Scandinavia @ @ @ @ @ into the city in the late 19th and early 20th centuries .
And whether they @ @ @ @ @ switched to coffee , some still function as the proverbial “ third place , ” @ @ @ @ @ work or home .

The now permanently closed Southport Lanes & Billiards on North Southport Avenue on Sept. 28, 2020, in Chicago. Originally built by the Joseph Schlitz Brewery, the tavern in Lakeview closed recently after nearly 100 years as a bar, bowling alley, billiard hall and brothel. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
Raise a glass to Chicago’s architecturally alluring beer buildings. Their ornate brickwork, fanciful turrets and other decorative flourishes make them a savory alternative to less-is-more design sobriety.
From the mansions of brewing magnates to former taverns built by marquee brands like Schlitz, beer buildings brighten nearly every corner of the city. They provide a visible link to the immigrants from Germany, Ireland, Scandinavia and Eastern Europe who poured into the city in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. And whether they still sell beer or have switched to coffee, some still function as the proverbial “third place,” the gathering spot apart from work or home.
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Now the time is right to give these often-overlooked building a fresh look.
The upcoming Open House Chicago architecture festival, which runs Oct. 16-25, will feature an outdoor-only walking tour of Wicker Park’s “Beer Baron Row,” an impressive lineup of ornate late 19th Century mansions.
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The now permanently closed Southport Lanes & Billiards on North Southport Avenue in Chicago. Originally built by the Joseph Schlitz Brewery, the tavern in Lakeview closed recently after nearly 100 years as a bar, bowling alley, billiard hall and brothel. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
On Tuesday, a City Council committee is expected to approve official landmark status for a former Schlitz-built tavern on the Far Southeast Side.
Yet for many beer building owners, the shadow cast by COVID-19 makes these times anything but happy hour. The coronavirus crisis has had a chilling impact on their businesses, leading to city-imposed restrictions that contributed to last Sunday’s shutdown of another former Schlitz tavern, Southport Lanes in Lakeview, which served as a bar, bowling alley and billiards hall for almost 100 years.
Even though Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Monday announced an easing of some of the coronavirus restrictions, which include allowing indoor bar service, the outlook for some owners of the beer buildings remains as bleak as a Chicago winter sky.
The beer back story
Once home to such beer behemoths as Miller, Pabst and Schlitz, Milwaukee is more strongly associated with beer than Chicago. But Milwaukee’s “Beer City” status is partly attributed to its historic proximity to Chicago’s vast population of working-class immigrants.
A neon Schlitz sign hangs on the exterior of Schubas Tavern, formerly a Schlitz Brewery, on Sept. 28, 2020, in Chicago. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
In Chicago’s early years, local brewers served up English-style ales and German-style lagers. Local brewers faced increased outside competition after the Great Fire of 1871, which destroyed five of the city’s 12 breweries and much of its drinking water infrastructure. In response, Milwaukee-based Schlitz shipped trainloads of beer and drinking water to the singed city.
"Schlitz’s good-will gesture earned the company a large number of loyal customers in Chicago, and it served as a basis for the brewery’s advertising slogan, ‘The beer that made Milwaukee famous,’” stated a 2011 city report on beer buildings.
Under the leadership of Edward Uihlein, who ran Schlitz’s ever-growing Chicago operations, Schlitz became the most prolific builder of so-called “tied houses,” which only sold beer made by the breweries that owned them.
The tied houses guaranteed brewers a retail outlet for their product, protecting them from wholesale price wars that ate into profits. And the buildings' designs — picturesque, well-crafted and above all, respectable — sought to protect the brewing companies from “dry” advocates who inveighed against the evils of public drinking and eventually got Prohibition passed in 1920.
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The tied houses
Schubas Tavern, at 3159 N. Southport Ave., is one of the most beautiful of the tied houses. The German Renaissance Revival gem features multicolored tracery brickwork, a bonnet roof atop its corner bay, and Schlitz’s distinctive Schlitz logo, a belted globe, beneath its steeply-pitched front gable.
The architects of the 1903 building, the Chicago firm of Frommann & Jebsen, reportedly designed more than 25 buildings for Schlitz.
Schubas Tavern, left, formerly a Schlitz Brewery built in 1903, and Tied House, added in 2018, on North Southport Avenue. The Milwaukee-based Joseph Schlitz Brewery built "tied house" taverns all over the city that were tied to its brand because they only sold Schlitz beer. Schubas was designated a Chicago Landmark in 2011. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
A 2018 addition to Schubas, designed by the Chicago office of Gensler and appropriately called “Tied House,” placed an outdoor seating area and a contemporary brick building to the south of the original building. The addition’s screen-like facade, which picks up on the brick patterns of the original structure, is a model of complementary contrast, successfully marrying the old with the new.
The outdoor seating and a sliding-glass door that brings the outside into the addition’s indoor dining area have helped during the pandemic.
But while the just-eased city restrictions will let Schubas squeeze in more dining customers, they won’t let Schubas reprise its identity as a renowned small music venue. Schubas' German Gothic Revival music hall, which delivers visual pleasure you don’t expect from a tavern’s meeting hall, can’t be packed with standees due to the need for social distancing.
“Live music for us is still a riddle to be solved," said Schubas' manager and previous co-owner, Mike Schuba.
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The Schlitz belted globe below the gables of Schubas Tavern. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
Open House Chicago has put together a driving tour of the tied houses, which will include Schubas and a former Schlitz tied house at 9401 S. Ewing Ave. that the City Council’s landmarks committee is expected to consider Tuesday.
If the full council approves it, the two-story Queen Anne and Tudor Revival structure will become Chicago’s 10th tied house landmark, according to the city’s Department of Planning and Development. Among that group is a Queen Anne-style Starbucks at 2159 W. Belmont Ave., still a neighborhood focal point even though it serves coffee instead of beer.
But beer’s architectural legacy extends beyond the tied houses, as Wicker Park’s Beer Baron Row makes clear.
The mansions
Tucked behind the chic shops and bike lanes of Milwaukee Avenue, the row belongs to what has been called Chicago’s ethnic Gold Coast. Here, on shady, tree-lined streets, the visitor finds humble workers' cottages that popped up on the same blocks as mansions in the building frenzy that followed the Great Fire.
“The neighborhood developed as a real eclectic blend of incomes and ethnicities. It wasn’t meant to be the next Gold Coast by any stretch," said Ian Spula, a Chicago Architecture Center specialist.
Spula is putting together the Open House Chicago audio tour of the multi-block Row, which is concentrated on North Hoyne and West Pierce avenues. Among the tour’s highlights: a Second Empire mansion at 1407 N. Hoyne, with a spectacular domed turret, a multicolored porch and a vast yard surrounded by a wrought-iron fence.
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The Second Empire mansion at 1407 North Hoyne Ave. in Chicago. German immigrant John Raap, a wine merchant and wholesale liquor retailer, was the home’s original owner. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
According to the American Institute of Architects "Guide to Chicago,” the mansion was built in 1879. The original owner was German immigrant John Raap, a wholesale liquor retailer and wine merchant who was murdered in 1897 by a former employee at his wholesale liquor store on Milwaukee Avenue. The identity of the home’s architect is not known.
A nearby 1884 mansion, the Hans (also known as John) Runge House at 2138 W. Pierce, sports an intricately detailed, two-story wood porch that reflects the wood-milling fortune made by its namesake. Its indirect tie to beer comes through its architects, Frommann & Jebsen, the designers of Schubas and other tied houses.
Why did the German beer barons cluster in Wicker Park? “The foreign-born beer barons weren’t necessarily a good fit for assimilating into the wealthy neighborhoods of the Gold Coast or South Side, and many actually chose to live in neighborhoods where their language and customs were shared,” explained Tim Samuelson, Chicago’s official cultural historian.
One notable exception: Madlener House at 4 W. Burton Place in the Gold Coast. Originally the home of German-American brewery owner Albert F. Madlener, its deft combination of German neoclassicism and Chicago’s Prairie style was designed by Chicago architect Richard Schmidt and his employee Hugh Garden. Since the early 1960s, it has served as the headquarters of the Graham Foundation, the architectural grant-making organization.
The saga of ‘Schlitz Row’
The city’s recent attention to the architectural merits of its beer buildings marks a welcome shift from what happened in 2002 in the former “Schlitz Row” in the Roseland neighborhood on the city’s Far South Side.
Schlitz Row was a mini-city of saloons, beer gardens, houses and stables that the Milwaukee brewery erected in the early 1900s to quench the thirst of workmen in the “dry” company town of Pullman, a few blocks to the east.
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Historic preservationists had hoped Schlitz Row would someday become an extension of the Pullman historic district. But with the blessing of the local alderman, the Metra commuter rail agency razed a Frommann & Jebsen-designed tavern at 11444 S. Front Ave. to expand the parking lot at its heavily used Kensington/115th Street station.
As if to atone for this fiasco, the city in 2011 granted landmark status to two surviving Schlitz Row buildings, both in the 11000 block of South Front Avenue — a former brewery stable, adorned with terra-cotta horse heads, and a former tavern.
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In 2009, the old stable became the home of the Argus Brewery, backed by Bob Jensen, who had made millions as the president of a transportation company he had taken public. But Jensen closed it March 28 after its draft beer businesses dried up when bars and restaurants closed in mid-March, then put it up for sale in June on Craigslist for $2.5 million.
The exterior of the former Schlitz brewery stables, more recently known as the Argus Brewery, at 11314 S. Front Ave. in Chicago. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune)
Jensen did not return a phone call inquiring about the current status of the building, but its windows are boarded up while a blue Argus banner remains on display, along with a sculpture of a white horse adorned with the brewery’s name and a picture of the Chicago skyline.
I hope this building has a better outcome, like the one Chicago artist and developer Theaster Gates achieved when he converted an old South Side beer warehouse into a pottery studio.
Yet even in its sorry state, the old stables, like its beer building brethren, convey a certain dignity. Socially and aesthetically, the beer buildings form part of the glue that holds together a fractious city.
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Blair Kamin is a Tribune critic.
bkamin@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @BlairKamin


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Illinois hotels warn of mass closures, huge job cuts without federal help. ‘Winter is coming both li

Illinois hotels warn of mass closures, huge job cuts without federal help. ‘Winter is coming both literally and figuratively.’

At the start of the pandemic , hotels across the Chicago area furloughed and laid off workers , under the @ @ @ @ @ suspended travel .
The hotel industry , which is a large source of jobs and @ @ @ @ @ , has been one of the sectors hardest hit by the health crisis .
In @ @ @ @ @ jobs in Chicago were down almost 27 % from 2019 , according to the Bureau @ @ @ @

Room attendant Maria Barajas get supplies for a room at the Hilton Hotel in Oak Brook on Sept. 30, 2020. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)
Already battered by the coronavirus pandemic, Illinois' hotel industry could see double the number of job losses if Congress doesn’t pass another stimulus bill, and the outlook for Chicago is particularly grim, an industry group warns.
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The state has already lost more than 67,000 hotel-related jobs since March and about half of Illinois hotel owners surveyed say their properties are in danger of foreclosure, according to an American Hotel and Lodging Association survey conducted in mid-September. The survey polled about 1,000 association members nationwide, according to Chip Rogers, the group’s president and CEO.
At the start of the pandemic, hotels across the Chicago area furloughed and laid off workers, under the strain of stay-at-home orders and suspended travel. The hotel industry, which is a large source of jobs and tax revenue for the state, has been one of the sectors hardest hit by the health crisis. In September, leisure and hospitality jobs in Chicago were down almost 27% from 2019, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
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“In Illinois, winter is coming both literally and figuratively. We need Congress to act and act now," said Michael Jacobson, president and CEO of the Illinois Hotel & Lodging Association, during a news conference Tuesday.
Room attendant Maria Barajas get supplies for a room at the Hilton Hotel in Oak Brook on Sept. 30, 2020. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)
In the Chicago area, the outlook for hotels is particularly grim, according to Jacobson. Downtown hotels are having a harder time filling rooms compared with other urban markets. The week of Sept. 13, the overall occupancy rate for Chicago hotels was around 35.4%, down almost 60% from a year before, according to STR, which tracks the hotel industry. Other cities, like San Francisco, Dallas and Seattle, had occupancy rates around 40%.
Jacobson and his colleagues are calling on Congress to pass legislation extending the Paycheck Protection Program, which ended Aug. 8 after giving out more than 225,000 loans worth $23 billion in Illinois. Businesses with fewer than 500 employees were eligible for forgivable loans of up to $10 million if 60% of the money went toward payroll.
Experts are projecting that without additional assistance, there could be a flood of small-business bankruptcies this fall.
One Chicago-area hotel owner calling on Congress to extend the PPP is Bob Habeeb, the founder and CEO of Maverick Hotels and Restaurants. Habeeb, who owns several hotels in Illinois, including the Hilton Chicago in Oak Brook, said his occupancy rates are down by 60% to 75% compared with last year.
Maverick, which had 1,100 employees before the pandemic, brought back 350 of 450 furloughed employees thanks to the Paycheck Protection Program, but that funding ran out in late June, Habeeb said.
The company could lay off 700 more employees if it doesn’t receive help, according to Habeeb.
“Our PPP money is long gone, the summer travel season is exhausted and we’re being forced to go back and look again at laying off our team members, many of whom have been serving guests for decades,” Habeeb said. “The face of hospitality might look very different in the United States a few months from now if we don’t see some relief and relief quickly from Washington."
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Rogers said the group also wants to see changes made to the Federal Reserve’s Main Street Lending Program, which bases loan eligibility on criteria that excludes many hotels from participation.
“This is urgent and this is necessary,” Rogers said. “We’re simply asking for some help to make it past this really tough stretch on into next spring, next summer.”
Jacobson said downtown hotels are at a disadvantage because of a combination of the state’s restrictions on large gatherings, suspended international travel and recent instances of looting.
An employee arranges outdoor seating for guests at the Hilton Hotel in Oak Brook on Sept. 30, 2020. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)
Since June 26, Illinois has been in phase four of Gov. J. B. Pritzker’s reopening plan with public gatherings restricted to 50 or fewer people. The limit has hurt hotels reliant on business from conventions and group travel. Since March, 159 events at McCormick Place have canceled, which caused hotels to lose out on about 1.4 million hotel room nights, according to spokeswoman Cynthia McCafferty.
Jacobson said while he welcomed Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s easing of city restrictions this week on bars and restaurants, the changes aren’t enough to make a meaningful difference for hotel business.
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“Until some of those restrictions get eased, there isn’t going to be a significant recovery,” Jacobson said, referring to governor’s restrictions on public gatherings. “Leisure travel can only help us so much.”
In addition to the pandemic’s impact on travel, recent looting downtown also has the potential to discourage leisure travelers from coming to Chicago, Jacobson said. In June, the downtown area had a spike in burglaries following unrest in May after the killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis.
Over two-thirds of Illinois hotel owners who responded to the American Hotel and Lodging Association survey said they will close if they don’t receive additional aid from Congress.
“These hotel owners need to see a glimmer of hope,” Jacobson said.
The Illinois Hotel & Lodging Association is part of a coalition of nearly 200 public and private sector leaders, including the Illinois Casino Gaming Association and the Illinois Retail Merchants Association, who sent a Sept. 30 letter to congressional leaders warning of “catastrophic economic harm” if Congress does not pass additional emergency relief before adjourning for the election.
The group warned that without action, “millions of employees will be furloughed or terminated; millions of unemployed Americans will lose their unemployment insurance pandemic benefits; hundreds of thousands of companies will be at risk of closing their doors forever; and the vast majority of state and local governments will have to curtail critical services in order to balance budgets due to a decline in tax revenue.”
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Some 7,000 laid off hotel workers in Chicago saw their insurance benefits expire Wednesday after a fund for premiums ran dry, according to Elliott Mallen, spokesman for UNITE HERE Local 1, which represents workers at 51 hotels in the city.
Chicago resident Carmella Carothers is one of those workers. In March, she lost her job as a banquet server at the downtown J.W. Marriott, where she had worked for almost 10 years.
The 41-year-old said she’s terrified of losing her insurance. She can’t afford the $500 monthly payment to continue her coverage and does not qualify for Medicaid. Carothers said she will get by using a federally qualified health center, which serves low-income patients, even though that means she’ll no longer be able to see her primary care doctor.
“This is a big deal. Taking care of health care for people should be the first thing on the agenda,” she said. “For companies to just turn their backs, you need employees to be healthy so that when business comes back around, employees can come back healthy.”


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--US appeals court blocks Trump from shutting down census early, but  still no firm deadline for endin

US appeals court blocks Trump from shutting down census early, but  still no firm deadline for ending the count

Early on in the pandemic , there was widespread agreement that the count would have to be extended into next @ @ @ @ @ for getting the results to the president is Dec. 31 .
The Census Bureau asked @ @ @ @ @ to the end of April 2021 .
The House approved the extension .
The Senate @ @ @ @ @ .

A federal appeals court has blocked the Trump administration’s latest effort to end the census early, but there’s still no firm deadline for finishing the count, furthering the confusion that has hampered efforts in Chicago to reach undercounted areas in communities of color.
On Wednesday, a federal appeals court decided to let stand a preliminary injunction barring the Trump administration from shutting down the census count early. A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 that stopping the Census Bureau’s count now “risks undermining” its mission.
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“Given the extraordinary importance of the census, it is imperative that the Bureau conduct the census in a manner that is most likely to produce a workable report in which the public can have confidence,” wrote Judge Johnnie B. Rawlinson, a Clinton appointee, for the majority. Judge Morgan Christen, an Obama appointee, joined Rawlinson in the ruling.
The panel called the planned speedup “hasty and unexplained.”
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Volunteer Martha Pita, left, interviews a woman for the 2020 census before David Moscoso, right, gives her a ticket to enter the Our Heritage Counts 2020 Census Party in Humboldt Park on Sept. 30, 2020, in Chicago. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)
The coronavirus outbreak severely disrupted the census count this year. The Census Bureau, which is part of the Department of Commerce, had to suspend field operations in March, and when the agency resumed, it was unable to recruit enough temporary employees to work in the field.
Early on in the pandemic, there was widespread agreement that the count would have to be extended into next year. The legal deadline for getting the results to the president is Dec. 31. The Census Bureau asked Congress to extend the deadline to the end of April 2021. The House approved the extension. The Senate has not yet done so.
With no extension in place, the Trump administration argued that field operations had to end a month early to get the census to the president by the legal deadline. The count is used for various federal decisions, including apportioning seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and the Electoral College.
In early August, a “senior Department (of Commerce) official” in the Trump administration changed course and ordered the bureau to complete its fieldwork and data collection by Sept. 30.
A group of civil rights groups and local governments challenged the speedup. A federal district judge last month blocked it, saying the Trump administration knew that suspending operations a month early would lead to an inaccurate count.
An envelope containing a 2020 census letter mailed to a U.S. resident. (Matt Rourke/AP)
The next day, the administration appealed the ruling to the 9th Circuit. This week, the administration tweeted yet another schedule change as it waited for an answer from the appeals court: Oct. 5 was now the “target date” for ending the count.
The judge has said it appears the new date violates her order and she has scheduled a hearing Friday. In the meantime, the counting is to continue with no firm deadline.
Groups in Chicago say they are working on the assumption that Oct 5 will be the end, and they are instructing residents to fill out census forms immediately and be included in a count that will determine Illinois’ representation in Congress, as well as the state’s and city’s share of billions of dollars in federal aid over the next 10 years.
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Statewide, the self-response rate has already surpassed 2010 levels at just over 70%. But rates in Chicago continue to hover around 60%, with some neighborhoods reporting rates as low as 30%. Some of the city’s lowest rates are in neighborhoods such as Back of the Yards, West Englewood, Little Village and North Lawndale, all areas that have struggled with poverty and a lack of resources.
The Trump administration has said it wants to exclude immigrants without documentation from being included in the count. President Donald Trump issued a memorandum ordering the change in July, but a federal court in New York blocked it this month. Trump has appealed the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The 9th Circuit will continue to consider the government’s appeal of the district court’s decision. The government may appeal the panel’s decision within the 9th Circuit or ask the Supreme Court to intervene.
A spokesperson for the Justice Department could not be immediately reached for comment.
Maura Dolan at the Los Angeles Times contributed.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Second teenager in Wauconda crash dies

Second teenager in Wauconda crash dies

“ We have been in close contact with both families and our deepest condolences go out to them during this @ @ @ @ @ truly a tragedy , ” Cooper said in a statement released Thursday .

A teenager who was severely injured last week, when the car in which she was riding ran into a truck, died Wednesday, according to the Lake County Coroner’s Office.
The girl, 16, was a passenger in a vehicle driven by Aria Albertelli, 19, of Barrington. Albertelli was also killed in the crash, which took place around 1:35 p.m. on Sept. 25 on Route 12 in Wauconda.
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Authorities have not released the 16-year-old’s name. An obituary for Albertelli said she and the girl were friends.
Albertelli and her friend were headed north on Route 12 in a BMW 325i when their vehicle struck a Mack truck towing a trailer holding a bulldozer, which was pulling out of a private driveway in the 29000 block of Route 12, just south of Case Road.
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Police say the BMW was traveling at a high rate of speed when it struck the rear of the truck and the trailer.
The truck driver, a 69-year-old man, was not injured, police said.
An autopsy was performed on Albertelli Monday. Coroner Dr. Howard Cooper said initial findings indicate she died from blunt force trauma.
“We have been in close contact with both families and our deepest condolences go out to them during this difficult time. This is truly a tragedy,” Cooper said in a statement released Thursday.
The cause of the accident remains under investigation.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Man pleads guilty to sexually assaulting college student in Elgin casino parking garage

He then ordered the woman to drive him to an Elgin convenience store , where he had her to accompany @ @ @ @ @ cab for him from her cell phone , reports said .
He directed her drive @ @ @ @ @ station so he could meet the cab and flee , the release said .

A former Kentucky man has pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a 21-year-old college student in the parking garage of the Grand Victoria Casino in Elgin after forcing her to give him money from her bank account, prosecutors said.
Justin Dalcollo, 36, entered guilty pleas Wednesday to aggravated criminal sexual assault and armed robbery charges, both class X felonies, in exchange for a maximum recommended prison term of 75 years when he’s sentenced Oct. 29, a news release issued by the DuPage and Kane county state’s attorneys said.
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Armed with a gun, Dalcollo approached the victim about 3:30 p.m. March 22, 2019, in the parking lot of the Bloomingdale Court Mall at 344 W. Army Trail Road and forced his way into her car, the release said. He demanded the woman drive to a bank in Glendale Heights and use her debit card to obtain $300 for him, according to reports.
After having her drive to several locations in Hanover Park and Bartlett, he had the victim park in the casino’s parking garage and then sexually assaulted her, the release said.
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He then ordered the woman to drive him to an Elgin convenience store, where he had her to accompany him inside and call a cab for him from her cell phone, reports said. He directed her drive him to the Elgin train station so he could meet the cab and flee, the release said.
The victim reported the sexual assault at the hospital she went to after Dalcollo left, triggering an investigation by the Bloomingdale Police Department and leading to Dalcollo’s arrest in Chicago the next day, the release said. He has been held without bond in the DuPage County jail since his arrest.
“This morning, Mr. Dalcollo took responsibility for the incredibly violent and terrorizing ordeal he inflicted upon an innocent young woman last year,” DuPage County State’s Attorney Robert Berlin said in the release.
“While the memories of that horrible afternoon may stay with the victim for many years to come, it is my hope that today’s proceedings serve as an important first step in perhaps providing the victim some measure of closure,” he said.
Kane County State’s Attorney Joe McMahon credited the work of the Bloomingdale, Elmhurst, Elgin and Chicago police departments, the DuPage County MERIT Task Force and the DuPage County Crime Lab with helping solve the crime and obtaining a conviction.
Dalcollo will receive between 42 and 75 years in the Illinois Department of Corrections when a judge decides his sentence later this month, the release said.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Prospect Heights, Chicago men ID’d as those killed in crash that sent vehicles onto Wheeling airport

Prospect Heights, Chicago men ID’d as those killed in crash that sent vehicles onto Wheeling airport grounds

The crash happened about 7:35 a.m. Wednesday when a box truck headed east on Messner Drive failed to stop at @ @ @ @ @ Road , according to Deputy Chief Joseph Licari of the Wheeling Police Department .
It @ @ @ @ @ and the force of the collision sent both vehicles careening into a fence at the @ @ @ @ @ Plant Road , coming to rest on a grassy area at the west end of @ @ @

The identities of two men killed in a collision that sent two vehicles through a fence and onto the grounds of the Chicago Executive Airport in Wheeling were released Thursday morning by officials.
The crash happened about 7:35 a.m. Wednesday when a box truck headed east on Messner Drive failed to stop at a stop sign at Wolf Road, according to Deputy Chief Joseph Licari of the Wheeling Police Department. It collided with an SUV, and the force of the collision sent both vehicles careening into a fence at the Chicago Executive Airport, 1020 Plant Road, coming to rest on a grassy area at the west end of the airport.
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Licari said the box truck had a driver and passenger and the SUV had a single occupant. The passenger in the truck was ejected onto an airport taxiway and later pronounced dead. The driver of the truck suffered injuries but survived, while the driver of the SUV also was pronounced dead, police said.
The driver of the truck was identified as a 21-year-old man from Prospect Heights, according to Licari. The two men who died were identified as Humberto Urbano, 40, of Prospect Heights, and David Sosa, 26, of Chicago, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
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It wasn’t immediately clear which man was a passenger in the box truck and which was the driver of the SUV.
Jamie Abbott, executive director of the airport, said Wednesday he was notified just before 8 a.m. and said the collision happened on an outer road on the west side of the airport but the force of the crash sent at least one vehicle “through the airport perimeter fencing and onto airport property.”
The airport’s secondary runway was closed as a precaution because of debris on the taxiway, Abbott said.
Abbott said his prevailing concern is for the families of those who died.
“The airfield is secure and safe and we’re more just worried about the families and the people involved,” he said. “Our thoughts go out to the families.”
PROSPECT HEIGHTS/WHEELING: Serious crash involving a truck and a vehicle that crashed off the road and onto the Chicago Executive Airport grounds. Wolf Rd is CLOSED Palatine Rd to Hintz. pic.twitter.com/K8uCZiDsbj — Sarah Jindra (@SarahJindra) September 30, 2020
Wolf Road was closed from Palatine Road to Hintz Road, and traffic was rerouted as crash investigators worked, Licari said. Traffic was reopened about 2:45 p.m.
Licari said the Wheeling Fire Department responded to the crash, as did members of the Prospect Heights Fire Department.
No charges or citations had been made public as of Thursday morning. Check back for updates.
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kdouglas@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @312BreakingNews


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Illinois launches small business COVID safety program to help workers and customers returning to the

Illinois launches small business COVID safety program to help workers and customers returning to the office

“ Our consultation program has been going on for years , ” Matulis said .
“ We have people on @ @ @ @ @ in general .
Basically , any business with 250 employees or fewer can come to @ @ @ @ @ and safety matters , and that has existed pre-coronavirus .
”

After six months of working from home, many small businesses are facing a new challenge — how to safely return to the cubicle farm in the age of COVID-19.
The Illinois Department of Labor is launching the “Back to Business” program to help small businesses protect workers and customers as they begin to reopen.
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“There’s so many businesses now that are wanting guidance on how to come back safely,” Mike Matulis, an Illinois Department of Labor spokesman, said Wednesday. “This is aimed at giving them the best guidance for keeping their customers, employees and visitors … from getting sick.”
Open to businesses with 250 or fewer employees, the program combines online training with a virtual consultant — a Department of Labor employee — to navigate everything from configuring office space to quarantining a symptomatic sales manager.
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The initiative is primarily funded by a 45-year-old federal small business workplace safety program. Illinois received a $1.9 million federal grant for the On-Site Consultation program for fiscal year 2020. The Department of Labor allocated $400,000 of the federal funding for its COVID safety program, matched by $40,000 from the state, Matulis said.
“Our consultation program has been going on for years,” Matulis said. “We have people on staff who deal with that in general. Basically, any business with 250 employees or fewer can come to us for help with health and safety matters, and that has existed pre-coronavirus.”
Matulis said helping small businesses implement best safety practices during the pandemic will “provide a heightened level of exposure” to the ongoing federal program, which offers workplace health and safety “consultation and correction, not enforcement.”
The “Back to Business” program will pair Department of Labor health and safety consultants with small businesses based on industry expertise, Matulis said. The one-hour consultation will review the physical operation, identify best practices and find ways to implement them.
For safety reasons, the consultations will take place virtually during the pandemic, Matulis said.
In addition, businesses can participate in a voluntary self-certification program by completing a series of online modules at the Department of Labor website. Businesses that successfully complete the program can print a certificate to “show employees and visitors that necessary measures have been addressed to keep them safe and healthy,” according to the website.
The COVID safety program is open to any small business, including retailers, manufacturers and offices.
rchannick@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Who are the Proud Boys?

Who are the Proud Boys?

Treja Kelley had been hesitant to come forward after witnessing the murder of her 17-year-old cousin .
But she found @ @ @ @ @ stand last year and helped secure a guilty verdict .
Her testimony , though , @ @ @ @ @ head , prosecutors said .
Just a few months after testifying , Kelley was shot @ @ @ @ @ not far from where her cousin had been slain .
She was 18 and pregnant @

Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 10 A right-wing demonstrator gestures toward a counterprotester Sept. 26, 2020, as members of the Proud Boys and other right-wing demonstrators rally in Portland, Oregon. (John Locher/AP)
The Proud Boys are a far-right group that has turned street thuggery into political theater and become a household name when President Donald Trump told them to "stand back and stand by" in a presidential debate when asked to condemn the organization.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Daywatch: Kim Foxx won’t debate GOP opponent, COVID-19′s unusual and long-lasting symptoms and all t

Daywatch: Kim Foxx won’t debate GOP opponent, COVID-19′s unusual and long-lasting symptoms and all the Chicago insults on a new Netflix series

Kim Foxx said “ no ” this week to a debate against her Republican opponent in the Cook County state @ @ @ @ @ race and will not sit on a stage with him at all as she campaigns @ @ @ @ @ is bowing out of debates because of past editorial board interviews in which each candidate @ @ @ @ @ Cook County ’ s top prosecutor , Foxx ’ s spokeswoman Alex Sims wrote in @ @ @

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Good morning, Chicago. On Wednesday, state health officials reported 2,273 new known coronavirus cases and 35 additional confirmed deaths. You can search for COVID-19 cases in your neighborhood here.
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Are you starting to plan for the spooky season? The Illinois Department of Public Health released their guidelines for Halloween on Wednesday. Here’s what they say about trick-or-treating, passing out candy and more.
Also, early voting for Chicago voters is set to begin today at the Loop location. If you’re voting by mail, here’s where you can securely drop off your mail-in ballot in Chicago and the suburbs.
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Here are some of the top stories you need to know to start your day.
Cook County State's Attorney Kim Foxx is interviewed following a primary election debate at ABC 7 in downtown Chicago on Feb. 28, 2020. (Chris Sweda / Chicago Tribune)
Kim Foxx said “no” this week to a debate against her Republican opponent in the Cook County state’s attorney’s race and will not sit on a stage with him at all as she campaigns for reelection. The incumbent is bowing out of debates because of past editorial board interviews in which each candidate argued their case to be Cook County’s top prosecutor, Foxx’s spokeswoman Alex Sims wrote in a statement.
Sims said Pat O’Brien, Foxx’s challenger, opted for “Trump-like name calling and fear mongering” during these interviews. Thus, there will be no debates between them for now, Sims said, pointing to the chaos of Tuesday night’s debate between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden.
Farmland is seen on the northeast corner of Harlem Ave. and Vollmer Rd. in unincorporated Rich Township on Wednesday, September 30, 2020. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune) (Chris Sweda / Chicago Tribune)
Tinley Park has not fared well in its dealings with video gambling operator Rick Heidner over the last year. First, the southwest suburb signed onto Heidner’s plan to build a horse racing track and casino on state-owned land, only to have Gov. J.B. Pritzker derail the project after a Tribune investigation revealed Heidner’s long-standing business ties to people connected to organized crime.
Now, the Tribune has learned that Tinley Park officials have been secretly negotiating a real estate deal that would provide Heidner a $2.5 million windfall on land he purchased less than a year ago as a possible alternate casino site.
Some of the boxes of food distributed on Sept. 29, 2020 by the Greater Auburn-Gresham Development Corp. in Chicago came from a federally funded program and contained a letter from The White House bearing the signature of President Donald Trump. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune)
Food pantries for months have relied on a government-sponsored food box program to serve a spike in needy families during the pandemic. But the latest batch of boxes includes an item some find unpalatable as the election nears: a letter signed by President Donald Trump.
Julie Sciascia-Van Horn of south suburban Bridgeview tested positive for COVID-19 in early April, but she's still suffering from symptoms months later. (E. Jason Wambsgans / Chicago Tribune)
As medical experts and scientists grapple to understand the new virus, some patients are reporting a great variety of symptoms that fall outside the official lists issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other major health authorities.
Lily Collins stars on the Netflix series "Emily in Paris," which premieres in October 2020. (COURTESY OF NETFLIX / HANDOUT)
It’s amazing Emily Cooper survived so long in Chicago, considering our disgusting food, fat residents and basic accessories. Actress Lily Collins plays Cooper, a Chicago marketing executive who gets a one-year assignment with a French luxury marketing company, on the Netflix series “Emily in Paris,” due out Friday.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Column: She waited on Martin Luther King Jr. and ‘watched six generations grow up here.’ Now, after

Column: She waited on Martin Luther King Jr. and ‘watched six generations grow up here.’ Now, after 58 years, ‘Momma’ Harper is leaving North Lawndale.

“ One thing about it , they did not touch me , ” she said , adding that she had @ @ @ @ @ weeks during the COVID-19 pandemic .
“ They tore up all around me but didn @ @ @ @ @ The currency exchange was set on fire , and the mom and pop ( store @ @ @ @ @ its windows broken and everything stolen .
”

Owner Louise "Momma" Harper cooks at the griddle at the New Pine Valley Restaurant in Chicago's North Lawndale neighborhood. She's decided to sell the place and retire after 58 years. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)
Louise Harper had been working as a waitress at the Pine Valley Restaurant for four years when the distinguished-looking man in a dark suit walked in.
Everyone knew the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. had moved into a third-floor apartment on South Hamlin Avenue with his wife, Coretta, and their four children.
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So it really wasn’t a surprise that he and his organizers would have breakfast at the restaurant that had long been an African American institution on the West Side. But to see the civil rights icon up close was like being in the presence of a celebrity.
Harper, then in her early 20s, walked over and took his order with the courtesy she affords every customer. And he responded just as graciously.
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“I felt like I was part of something big,” Harper told me recently. “They treated me nice, and I was proud to be there to wait on them.”
That event in 1966 is among the most memorable in Harper’s storied career at the restaurant, which she eventually bought and operated for decades. Treating people with courtesy and respect has been a tried-and-true recipe she used for 58 years.
This week, though, she walked away from the restaurant and the people whom she considers as family. At 77, she said she is retiring and moving to Florida.
The new owners plan to keep the restaurant going, but everyone knows it will seem different without the woman people in the neighborhood fondly call “Momma.”
A few years ago, Harper moved the restaurant from its original location at 16th Street and South Pulaski Road to a location across the street. She changed the name to the New Pine Valley Restaurant. The floors are newer, the space is bigger and the walls are sturdier. But little else changed in more than a half-century.
People still came for the $1.35 cheeseburgers, the same price they were when she began working at the restaurant in 1962.
“They depend on me for their coffee, and they want cheeseburgers all day long,” she said. “I can’t make enough cheeseburgers.”
As the neighborhood’s Momma, Harper saw to it that everyone ate. She calls her young customers her babies, and Mommas don’t allow their children to go hungry.
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“They walk in the door and say, ‘Momma, give me a cheeseburger.’ So I cook them one. Sometimes the babies don’t even have $1.35, so they give me a dollar or whatever they have.”
She attributes her longevity in North Lawndale to the close relationship she always has had with the residents. No one seemed to care that she wasn’t actually one of them.
Harper moved to Chicago from Mississippi and lives on the South Side. But she is as much a part of the historic fabric of North Lawndale as King or anyone else.
For years, she followed the same routine — driving from the South Side at 2:15 a.m. so she could open the restaurant at 3 a.m. and heading back after closing at 5:30 p.m. She did it, she said, because the residents depended on her.
“I’ve watched six generations grow up over here,” she said. “I love being in this community.”
But she has also seen the community around 16th Street — once the Black business hub of the West Side — decay and fall into ruin. That has been painful.
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When King was there, the neighborhood was a much different place. Pine Valley was among many thriving businesses, most of them owned by African Americans.
“Now, it’s nothing like it used to be,” she said.
Unlike other small businesses in the area that are not Black-owned, the New Pine Valley was untouched during the recent looting. Harper doesn’t believe the young in the area would destroy what they consider to be their own.
“One thing about it, they did not touch me,” she said, adding that she had to close her doors for weeks during the COVID-19 pandemic. “They tore up all around me but didn’t hit me. The currency exchange was set on fire, and the mom and pop (store) across the street had its windows broken and everything stolen.”
In a neighborhood plagued by violence, gang activity and drugs, Harper and her restaurant were off-limits to troublemakers.
“They’re like my kids. They don’t give me any problems,” she said. "They respect me, and I respect them. They don’t play with me, and I don’t play with them. I keep them in the right place.
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“They say, ‘Don’t go over there and mess with Momma.’”
Harper said she sold the restaurant to someone from the community. It was important, she said, that tradition of the New Pine Valley continue for years to come.
Some residents say that King’s seven-month Chicago Freedom Movement, in which he brought the housing discrimination and economic disadvantages on the West Side into the national spotlight, made him particularly endearing to the residents of North Lawndale.
When he was assassinated two years later, riots broke out. People burned downed nearly all of the white-owned businesses, and the neighborhood never recovered.
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Harper would have loved to be a part of a movement that she hopes will transform the 16th Street corridor and the entire North Lawndale neighborhood back to its glory days before the 1968 riots.
She stayed in North Lawndale decades after nearly everyone else abandoned it. She owes no debt to the community.
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Still, she will miss the faces and the smiles of those whom she grew to love.
“I’m going to miss it,” she said.
No one knows whether the $1.35 cheeseburger will remain on the menu. But even if it does, it won’t be the same without Momma’s touch.
dglanton@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @dahleeng


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--Embattled video gambling owner was in line for $2.5 million, taxpayer-funded windfall by flipping la

Embattled video gambling owner was in line for $2.5 million, taxpayer-funded windfall by flipping land. Now it’s off the table.

More recently , Tinley Park had been in negotiations to buy the former mental health center land from the state @ @ @ @ @ then sell to Heidner .
In 2018 , Heidner beat out other developers who submitted @ @ @ @ @ turn the 280-acre campus into housing .
Later , Heidner informed Tinley officials that his @ @ @ @ @ he anticipated building a racino as part of a yet-to-be approved state gambling expansion .
@ @ @ @ @ and said they believed a new horse track could be viable when paired with a @ @

Tinley Park has not fared well in its dealings with video gambling operator Rick Heidner over the last year.
First, the southwest suburb signed onto Heidner’s plan to build a horse racing track and casino on state-owned land, only to have Gov. J.B. Pritzker derail the project after a Tribune investigation revealed Heidner’s long-standing business ties to people connected to organized crime.
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Now, the Tribune has learned that Tinley Park officials have been secretly negotiating a real estate deal that would provide Heidner a $2.5 million windfall on land he purchased less than a year ago as a possible alternate casino site.
Under the proposal, Tinley Park was prepared to pay $7.5 million for 114 acres ― about $2 million more than its own appraisal said it was worth, said Tinley Park Village Manager David Niemeyer. Heidner paid $5 million for the land, meaning he would take away a $2.5 million profit at taxpayers’ expense.
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The deal came to an abrupt halt last week when Heidner sent a short email to village officials on Sept. 23 saying the land was no longer for sale. That email came a day after the Tribune began asking questions about Heidner’s ownership of the land on Sept. 22. (After the Tribune published this story, a Heidner spokesman released an email chain from Sept. 21 in which Heidner had indicated to associates that he intended to pull out of the deal.)
Rick Heidner waits to speak in front of the Illinois Racing Board in Chicago on Sept. 17, 2019. (Stacey Wescott / Chicago Tribune)
Niemeyer said he does not know why Heidner pulled out, but said the justification for the village’s offer was an attempt to wrest control of the undeveloped parcel from the neighboring village of Matteson, which struck a deal with Amazon this year to build a distribution warehouse across the road from Heidner’s property.
He noted that the purchase would have needed public approval by the Village Board. Officials had intended to use cash reserves to buy the land rather than borrowing money or issuing bonds, Niemeyer said.
In a statement, Heidner said he stopped negotiations because “certain Tinley Park officials attempted to make the purchase a divisive political issue.”
Heidner spokesman Randall Samborn did not elaborate on what Heidner meant, other than noting that not all village trustees supported the plan to use taxpayer money to buy the land. The proposed purchase had not been publicly known, given that discussions took place in closed session during recent months.
Tinley Park offered the price above appraisal after Heidner told village officials he had an offer from a developer, Schiller Park-based Northern Builders Inc., to buy a portion of the land, Niemeyer said. Heidner’s spokesman said the current offer is $6.3 million for 27 acres, with an option on another 27 acres, but that Heidner had not accepted it.
The potential profit from flipping the land would have come at a critical time for Heidner. He has been embroiled in a long dispute with a video gambling cafe chain owner over that company’s attempt to remove Gold Rush machines from 44 locations. Video gambling was shut down for months by the pandemic this year, and the economic downturn also has ravaged commercial real estate, which Heidner also is involved in.
The land in question is at the corner of Harlem Avenue and Vollmer Road. It sat on the market for years without generating much interest, until Heidner bought it in a cash deal last November. Using a string of land trusts and shell companies, he closed on the property about six weeks after Pritzker blocked his first option for a casino site.
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Land at the northeast corner of Harlem Avenue and Vollmer Road in unincorporated Rich Township is seen on Sept. 30, 2020. (Chris Sweda / Chicago Tribune)
Niemeyer and Heidner confirmed that they had discussed using the undeveloped parcel as a “racino” site if Heidner could rejuvenate his prospects of winning a casino license from the Illinois Gaming Board. Instead, the Gaming Board is now seeking to revoke his video gambling license on unrelated charges.
Heidner’s land is currently unincorporated, though both Tinley Park and Matteson have been eyeing it. Niemeyer said that Heidner’s proposed deal with Northern Builders included annexation to Matteson, meaning that municipality would control zoning and building decisions, as well as reaping whatever taxes the property produced in the future. Tinley Park was trying to stop that from happening, the village manager said.
Heidner and Tinley officials both say that the Amazon warehouse could spur other industrial development in the area.
But village officials were not all sold on the idea of municipal government getting into the real estate business using taxpayer money. Those opposed to the deal included Mayor Jacob Vandenberg.
“I don’t think we should be using public money to buy property. That’s been my position since day one,” he said.
However, the mayor finds himself with limited power because he’s often on the losing end of 4-3 split among Village Board factions.
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The economic downturn caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has hit Tinley Park’s finances as it has many otherwise prosperous local governments, and the village has had to furlough some management employees, officials acknowledged.
“What does this say to our employees? ‘Sorry, we have to furlough you and cut your pay so we can buy some land,’” the mayor said.
Trustee Michael Glotz, who leads the board’s majority faction, declined to answer questions about the land.
“That hasn’t been discussed publicly,” said Glotz, who declined to say whether he supported the proposal. Other trustees did not respond to requests for comment.
On the Matteson side of the divide, Village President Sheila Chalmers-Currin said her town had planned to annex the land until Heidner recently informed officials that he had a deal to sell the land to Tinley Park. She said she was unaware that the Tinley Park sale also had fallen through until the Tribune informed her during an interview.
“A couple weeks ago, the owner of the land had decided to not allow the village (of Matteson) to annex the land ― that the village of Tinley Park was going to buy it,” she said. “At that point, everything was off the table. … We were informed through our attorney that this was no longer an option. Of course, I was disappointed. But no additional information has come to us.”
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Matteson officials wanted the land to be in their village in case the Amazon property across Vollmer Road led to more interest in development in the immediate area, Chalmers-Currin said.
Both suburbs have spent public money dealing with Heidner over the land.
Among Tinley Park’s costs was an appraisal, which set the land’s value at between $5.25 million and $5.75 million, Niemeyer said. The range depended on whether an environmental study found more serious flood risks on the property, and whether the land ultimately was awarded Cook County tax credits often used to help landlords compete with much lower property taxes in neighboring Will County. Niemeyer later said the value of the land could be higher if other tax incentives were granted to the owners.
A significant portion of the land lies either in a flood way or a flood plain, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s map of the region.
Land in a flood way typically cannot be developed because of a high risk of flooding. A funnel-shaped segment of the property, which consumes most of its northeast corner before narrowing and running through the middle of the land to Vollmer Road, would not be suitable for building, said Arthur Schmidt, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who reviewed the map for the Tribune.
Heidner "has made no other decisions regarding sale or disposition of the property,” a spokesman said in a statement.
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The northwest suburban business owner continues to battle state gambling regulators. In December, the Gaming Board filed charges to revoke Heidner’s gaming license after gathering text-message evidence from a lawsuit that indicated Heidner offered an alleged $5 million bribe to the owner of the Stella’s chain of video gambling cafes to keep his machines in place.
Heidner has denied the allegation and said he was the victim of an illegal scheme to squeeze him out of the business. Heidner is appealing the state’s attempt to revoke his license.
Gaming officials moved to take Heidner’s license about two months after an October 2019 Tribune investigation revealed that for nearly two decades Heidner has owned numerous commercial properties via shell companies in several states with Rocco Suspenzi, the longtime chairman and part owner of Parkway Bank and Trust in Harwood Heights.
In 2003, the Gaming Board and the FBI accused Suspenzi of concealing secret ownership stakes of organized crime figures in a proposed Rosemont casino. Suspenzi and his son invoked their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination in 2005 when the Gaming Board sought to question them about their role concealing the ownership stakes of reputed Outfit-linked investors Vito Salamone and Nick Boscarino.
At the same time, Heidner has a similar real estate partnership with convicted bookmaker Dominic Buttitta. Together, they own a building in Elgin that is leased to a bar that is licensed for video gambling and uses Heidner’s Gold Rush machines. In 2012, Buttitta pleaded guilty to federal charges of running an illegal sportsbook from the South Elgin strip club he controlled. He also was convicted of skimming millions of dollars from the business by not declaring income from the daily fees that dancers pay to perform at the strip club.
Former Gaming Board members who granted Heidner a video gambling license in 2012 said those business ties would have been a red flag to board members, but they were unaware of the relationships at the time.
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More recently, Tinley Park had been in negotiations to buy the former mental health center land from the state, which it planned to then sell to Heidner. In 2018, Heidner beat out other developers who submitted plans to the village to turn the 280-acre campus into housing. Later, Heidner informed Tinley officials that his plans had changed, and he anticipated building a racino as part of a yet-to-be approved state gambling expansion. Village officials embraced the idea and said they believed a new horse track could be viable when paired with a casino.
By the time the Tribune’s investigation was published, Heidner’s proposal for harness racing, a hotel, a music venue, restaurants and a casino already had received preliminary approval from the Illinois Racing Board, which regulates and promotes the horse racing industry in the state.
A few days later, Pritzker sent a letter to the Racing Board announcing that the state no longer would be making the Tinley Park campus available for the project.
dheinzmann@chicagotribune.com
This story was updated Oct. 19 to include information in this clarification: In an Oct. 1 story about the Village of Tinley Park’s plan to buy land from video gambling operator Rick Heidner, the Tribune reported that Heidner informed municipal officials that he was pulling out of the deal on Sept. 23, one day after a Tribune reporter began making calls to ask questions about the plan on Sept. 22. We stand by that reporting. After publication of the story, however, Heidner provided a chain of internal emails from his business which indicated that he had informed one of his attorneys and his son at 8:59 p.m. on Sept. 21 that he intended to pull out of the deal on Sept. 23.


chicagotribune--2020-10-01--No. 3 Chicago police official, leader of department’s reform efforts to retire

West took over the reform effort for a department that missed more than 70 % of its deadlines for making @ @ @ @ @ policing practices during the first year the consent decree went into effect .
But she @ @ @ @ @ of the new bureau for about a month before the year-long period ended .

The Chicago Police Department official directly in charge of its efforts to implement federally mandated reforms has announced her retirement.
Barbara West, the third highest-ranking CPD official, will retire after 26 years with the department, officials said. They did not say why she’s leaving the department.
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West made history earlier this year when then-interim police Superintendent Charlie Beck promoted her to deputy superintendent of the department’s new Bureau of Constitutional Policing and Reform, making her the highest-ranking Black woman in CPD’s history.
“She has blazed a trail that will serve as a model and example for current and future generations of Chicago Police officers,” police Superintendent David Brown said in a statement.
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As deputy superintendent, West oversaw several units that play various roles to ensure the department is following a court-ordered consent decree to improve CPD’s training of officers, their supervision and other areas. Her bureau’s creation was the result of the court-ordered release of video in 2015 showing a white officer fatally shooting Black teen Laquan McDonald the year before on the Southwest Side.
West took over the reform effort for a department that missed more than 70% of its deadlines for making adjustments to some of its policing practices during the first year the consent decree went into effect. But she had only been in charge of the new bureau for about a month before the year-long period ended.
She’s held several leadership posts in her CPD career, including as commander of the West Side’s Harrison and Austin patrol districts, two districts that cover neighborhoods challenged by poverty, violence, drug-dealing and other societal issues.