09.21.23

SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY

The South Side Weekly is an independent non-profit newspaper by and for the South Side of Chicago. We provide high-quality, critical arts and public interest coverage, and equip and develop journalists, artists, photographers, and mediamakers of all backgrounds.

Volume 10, Issue 25

Editor-in-Chief Jacqueline Serrato

Managing Editor Adam Przybyl

Senior Editors Martha Bayne

Christopher Good

Olivia Stovicek

Sam Stecklow

Alma Campos

Jim Daley

Politics Editor J. Patrick Patterson

Labor Editor Jocelyn Martínez-Rosales

Immigration Editor Wendy Wei

Community Builder Chima Ikoro

Public Meetings Editor Scott Pemberton

Contributing Editors Jocelyn Vega

Francisco Ramírez Pinedo

Visuals Editor Kayla Bickham

Deputy Visuals Editor Shane Tolentino

Staff Illustrators Mell Montezuma

Shane Tolentino

IN CHICAGO

End of gang database

This month, the Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability voted to erase the Chicago gang database, which research has shown was outdated, inaccurate and racist. For years, community groups held protests, town halls, collected petitions and filed lawsuits to dispute its reliability and cease its use as a tool to arrest and criminalize Black, Latinx, and immigrant people. The database was heavily criticized by the Inspector General in a 2019 audit. The Erase the Database Campaign is calling this the “first major victory to reimagine public safety under the Johnson administration.”

Municipally owned grocery store

Mayor Brandon Johnson announced the City's exploration of a municipally owned grocery store. In partnership with the Economic Security Project, a national nonprofit organization dedicated to the promotion of an equitable economy, the City is conducting a feasibility study.

“We know access to grocery stores is already a challenge for many residents, especially on the South and West sides,” Mayor Johnson said in a press release referencing the disparity in food accessibility in marginalized communities.

This move comes after major chains like Walmart closed four locations in the spring, two of which were located in West Chatham and Kenwood. The list of shuttered grocery stores by companies like Aldi, Save A Lot, and Jewel-Osco impact neighborhoods like Washington Park and Auburn Gresham. “My administration is committed to advancing innovative, whole-of-government approaches to address these inequities,” continued the mayor.

IN THIS ISSUE

city council advances progressive goals

Last Wednesday, alders introduced ordinances for Bring Chicago Home and a South Shore community benefits agreement.

Director of

Fact Checking: Savannah Hugueley

Fact Checkers: Christopher Good

Micah Clark Moody

Alani Oyola

Lauren Sheperd

Layout Editor Tony Zralka

Program Manager Malik Jackson

Executive Director Damani Bolden

Office Manager Mary Leonard

Advertising Manager

Susan Malone

Webmaster Pat Sier

The Weekly publishes online weekly and in print every other Thursday. We seek contributions from all over the city.

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Cover visuals by Kayla Bickham

Depending on the study, Chicago could be the first major city in the country to establish a municipally owned grocery store. The city would make use of a $20 million dollar grant provided by the Illinois Grocery Initiative to fund the project.

Libraries respond to bomb threats

Last week, the Chicago Public Library searched or closed all its branches in response to bomb threats that were ultimately unfounded. Similar threats were made against libraries in neighboring areas like Aurora, Addison and Evanston. Weeks prior, Oak Park Public Library and Wilmette Public Library received threats.

Libraries across the country have been the subjects of controversy as some Americans call for certain books—especially ones discussing critical race theory or LGBTQ people—to be censored or banned. The bomb threats appear to be an escalating tactic to force libraries to ban these books.

In a statement, Edwin C. Yohnka, Director of Communications at the ACLU of Illinois, wrote, “We should all be clear. The recent threats result from ideologically driven attacks on libraries, attacks from a small handful of loud voices who seek to ban books and displays that reflect and elevate the experiences and views of LGBTQ+ people, people of color and other voices too often ignored in our society. The language and misinformation driving these book bans sadly lead some to believe that threats of violence are an appropriate response to children’s books they do not like. Threats of violence against libraries make clear that each of us must support the work of all librarians across Illinois. It is time that we unite as a state in opposing the voices of anger that want to ban books and not allow ourselves to be coerced by threats.”

jim daley ..................................................

4 public meetings report

A recap of select open meetings at the local, county, and state level.

scott pemberton and documenters 5 larry snelling garnered multiple use-of-force complaints in the 1990s

The mayor’s pick to lead CPD was accused of slapping and punching young men when he was a patrol officer on the South Side.

max blaisdell ..........................................

6 robocalls mislead on welcoming city amendment

Anonymous robocalls poll recipients’ support for Ald. Ray Lopez’s (15th) proposed amendment to the Welcoming City Ordinance. wendy wei

obama cba organizers propose affordable housing ordinance

7

The Obama CBA Coalition introduced a new ordinance for South Shore residents. tonia hill, the triibe 9 the gift of space

Pilot program fosters space sharing between artists and sacred places of worship on South Side. dierdre robinson 10 the exchange

The Weekly’s poetry corner offers our thoughts in exchange for yours.

c. lofty bolling, cortez stewart

12 op-ed: why the right really cares so much where stacy davis gates sends her son to school

The attacks on Davis Gates are about promoting their “school choice” agenda.

ricardo gamboa

14 when celebrating hip-hop’s 50th anniversary, don’t forget the south side

Our local venues, graf artists, radio stations, music stores, authors, producers, breakers, emcees, promoters, DJs, and folks who contributed to hip-hop deserve to be seen. evan f. moore ............................................ 15 space is the place

A review of Noname’s new album.

imani joseph

17 dying and disabled illinois prisoners kept behind bars

The Joe Coleman Medical Release Act was expected to have freed hundreds of terminally ill and medically incapacitated prisoners in Illinois by now, but only a few dozen have been released. carlos ballesteros (injustice watch), shannon heffernan (wbez), amy qin (wbez) 20 calendar Bulletin and events.

zoe pharo

23

City Council Advances Progressive Goals

BY JIM DALEY

On Wednesday, the City Council moved forward on ordinances long sought after by progressive organizers, including measures that would create a real estate transfer tax to fund anti-homelessness efforts, a youthled violence prevention program, and a housing preservation plan designed to protect renters and homeowners in South Shore.

The measures have been goals of organizers for years, and some, such as the real-estate transfer tax, would keep campaign promises made by Mayor Brandon Johnson if passed. That ordinance, called “Bring Chicago Home” by its backers, would increase the tax on real estate sales of more than $1 million to create a dedicated funding stream for homelessness alleviation and prevention.

Last year, Bring Chicago Home stalled in the City Council after then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who had included it in her 2019 campaign platform, withdrew her support. That version of the ordinance would have created a flat tax on all real estate sales above $1 million. Johnson’s proposal will be graduated for sales above $1 million, and reduce the tax on property sales below that. The ordinance Johnson and his City Council allies introduced today would put a referendum on the March 2024 ballot for voters to decide the fate of the tax.

Ald. Desmon Yancy (5th Ward) and Jeanette Taylor (20th Ward) announced the South Shore Housing Preservation Ordinance at a press conference before the council meeting, where it was later introduced. The ordinance was championed by the South Shore Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) Coalition, which formed in 2016 when the Obama Center construction was announced. In the February municipal election, South Shore residents overwhelmingly supported two advisory referendums calling for a CBA in South Shore and more affordable housing

Ordinance would require 60 percent of new developments be reserved for households that earn less than 30 percent of the city’s median income, or roughly $20,000, and reserve all vacant lots in South Shore owned by the City, as well as a lot at 63rd and Blackstone Avenue in Woodlawn, for affordable housing developments. It would also ban move-in fees and cap application

CPD, but was voted down. The council then passed the entire amendment, with “no” votes from Lopez, Desmon Yancy (5th Ward), Anthony Beale (9th Ward), and James Gardiner (45th Ward). In a separate measure, the council approved a plan for the City to purchase a North Side building from the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District and convert it into a shelter for asylum seekers.

A proposal that would eliminate the

that the City will pay to two men who were wrongfully convicted of a 1993 murder and spent decades in prison before being exonerated. Alderpersons Brian Hopkins (2nd Ward), Marty Quinn (13th Ward), Silvana Tabares (23rd Ward), Bill Conway (34th Ward), Anthony Napolitano (41st Ward), and Brendan Reilly (42nd Ward) voted against the settlement.

During the nearly five-hour meeting, council members also passed resolutions honoring Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr., Hispanic Heritage month, and a Lincoln Park restaurant. Jackson, who ran Operation PUSH at 930 E. 50th Street for decades before his retirement earlier this year, is a longtime civil rights leader. He became the first Black man to run for president in 1984 and ran again in 1984. Jackson attended the meeting, where he was lauded by multiple alders and received a standing ovation.

The council approved the mayor’s nomination of Chasse Rehwinkel as the City's comptroller. Alderpersons Greg Mitchell (7th Ward), Marty Quinn (13th Ward), Raymond Lopez (15th Ward), Silvana Tabares (23rd Ward) and Jason Ervin (28th Ward) voted against his appointment. The council also approved Angela Tovar as the City’s chief sustainability officer, where she will be tasked with advancing a climate and environmental sustainability agenda.

fees and security deposits for renters.

In an amendment that drew an attempt at parliamentary maneuvering from Ald. Raymond Lopez (15th Ward), who opposed it, the City Council also voted to accept $33 million in federal funds to underwrite support for asylum seekers. Lopez, who referred to the measure as “bacon wrapped in a turd” on the Council floor, tried to carve the $33 million out for separate consideration from the rest of the funding in the amendment, which was allocated for homelessness and the

minimum wage for tipped workers and another that would introduce the Peace Book Ordinance, a violence prevention plan long championed by GoodKids MadCity, were both sent to the Rules Committee.

Alderperson Rossana RodriguezSanchez (33rd Ward) introduced an ordinance that would create a working group to plan the expansion of public mental health clinics.

The council also approved City settlements that collectively totaled millions of dollars. The largest was for $25 million

At a press conference after the meeting, Mayor Johnson called Bring Chicago Home “a crucial step for eradicating homelessness” for Chicago residents.

“This is very, very much personal for all of us here today,” said Johnson, whose older brother died while experiencing homelessness some years ago. “And so the time to act is now.” ¬

Jim Daley is a senior editor at the Weekly

in Woodlawn.

Last Wednesday, alders introduced ordinances for Bring Chicago Home and a South Shore community benefits agreement.

“The time to act is now.”

– Brandon Johnson

Mayor Brandon Johnson.

Public Meetings Report

ILLUSTRATION BY HOLLEY APPOLD/SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY

A recap of select open meetings at the local, county, and state level.

BY SCOTT PEMBERTON AND DOCUMENTERS

August 28

A City of Chicago loan for as much as $13.8 million could help to fund a full rehabilitation of the proposed 240-unit Island Terrace Apartments down the block from The Obama Presidential Center. At its meeting, the Chicago City Council Committee on Housing and Real Estate recommended that the Council approve funding that would also draw from federal low-income housing tax credits and COVID relief funds. Coordinating the relocation of residents during the renovation will be Preservation of Affordable Housing (POAH), a national nonprofit developer that recently bought the building and plans to collaborate with the City’s Department of Housing. In 2020, the City Council committed $4.5 million through the Woodlawn Preservation Ordinance to pilot strategies designed to prevent displacement and to support homeownership. The existing preservation ordinance doesn’t go far enough, contend residents backing a community benefits agreement. Such an agreement could legally bind the Obama Presidential Center and the City to more sweeping and specific commitments.

August 29

During a hearing with the City’s departments of finance and water management, the City Council Committee on Finance explored making water bills more accurate and less burdensome for taxpayers. Some Chicagoans have reported water bills running to tens of thousands of dollars. The meeting reviewed individual anecdotes, media coverage, and research, as well as emphasizing the importance of identifying unknown leaks, unauthorized usage, and inaccurate meter-reading systems as the source of higher costs.

August 31

At its meeting, the Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability adopted changes to how it selects members for the Chicago Police Board, such as streamlining background check requirements and explicit guidance around what constitutes a conflict of interest. Created in July 2021, the commission is to serve as a model for police oversight, accountability, and alternative approaches to public safety. Also on the agenda was discussion about a recent arbitrator’s ruling that a police officer facing firing or suspension for misconduct could choose arbitration instead of the Police Board to decide their case. Implementing this change would require

adjusting the City’s contract with the police union and approval by the City Council. One public commenter favored the change, saying that “police officers are human beings and mistakes happen” and that arbitration would improve the fairness of the decision-making process. A commenter opposed to the change argued that arbitration would, in effect, change some laws and would be an “attack on democracy.” Before a presentation by Deputy Inspector General of Public Safety Tobara Richardson, Commission President Anthony Driver, Jr., declared his strong opposition: “Driving this process of police misconduct of the most serious cases behind closed doors in a city that has struggled as mightily as Chicago has is the absolute wrong way to go."

September 6

At its meeting the City Council Committee on Environmental Protection and Energy recommended retaining Angela Tovar as chief sustainability officer. Appointed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot in June 2020, Tovar inherited several challenges, including the controversial Hilco demolition in Little Village and the proposed move of metal scrapper General Iron to the Southeast Side. Tovar told the Committee she would prioritize collaboration with the City and Chicago’s most environmentally impacted communities to create policies that were more just. Mayor Rahm Emanuel had dissolved the City’s Department of Environment in 2012; Lori Lightfoot created the sustainability officer position but stopped short of keeping a campaign promise to revive the department itself. Tovar told the Committee that she supported Mayor Brandon Johnson’s environmental goals.

Accommodating migrant children in schools was a key topic for a meeting of the City Council Committee on Education and Child Development. CPS officials reported that during July and August the district helped some 1,500 students living in migrant shelters and police stations. CPS has a specific classification of students considered “newcomers,” which includes Students in Temporary Living Situations (STLS) and English Learners (ELs). CPS is notified by shelters or police stations when students arrive and CPS then matches them with a nearby school. CPS also takes into account EL support and whether siblings can enroll at the same school. Migrant families were turned away from a school in her ward because there were not enough resources, noted Committee Chair Jeanette Taylor (20th Ward); she asked about the nature of resources. A formula was presented that determines the number of part-time and fulltime support staff based on the number of ELs in the school. Schools with more than 600 ELs, for example, will receive two full-time support positions.

September 8

This month, Illinois is to become the first state to implement a system that does not require cash bail as a condition for releasing individuals awaiting trial who are not a flight or safety risk. At its meeting, the Cook County Justice Advisory Council (JAC) heard details of The Pretrial Fairness Act, also known as the SAFE-T Act. Specifically, the act “increases the range of charges for which police may release people… with a citation and notice to appear [in court].” Originally scheduled to go into effect January 1 of this year, the act could not be implemented when a judge ruled that it violated the state’s Constitution. In July, however, the Illinois Supreme Court in effect reversed that ruling, and September 18 became the new launch date. Individuals currently jailed under a cash bail order will get a release hearing. The JAC’s mission is “to promote equitable, human-centered, community-driven justice system and practice.”

This information was collected and curated by the Weekly in large part using reporting from City Bureau’s Documenters at documenters.org.

Larry Snelling Garnered Multiple

Use-of-Force Complaints in the 1990s

BY MAX BLAISDELL

As a beat cop in Englewood and Morgan Park in the 1990s, Larry Snelling was the subject of eight excessive force complaints, two of which resulted in suspensions. Some of the allegations describe Snelling slapping or punching people as young as fourteen in the head, while others detail verbal abuse. The allegations describe behavior that, if true, violated long-standing departmental rules that “prohibit all brutality, and physical or verbal maltreatment of any citizen while on or off duty.”

Snelling is Mayor Brandon Johnson’s nominee to be the next superintendent of the Chicago Police Department (CPD). He was shortlisted by the Community Commission on Public Safety and Accountability (CCPSA) after a nationwide search, and has been described as a candidate who is respected by the rankand-file in the department. Snelling spent much of the last two decades training cops in the department’s use-of-force policy at the police academy. Johnson specifically cited Snelling’s expertise when he announced his pick on August 14, adding that he was confident Snelling would “implement constitutionally driven reforms” like those governing the use of force.

Under CPD’s current use-of-force policy, officers can use force only when it is “objectively reasonable, necessary, and proportional.” Proportionality means that the amount of force an officer uses should have a direct relation to the actions, behaviors, and level of threat exhibited by a person. Officers generally aren’t allowed to strike people who are handcuffed or otherwise restrained. The current policy also requires officers to use de-escalation techniques whenever possible to avoid

That policy was updated in 2017, after the 2015 murder of Laquan McDonald by then-officer Jason Van Dyke sparked a comprehensive investigation into the department by the Department of Justice (DOJ). The DOJ identified serious flaws in both CPD’s use-of-force policy and the training officers were getting at the police academy where Snelling worked. The court-ordered consent decree that came out of the DOJ’s findings in 2019 includes pages of provisions specific to the use-offorce policy.

Snelling has been called to testify more than two dozen times as an expert witness on the use of force in cases where officers have been accused of unjustified levels of force. In 2015, he was a witness in the federal trial of Aldo Brown, a CPD officer who was convicted of using excessive force

ILLUSTRATION BY KAYLA BICKHAM

for the brutal beating of a convenience store clerk, and in 2018, he testified in the murder trial of Van Dyke for the killing of McDonald.

The Weekly reported last week that in 2015 Snelling defended the conduct of Glenn Evans, an officer notorious for his brutality, who was accused of using “pain compliance” on a mentally ill woman. Both the Independent Police Review Authority (IPRA) and then-superintendent Eddie Johnson recommended Evans be disciplined in that case.

In all, Snelling received nine excessive force complaints between 1993 and 2000, eight of which occurred within a roughly three-year period. For comparison, during a five-year period between 2015 and 2020 about half of all officers garnered zero complaints at all, and only six percent had more than three complaints in that time

period, according to internal audits the Weekly published in 2021.

Snelling was sworn in as a CPD officer in January 1992 at the age of twenty-three. For the next six years, he was assigned to the 7th District, covering Englewood, the neighborhood where he grew up. The detailed investigative reports obtained by the Weekly show a striking pattern of physical violence and verbal abuse allegedly committed by Snelling during his early years with the department.

Last month, the Tribune reported that in 1994, the Office of Professional Standards (OPS) found a complaint that Snelling slapped a person under arrest twice across the face was sustained. The complainant also alleged that Snelling called him a “motherfucker” while he was being transported between police stations for a mugshot. Records obtained by the Weekly revealed that the person was in handcuffs when Snelling slapped him, and that when he advised another person that they didn’t have to answer officers’ questions, Snelling told him to “shut up.” OPS gave Snelling a two-day suspension.

About seven months later, in February 1995, Snelling was accused of using excessive force by two fourteen-year-old Black boys, according to records obtained by the Weekly. One alleged that Snelling “grabbed (him) by the back of the hair and slammed him face down on the concrete,” kicked him in the head, slapped him on the face while he was inside the squad car, and told him to “shut the fuck up,” and to “shut up bitch, your mother sucks dick and eats pussy,” while he was in custody and waiting for his mother to pick him up.

OPS opened an investigation after the mothers of the two boys complained.

The mayor’s pick to lead CPD was accused of slapping and punching young men when he was a patrol officer on the South Side.

Multiple witnesses, including the boys themselves and one of their sisters, made consistent, signed statements alleging rough treatment of the two boys by Snelling during the arrest. One of the boys’ injuries were serious enough that he sought medical treatment from Jackson Park Hospital. In the course of their investigation, OPS requested and obtained those medical records for review.

Despite the witness statements and the boy’s medical records documenting his injuries, OPS marked the allegations as “not sustained,” and promptly closed the investigation. In his conclusion, the investigator wrote in justifying the closure, “It would seem that if [he] had been physically abused as he so alleged, he certainly would have sustained injuries of a more serious nature.”

Four months after that, Snelling was accused of brandishing a gun at another driver while off duty, in another complaint first reported by the Tribune. What was not reported by the Tribune, however, was that there were several other passengers in the complainant’s vehicle at the time, all of whom alleged that when Snelling pointed the gun at them, his finger was directly on the trigger. They also alleged that he threatened them to get out of his “hood.” When the driver of the vehicle told Snelling that they were minding their “own business” and that he “should do the same,” Snelling responded, “Motherfucker we will see about your business."

Snelling admitted having a gun, but denied pulling it from his waistband. He also denied cursing out the other driver. But because the witness accounts were consistent in identifying the type of gun Snelling pointed at them and about his threats—and perhaps because the other driver was an employee of the Cook County Sheriff’s Office—OPS sustained the complaint against Snelling.

He was issued a five-day suspension, even though threatening to harm someone while brandishing a gun is a misdemeanor that can land someone in prison for up to one year.

A year later, Snelling was again investigated for allegations of excessive force. A young man alleged that Snelling struck him “with his fist four times on the head” during an arrest. One of the other officers on the scene, Robert Haile, noted that the young man was not resisting arrest.

In the officers’ arrest report citing the young man for disorderly conduct, they made no note of him fighting them or hitting back, only that he had yelled and cursed at them.

In addition, the young man complained that while inside a room at the 7th District police station, Officer Snelling “slapped him once on the face,” resulting in “a small cut on his left eye.” Snelling did not deny using force, only stating that it was “necessary force.” He denied punching the young man in the head or slapping him at the station. Investigators found the complaint not sustained because of a “lack of physical evidence and independent eyewitness accounts of the incidents that could prove or disprove them.”

After racking up seventeen complaints in his first six years in the department, Snelling took a leave of absence from 1998 to 2000 to work as the regional security director for AT&T. After rejoining CPD in 2000, he was assigned to the Education and Training Division as a police instructor, and not to a district station where he’d be patrolling the streets.

Over the rest of his career, he’s received three additional complaints, including one use-of-force complaint in 2000. That was for allegedly getting into a fist fight with a drunk person who’d bumped into Snelling’s parked car. And that was the only complaint that investigators determined that the allegations against Snelling were unfounded and exonerated him for, meaning there was evidence that one of the allegations wasn’t based on facts or did not occur and for the other that he acted in accordance with police policy.

The other finalist for superintendent from within the department, Angel Novalez, has a single excessive force complaint made against him in his twentyone-year career on the force, according to the Citizens Police Data Project, and just six complaints overall. Semifinalist Ernest Cato III, who did not make the CCPSA’s shortlist, has three excessive force complaints. And neither was implicated in any kind of corruption sting as Snelling was in 1997.

The CPD’s press office did not respond to the Weekly’s questions about the allegations against Snelling. ¬

Max Blaisdell is a fellow with the Invisible Institute and a staff writer for the Hyde Park Herald

Robocalls Mislead on Welcoming City Amendment

Anonymous robocalls poll recipients’ support for Ald. Ray Lopez’s (15th) proposed amendment to the Welcoming City Ordinance, but understate the scope of Lopez’s proposal.

BY WENDY WEI

Over the past week, an unknown number of Chicago residents received anonymous robocalls that claim to be polling support for a proposed amendment to the Welcoming City Ordinance, which could allow Chicago police to cooperate with federal immigration authorities. The robocalls contain misleading statements about the content of an amendment proposed by 15th Ward Alderman Raymond Lopez, who denies having sent the call.

The pre-recorded messages claim that the amendment’s goal is to “allow the police to cooperate with federal officials so that criminal illegal aliens can be picked up by the government and deported after they complete their jail time in Chicago.” The call ends by asking recipients to demonstrate their support for the proposal by pressing one, or to “press two if you do not support it.”

The Office of Alderman Raymond Lopez stated that they did not pay for, produce, or send out the message, and that their office has also received the robocall. He did not elaborate on his proposal.

Recently, tensions between new arrivals living in and around city shelters, and long-term residents who live near the shelters, have been high. Proposals to open additional shelters have drawn backlash from some Chicagoans over

the past few weeks, with residents in Kenwood and West Roseland arguing against the shelters over concerns of public safety and disruptive behavior.

According to the Federal Trade Commission, a robocall is a call featuring a recorded message instead of a live person. The federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act prohibits robocalls or prerecorded voices to mobile phones unless the recipient has provided prior express written or oral consent, though calls to landlines are allowed without prior consent.

Sarah Bates, who is a resident of Rogers Park, says she received the robocall at 6:29pm on September 12—on her cell phone—from a (708) 740-7002 number. Bates listened to the call for about six seconds before hanging up.

Bates stated that she has never lived in Lopez’s ward and is not subscribed to his newsletter, and is unclear on how a caller seeking her opinion on Lopez’s proposal got her number. Another recipient of the call received it on their cell phone on the same day at 4:19pm.

The calls that residents have received do not explicitly identify the caller or provide a contact phone number. Though the recorded message credits Lopez for the proposal for which it is polling, it does not credit him for the call itself. Calls

made back to the caller number do not go through. The Federal Communications Commission’s TCPA rules requires “all prerecorded calls, including market research or polling calls, to identify the caller at the beginning of the message and include a contact phone number.”

Lopez has been vocal to news outlets about his proposed amendment since late August. In several interviews with reporters, he has stated that he intended to introduce the amendment to the City Council during the City Council Meeting last week on September 13th, but did not end up doing so.

In an interview with ABC 7 News, Lopez described the scope of his amendment, which seems to target a broader demographic than convicted and undocumented migrants, as stated in the robocall. Lopez’s proposal vaguely states that it would allow the city to work with ICE if “new arrivals engage in four areas of specific criminality, which include gang-related activity, drug-related activity, prostitution-related activity and sex crimes against minors,” according to the article. The interview does not explain what “engage” would legally entail.

Fred Tsao, senior policy counsel at Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR), said that “the call is certainly misleading. While the call insinuates that the ordinance would apply to those convicted of a crime, Lopez’s proposal covers people who have been arrested and charged with certain offenses without even requiring a conviction beyond reasonable doubt.”

Tsao also expressed concern that the “the timing of the call [will] add to confusion among the public. While much of the recent public dialogue has been focused on new arrivals, Lopez’s ordinance would go far beyond recent arrivals and apply to anyone in this city who is not yet a citizen.”

Prior to 2021, Chicago police could cooperate with federal immigration authorities under certain exceptions, such as if a person under investigation had an outstanding criminal warrant or had been included in the Police Department’s gang-member database. This meant that undocumented individuals could be deported before having the opportunity

to defend themselves in a court of law, or if they were listed in the CPD gang database.

But in February 2021, alderpersons voted forty-one to eight to eliminate these exemptions in the Welcoming City Ordinance under Mayor Lori Lightfoot.

The robocall’s “end goal of rolling back protections for immigrants is plain and clear,” Tsao suggested. “Communities fought long and hard to demand protection for all through welcoming policies at the city and state levels, and this ordinance is an attempt to undo

Communities Against Deportation’s (OCAD) campaign and coalition work. OCAD, a collective that fights the deportation and criminalization of immigrants, is aware of the robocalls. “The language is very much dehumanizing and incorrect.”

Sobrevilla is critical of the wording of the robocall and Lopez’s proposal because both are ”encouraging collaboration between ICE and police, which we know can be very dangerous. I mean, we fought as a community for five years to undo exceptions or carve outs, as we would call them, that would allow police to interact with ICE.”

To protect undocumented Chicago residents, under the current Welcoming City Ordinance, Chicago’s agents and agencies, including the police, cannot work with nor share information with federal immigration authorities. City agents and agencies can not grant ICE agents access to a person who's being detained.

“We’re very much aware and willing to continue to ensure that [the Ordinance] stands. We believe that what he’s trying to do, we’re hoping [the Ordinance] also would be protected by the Trust Act,” said Sobrevilla. The Illinois TRUST Act limits state and local law enforcement’s participation in federal immigration enforcement.

As to the unknown origins of the robocall, Sobrevilla was curious to know “just how they get people’s data information. I would also be a little bit concerned.” Ultimately, she characterizes the robocall “as a PR stunt, as a very confusing way to play on a divisive moment.”

Chicagoans who have received this robocall or other unwanted calls can file complaints with the FCC by going to fcc.gov/complaints. The FCC publishes information on how to identify and avoid robocalls at ftc.gov/calls, which is also available in Spanish at ftc.gov/llamadas.

Local watchdog organizations found the gang database to disproportionately target Black and Latinx Chicagoans and it was permanently scrapped by the Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability earlier this month.

decades of progress under six different mayoral administrations."

“[The call] is disturbing because it’s…painting any person that has any interaction with police, whether it be for any reason, as a criminal alien already,” said Xanat Sobrevilla, who leads Organized

Wendy is the immigration section editor at South Side Weekly and covers interracial solidarity between communities of color.

ILLUSTRATION BY MIRANDA PLOSS

“While much of the recent public dialogue has been focused on new arrivals, Lopez's ordinance would go far beyond recent arrivals and apply to anyone in this city who is not yet a citizen.”

— Fred Tsao, ICIRR

Obama CBA Organizers Propose Affordable Housing Ordinance

The Obama CBA Coalition introduced a new ordinance for South Shore residents, building on their nearly decade-long fight to prevent the displacement of longtime Black residents living near the Obama Presidential Center.

BY TONIA HILL, THE TRIIBE

This article was originally published by The Triibe on September 14. Reprinted with permission.

Linda Jennings, seventy-four, is a lifelong South Shore resident. Her family moved to the neighborhood in 1958. Today, she’s a homeowner and lives just a few blocks from the apartment building where she grew up in the 6800 block of South Crandon Avenue.

“I saw the building when I was eleven and said one day I want to live there. I got the opportunity, so I moved in,” she said, referring to her current home. Jennings is a condo owner and lives in a nearly 100-plusyear-old building in South Shore.

She’s also a member of the Obama Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) Coalition, which was formed in 2016 to protect area residents from displacement due to the development of the Barack Obama Presidential Center (OPC) in Jackson Park. A CBA is a contract signed by community groups and a real estate developer that requires the developer to provide specific amenities and development to the local community or neighborhood.

Obama and his foundation selected Jackson Park as the site for his presidential center and library in 2016. Jennings said she and other seniors have been concerned about being displaced from the neighborhood due to rising home maintenance costs. She also

fears that an outside developer could purchase the building, which would displace them.

“We don't have the reserves to get things fixed,” she explained. “So we're very vulnerable.”

Infrastructure issues are plaguing the building and are making it challenging to stay because most seniors are on a fixed income and can’t afford repairs, Jennings added. Her building still has radiator heat and needs other repairs. Severe thunderstorms this past June also caused damage to her neighbors.

“It [the water] was coming so fast, it knocked out a lot of ceilings in apartments. There was too much water, and our pipes

couldn't handle it,” she said.

Ahead of the Chicago City Council meeting on Sept. 14, organizing groups such as Obama CBA Coalition, Not Me We and Southside Organizing for Power (STOP) stood alongside Ald. Desmon Yancy (5th Ward) to introduce the South Shore Housing Preservation Ordinance, which includes a package of policies that would prevent displacement in South Shore.

The South Shore Housing Preservation Ordinance would set aside all city-owned vacant lots for affordable housing, ban move-in fees, cap rental application fees and security

deposits, create a South Shore Loan Fund for the redevelopment of vacant homes and multi-unit buildings, and designate a lot at 63rd Street and Blackstone Avenue for affordable housing, among other demands.

The South Shore Housing Ordinance needs approval from the City Council before becoming law.

About seventy-five percent of people in South Shore are renters and low-income. According to an analysis by the Chicago Reader, South Shore residents experience the highest level of evictions in Cook County.

“The 60649 ZIP code has had more evictions than any other ZIP code in the city,” Yancy said during the press conference. He was elected to be the fifth Ward alder in the April runoff, replacing Leslie Hairston, who retired from the City Council.

“We have to do something about that. So, I ran [for office] with a promise to support housing in South Shore and this community benefits agreement,” he continued.

Kiara Hardin, a South Side native and Obama CBA Coalition member, echoed Yancy’s sentiments.

Hardin lived in South Shore from 2018 to 2021 but was forced to leave because her rent increased from $900 to $1,450, she said. She moved from a high-rise on South Shore Drive to another apartment before settling in Washington Park.

Kiara Hardin, a South Side native and member of the Obama CBA coalition, speaks during a press conference introducing the South Shore Housing Preservation Ordinance outside City Hall on Sept. 14, 2023.

PHOTO BY ANF CHICAGO FOR THE TRIIBE®

“We're seeing the act of displacement happening now before this center is even built and all other developments like this. The Obama Center isn't the only development happening in South Shore,” Hardin said.

With its proposed ordinance, the Obama CBA Coalition builds on its nearly decade-long fight to protect residents from displacement. In 2020, the Chicago City Council passed the Woodlawn Housing Preservation Ordinance, which was cosponsored by Ald. Jeanette Taylor (20th Ward). One of the Woodlawn ordinance’s key features is that for each redevelopment of fifty-two vacant city-owned lots, at least thirty percent of new apartments must be made affordable to “very low-income households.”

The early iterations of the ordinance included South Shore and Hyde Park, but both were cut from the final Woodlawn Housing Preservation in 2020, according to a Hyde Park Herald news report, leaving the South Shore neighborhood unprotected.

In May, city planners selected the Woodlawn Social, a $48.4 million project, to redevelop land on the 900 and 1000 blocks of East 63rd Street. The project will include sixty affordable apartments in a sixstory building and a four-story structure containing ten-market rate townhomes. According to a Block Club Chicago news report, construction on the project may begin in mid-2024.

In February, nearly ninety percent of South Shore residents supported a ballot

The Gift of Space

Pilot program fosters space sharing between artists and sacred places of worship on South Side.

BY DIERDRE ROBINSON

referendum for the proposed South Shore CBA ordinance, and Woodlawn residents voted in favor of a referendum that asked voters whether elected leaders should support building affordable housing on the vacant lot at 63rd Street and Blackstone Avenue.

During a press conference following Thursday’s City Council meeting, Mayor Brandon Johnson was asked if he supported all of the provisions from the South Shore Housing Preservation Ordinance.

Johnson said he supports having a CBA that “doesn't push families out of the very community in which they've been raised in or they've raised the family in.”

“What we're clear about, though, is that a benefits agreement speaks to the needs of the people who live there and should have a right to remain there. That's what I'm committed to doing in my role with this benefits agreement and every piece of legislation that speaks to our values,” he added.

Yancy planned to join the Obama CBA organizers’ virtual community meeting on Sept. 14.

“I deserve development without having to be displaced. I pay taxes just like everyone else does. This ordinance sets a precedent. It sets a precedent that people living in communities are important and should be served and have all of the things that they need,” Hardin said. ¬

Creatives such as Quenna Barrett, a theater director and educator living on the South Side, know far too well about the disparity artists face when carving out their niche on the South Side. Her work with teens requires reliable rehearsal spaces. Barrett, who is currently a Policy Research and Analysis Fellow with Arts Alliance Illinois, notes that “artistic space is not always readily available to artists” on the South Side. So, when Barrett first learned about the pilot program South Side Artists in Sacred Spaces, she was intrigued.

South Side Artists in Sacred Spaces is a program born out of a collaboration between Partners in Sacred Places, Arts Alliance Illinois, and Bustling Spaces LLC. The goal of the program is to help local artists, such as Barrett, and art organizations find an affordable rental space on the South Side by matching them with places of worship that have free space and an interest in earning additional income.

“This program really does help meet the gap, in particular, for artists living and working on the South Side where there are less than a handful of spaces that we would be able to access,” Barrett said.

While similar Artists in Sacred Spaces programs exist in other large markets, like Philadelphia and New York, South Side Artists in Sacred Spaces is the first of its kind in Chicago. The program was developed thanks to feedback that Arts Alliance Illinois received directly from South Side artists.

Bustling Spaces Founder and Executive Director Henry Wishcamper said that Arts Alliance held a series of listening sessions with artists. “It just seemed like a perfect solution to…a problem that we were so clearly… hearing articulated by artists across the South Side.”

To be considered for the program, candidates were required to submit an application before the September 6, 2023 deadline. Those selected for the program are required to complete a five-week training session beginning on October 19, 2023, and ending January 11, 2024. The training will cover a variety of topics such as: mission and vision alignment, envisioning the sacred space, legal ins and outs, and areas of discernment.

According to program organizers, no artistic specialty is off limits and the art itself does not have to be sacred. Artists can have a business address anywhere in the city; however the focus of their work must be within a neighborhood south of I-55 and within Chicago city limits.

“I think on the artist’s side,” Wishcamper said, “the only criteria we’re really using to judge is, one, do you want to be working in a sacred space? And two, do you want to be working with and creating art for existing South Side communities?”

Requirements for houses of worship are similar to those required of the artists. They must be located on the South Side, interested in activating their underutilized space, and fall within the category of a ‘sacred space’ which the program designates

Margaret Brewer, a Woodlawn resident and member of the Obama CBA coalition, speaks during a press conference introducing the South Shore Housing Preservation Ordinance outside City Hall on Sept. 14, 2023.

PHOTO BY ANF CHICAGO FOR THE TRIIBE®

as a church, synagogue, mosque, or other neighborhood places of worship.

“The sacred spaces that we are hoping will participate are on the South Side… and should be congregations that are open, willing, and excited to share their spaces,” said Associate Director of Community Engagement for Partners for Sacred Places, Sarah Jones.

artists and congregations successfully complete the training program, they will be eligible to receive grant money. Artists are eligible to apply for rental assistance and congregations for capital grants.

South Side Artists in Sacred Spaces will distribute a total of $135,000 in capital grants to congregations to improve their building’s accessibility and attractiveness to

in the building, which is a really difficult project for a lot of Chicago churches that are older and were built when there were no standards.”

Funding projects will be a collaborative effort between the congregation and an artist partner. As a requirement, congregations must match the grant amount given by the Arts Alliance for their project with other funds. An estimated seven to ten grants are expected to be distributed.

South Side Artists in Sacred Spaces will also distribute a total of $20,000 to artists towards rental assistance to help them build their presence and/or programming in the sacred space. Rental assistance will only be granted to those who utilize space within their designated house of worship and funds will be distributed directly to the house of worship on behalf of each artist.

The program is supported by a Chicago Arts Recovery Program grant from the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. The project

is supported by federal assistance listing number 21.0237 awarded to Arts Alliance Illinois by the U.S. Treasury through the American Rescue Plan Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds in the amount of $235,000, representing 100% of total funding.

“I think this is sort of helping artists to think outside of the box,” said Barrett. “That you could absolutely partner in a huge way where it could be mutually beneficial to both the sacred spaces as well as the artistic practice.”

If you would like to know more about the South Side Artists in Sacred Spaces program, visit: https://sacredplaces.org, or you can contact Sarah Jones via email at sjones@sacredplaces.org. ¬

Dierdre Robinson is a writer and accounting manager in Chicago. She has a BA in Journalism from Michigan State University. She last wrote about Kia S. Smith and Memoirs of Jazz in the Alley for the Weekly

Reverend David J. Black of The First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, located at 6400 S. Kimbark Avenue, is one congregation leader who is willing and excited to share space with a partner artist.

“We see artists as being very essential to our own faith and our [own] religion,” Black said. “We really view artists as prophets who are seeing the world around us in unique terms that aren’t defined by history or sociology.”

In addition to space-sharing, once

arts organizations.

For Reverend Black, capital grant money for his historic church, which was organized in June of 1833, could be used to make improvements in essential areas within the church.

“Having a dignifying space dignifies the people there and is so important for the flourishing of culture. We don’t just want artists to come into space that’s half maintained,” Black said. “The other thing is providing ADA-standard accessibility

“The only criteria we’re really using to judge is, one, do you want to be working in a sacred space? And two, do you want to be working with and creating art for existing South Side communities?” – Henry Wishcamper

First Presbyterian arts in worship PHOTOS FROM PARTNERS FOR SACRED PLACES

University Church dancers. PHOTOS FROM PARTNERS FOR SACRED PLACES

Our thoughts in exchange for yours.

The Exchange is the Weekly’s poetry corner, where a poem or piece of writing is presented with a prompt. Readers are welcome to respond to the prompt with original poems, and pieces may be featured in the next issue of the Weekly

some coffee

by c. lofty bolling

Some coffee is sweet and others savory. Determined to give more, some coffee is black and some is black. Some coffee is coffee and some coffee is black.

A flower vase doesn’t grow with the flowers and that’s the secret of it all. The side effect, what affects the side profile affects the whole silhouette. What affects the outside of the bean affects the sugar inside.

The vessel the coffee sits in validates the timeliness and approximates its importance appropriately, i’ve rehearsed it so religiously I find no dissatisfaction in its eventual disappearance. the coffee table too. suddenly no coffee nor coffee table I consumed them both to bone leaving their vessels.

Some coffee is sweet and some is savory, Determined to give more/ Some coffee go and some coffee come. Some coffee is alive and some coffee is coffee.

I’m over-determined by paisley prints and jumping flowers on chairs. I am over determined by chrysanthemums and rose bushes full of thorns, throne rooms surrounded by greenery and shrubs, seraphs cloaked in weathered mercury, kief and iron residue on the lips on plant vases. white china and blue denim hold coffee stains

I’m waiting in line.

THIS WEEK'S PROMPT: “PERSONIFY YOUR FAVORITE COMFORT FOODS OR DRINKS AND COMPARE THEM TO PEOPLE YOU ARE CLOSE TO.” THIS PROMPT WAS INSPIRED BY AND CURATED WITH C. LOFTY BOLLING. This could be a poem, journal entry, or a stream-of-consciousness piece. Submissions could be new or formerly written pieces. Submissions can be sent to bit.ly/ssw-exchange or via email to chima.ikoro@southsideweekly.com

Chima Ikoro is the Weekly’s Community Builder.

Our thoughts in exchange for yours.

The Exchange is the Weekly’s poetry corner, where a poem or piece of writing is presented with a prompt. Readers are welcome to respond to the prompt with original poems, and pieces may be featured in the next issue of the Weekly

Featured below is a reader response to a previous prompt.

Bright Boy

by cortez stewart

What allows you to see at night the Christmas decorations and street lamps in your neighborhood? Cuz we got youngins lighting up Our blocks.

so I hop on tracks to get away, with no light at the end of the tunnel so no plight when you fold if you stumble, your never to dream so big but the wic on my candle burns for fantasy. can’t be snuffed out won’t become content for me this ray of hope pulls me through trials and tribulations away from darkness and its fixations although I’ve been every connotation of both

The bright kid “u a star you gone make it far” “show em who u are” bright boy how you get like that bright boy why talk like that bright boy why you talk. so. bright, boy. youngins that will smith ya.

But they ain’t acting on bright boy no flashes for your entrance they take our light and put them In prisons cuz how can you shine in a black hole we take our light and put them through prisms reflecting refracting on set goals being told

Not to waste time being shown everybody hates Chris until he let it shine that’s what will was banned for how could

He be like that when these other stars are so “pure” Being dimmed by constructs that can’t take the heat that’s why Jasmine was up in the stars being shown a whole new world singing songs but Tiana is of course she happy staying a frog

But if we make any buzz about it it’ll be light years before another one of us receive any shine And they know that we know

So why fight it bright boy a bunch of strays of rays can’t compete with the sun bright boy So enjoy the show, eat the chips watch your Moment in the sun fore you get eclipsed bright boy

Tell’em we are the screens, bulbs and the sun and we burn bright boy

Op-Ed: Why The Right Really Cares So Much Where Stacy Davis Gates Sends Her Son to School

The attacks on Davis Gates are about promoting their “school choice” agenda.

BY RICARDO GAMBOA

Earlier this month, it was revealed Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates was sending her son to a private school. The news incited a right-wing media frenzy calling out Davis Gates for “hypocrisy.” But this right-wing sensationalism and scandalization isn’t about hypocrisy; it is about the right wing and its allies promoting their harmful school choice agenda just as its local flagship program Invest in Kids is scheduled to sunset.

Subx.News broke the story about Davis Gates’ child attending private school with a post by former CTU employee and Subx founder and editor John Kugler. Kugler’s post doxed Davis Gates’ son, releasing personal details including his name, high school, and a current photo. Kugler doxing a child is alarming, but so are all the entries he’s posted to the blog since December 2021.

While several posts are dedicated to fearmongering about Chicago crime or promoting pro-police propaganda, almost half of his posts are obsessive attempts to take down Mayor Brandon Johnson, Stacy Davis Gates and CTU.

Unfortunately, Kugler’s unhinged hyperactivity isn’t fringe: it’s standard for today’s conservatives, and is arguably even enabled by mainstream corporate rightleaning media. So it’s no wonder news of Davis Gates’ son’s private school enrollment went national and was a headline in outlets such as Fox News, the New York Post and Wall Street Journal, all owned by News Corp, the media behemoth founded by conservative Rupert Murdoch.

Locally, the Chicago Tribune seized the

opportunity to continue its ongoing attacks on Stacy Davis Gates and the CTU. The Tribune has been spiraling into right-wing territory. Certainly the paper has been in questionable hands since its May 2021 acquisition by Alden Global Capital, a shady hedge fund founded by Trump donor Randal Smith and known for buying and gutting newsrooms.

The Tribune has given pages of ink to Paul Vallas, a school-choice proponent who lost the 2023 municipal election to Johnson. Vallas’ most recent contribution to the Tribune’s Editorial Page takes umbrage with commentary by Davis Gates that he ascertains was aimed at “school choice supporters” and charges the CTU, Davis Gates and Mayor Johnson with perpetuating institutional racism in

education by challenging school choice.

In recent social media posts, Vallas has called out Davis Gates’ “hypocrisy” for choosing to send her child to private school while opposing school choice—a catchphrase for laws that allow parents to use public funds to send their children to private schools. Indeed, it remains shocking that Vallas is still given any credibility or platform after disastrous tenures as an educational reformer across the globe. With Vallas’s track record of decimating public school systems and privatizing education, it is no shock Vallas is joining in exploiting this recent news about Davis Gates and her son’s education to promote their cause célèbre: school choice.

The scandalization of Davis Gates’ son’s private school enrollment has

revealed problematic double standards. While mayor presiding over historic school closures, Rahm Emanuel refused to tolerate queries about enrolling his children in private schools. Emanuel stated it was a “private” and “family” decision and demanded his personal life be kept separate from his mayorship. By and large, local media and politicians did just that. But this has not been the case with Davis Gates and her family who have become targets for unbridled racial hostility and right-wing selective outrage.

Never mind that Davis Gates still has her two other children enrolled in CPS schools, or that she stated her son’s enrollment at a private school is a matter of circumstance: he wants to pursue soccer and there is a lack of competitive soccer programs, much less adequately resourced schools in the Davis Gates family’s neighborhood. For Vallas and the right-wing writ large this is “hypocrisy,” “immoral,” and “not exactly a vote of confidence.”

But what is so hypocritical? Hasn’t Davis Gates and CTU been exclaiming CPS schools are not adequately resourced? Isn’t a quality education that includes robust extracurricular programming for the Black and Latinx youth who populate CPS exactly what CTU has been fighting to secure so other parents won’t be put in Davis Gates’s position?

Davis Gates’ enrollment of her child at a private high school doesn’t read as hypocrisy as much as it does as evidence for the claims that Davis Gates, CTU and Black and Brown families and communities have been making for years about public

Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates.

PHOTO BY JIM DALEY

schools.

But in these polarized political times, critical analysis, nuance, and facts are hardly factored into the kind of mob mentality that has come to define the right wing. The right wing will cannibalize what they can to further their agenda—right now, that means a messy and manipulative conflation with Davis Gates making the difficult choice where to send her child to school with their school choice movement.

It's important to be clear: Choosing where to send a child to school is not congruent with “school choice.” School choice is a right-wing conservative agenda that has attempted to divert monies from public schooling to alternatives, mostly through vouchers in which the state pays for private school tuition. (Although more recently, the “school choice movement” has relied on Education Savings Accounts that give money directly to parents to fund educational alternatives for their children.)

The “freedom” of school choice is hardly rooted in liberation. The origins of the school choice movement date back to the 1950s with economist Milton Friedman, who thought throwing education to the capitalist free-market wolves would save it from government monopoly.

School choice quickly rallied white people who wanted to exit public schools as they were being desegregated, as well as religious families and, of course, a capitalist class excited about the wealth to be extracted from making education a private enterprise and terrain of market competition.

For decades, the school choice movement has been propelled by conservative, Republican, and right-wing donors. Defunding public schools vis-à-vis “school choice” has been their focus and that’s no coincidence when racial minority youth populate public education in cities across the U.S.

Their “school choice” movement has become reinvigorated in recent years as the right-wing takes issue with public schools becoming another site for their war against accurate history, gun control, queer and trans people and youth, and sex education and reproductive rights.

The right wing’s investment in school choice is just another frontline in their battle to seize and reshape every aspect of life-in-common according to their extremist vision. In Chicago and Illinois, school choice has taken hold not just through charter schools but also through the Invest in Kids Act. The Invest In Kids Act was passed in 2017 under thenGovernor Bruce Rauner and since then has quietly diverted over $250 million dollars from underfunded public schools to private institutions.

Programs like Invest In Kids don’t save youth from “failing” public schools, since research shows voucher programs do not improve academic outcomes and put students in learning environments with little curriculum oversight. Additionally, discrimination on the basis of religion, disability, and sexual orientation is an issue in schools benefiting from voucher programs, according to a study by the Center for American Progress.

When passed, the Invest in Kids Act was supposed to last five years and end after this school year; it was already extended for an additional year. The right wing wants to expand the Invest In Kids program and make it the perpetual law of the land—and wouldn’t you know it, their last chance is right around the corner, when the Illinois General Assembly will vote on it in October and November.

So the hysteria around Davis Gates enrolling her son isn’t about ethics or hypocrisy. It’s about the right wing trying to seize and twist a moment to campaign for their ongoing war against public education. Don’t let them fool you or think otherwise. Whether her son attends private or public school, Stacy Davis Gates will still be leading our city’s teachers and fighting for quality schools for our Black and Brown youth. ¬

Ricardo Gamboa is a long-time Chicago artist and activist and works in film and television. Gamboa recently worked for three seasons as a writer and producer for Showtime’s The Chi. They are also pursuing their doctoral degree of American Studies in New York.

When Celebrating Hip-Hop’s 50th Anniversary, Don’t Forget the South Side

BY EVAN F. MOORE

Hip-hop’s birth can be traced to a party in the recreation room of a Bronx, NY, high-rise apartment building. At 1520 Sedgwick Avenue, DJ Kool Herc, a Jamaican immigrant, curated hip-hop, music’s most reproduced—and disrespected—genre.

Over the decades, we’ve gotten to know all about New York-based hip-hop. Then we heard about what was going down on the West Coast. And then the South blew up, led by Atlanta, Miami, Memphis, and Houston artists.

When it comes to Chicago— particularly the South Side, the most talked-about and most maligned part of the city—our contributions in light of this year’s fiftieth anniversary of hip-hop are often skewed and, in some cases, ignored.

After all, out of hip-hop’s four main aspects—DJing, breakdancing, rhyming and graffiti—the genre’s other three take a backseat to rhyming.

But the hip-hop scene from Chicago’s South Side deserves its flowers. Some folks may not know this, but South Side heads have a few addresses and intersections of their own that live in the hearts and minds of those that know.

Who didn’t stop by Dr. Wax Records at 5225 S. Harper Avenue, Coop’s Underground, Track One Records in

South Shore (my personal favorite), or the many other South Side stores that were the backdrop of so many tough decisions?

For example, Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) and A Tribe Called Quest’s Midnight Marauders—two bonafide classic albums—were released on the same day (November 9, 1993).

Even as a rabid fan of the Wu’s “Protect Ya Neck” and Tribe’s “Oh My God,” young Evan couldn’t buy both. And having vinyl, CD, or a tape before anyone in your friend group was a lofty social status.

Years later, at the tail-end of what I like to view as “Hip-Hop’s last Golden Age” (1993-1998), heads pondered a dilemma: which album to buy on September 29, 1998?

On that day, Tribe dropped The Love Movement, OutKast released Aquemini, Brand Nubian brought Foundation to the conversation, while Jay-Z released Vol. 2… Hard Knock Life, and Black Star, the duo of Mos Def (now Yasiin Bey) and Talib Kweli, dropped Mos Def & Talib Kweli Are Black Star, which features the track “Respiration” with the South Side’s own, Common.

How about college radio stations playing the artists and music that WGCI and B96 wouldn’t bother giving the time of day?

WHPK, located at 5706 S. University

Our local venues, graf artists, radio stations, music stores, authors, producers, breakers, emcees, promoters, DJs, and folks who contributed to hiphop deserve to be seen.

Avenue on the campus of the University of Chicago, and Kennedy-King College’s WKKC, formerly located at 6800 S. Wentworth Avenue and helmed by DJ PinkHouse, was the lifeline of young “Backpackers,” who were mostly influenced by boom bap hip-hop popularized by East Coast rappers.

The world is familiar with the intersection of 87th Street and Stony Island thanks to Avalon Park’s own Common, who spent decades shouting out the city through his music, acting career, and activism, and is widely recognized as Chicago’s hip-hop ambassador.

As a young kid who grew up in the South Side enclave of South Shore, Common’s second album, Resurrection continues to be a hyperlocal manifesto for me. Even though I loved Wu-Tang, Tribe, Mobb Deep, Public Enemy, Ice Cube, Boot Camp Clik, OutKast, et al., I personally identified with Common’s music because I actually lived the subject matter.

Going to parties with the crew and not sitting together in case something popped off, buying gear at stores in a Chicago neighborhood which is now called University Village (y'all remember the old name, I’m not saying it), and shouting out the high schools that had the finest girls, among other topics, were conversations I engaged in.

The venues where so many of us heard the music that became the soundtrack of our lives stand out in our memories— especially the ones thrown at 1900 S. Michigan Avenue. Who didn’t pull up to a function there?

And perhaps hip-hop’s greatest contribution to our global society is that the music and the culture bring people together. In Chicago, a city well-known for segregation, we met kids from other neighborhoods at these venues that we probably would not have interacted with otherwise.

In November 1998, my crew, Ill Nature, threw a party at the historic Blackstone Hotel in downtown Chicago. Yes, me and the homies threw a party at a downtown hotel. A lot of people did.

But our function showed what the city could be if we all agreed to provide spaces for teens to make mistakes and learn from them. Fast-forward twenty-five years later, I doubt the adults in charge would allow teens to rent such a space. It seems like

adults and teens don’t trust each other now more than ever—which isn’t new, but it feels like something is different these days.

The proof is in the pudding anytime we see a group of teens downtown. Unfortunately, they are lumped in with those who want to do harm. Very few of us want to differentiate.

Black South Siders most likely have Southern roots from folks who came to the city looking for a better life. Along the way, South Siders developed a “melting pot” for how musical tastes manifest over time. The range of stories and details from South Side born-and-bred artists have common threads.

From the Great Migration to the Chicago-based music TV series “Soul Train,” from the “Disco Demolition Derby” to the rise of House music, the ingredients of South Side hip-hop are baked within its history. Producers like Ye, The Legendary Traxster, No I.D., Prolyfic, SC, Young Chop, and so many others continue to spread the Chicago gospel via their beats.

But along the way, respect from the genre’s gatekeepers was fleeting. At one point in time, Chicago artists felt compelled to leave the city for New York or

Los Angeles for opportunities.

In the 90s and early 2000s, Common and Ye, along many other South Side creatives, moved to position themselves for life-changing opportunities—to get famous.

Meanwhile, a recent crop of South Side-bred artists like South Shore’s G Herbo, along with Chief Keef, and Rooga, best known for his song, “GD Anthem,” had to relocate because it became unsafe due to the negative attention they received over time.

Unfortunately, some artists deal with family issues, local law enforcement blocking performances, rivals, and, perhaps the most vile form of negativity, “haters” who want to make a name for themselves.

Lil Durk told Vlad TV he moved from Chicago to Atlanta for “growth” reasons after law enforcement began to shut down his local shows.

In Rooga’s case, he relocated to California to get away from the aforementioned reasons. He points to West Coast rapper and businessman Nipsey Hussle’s murder as a cautionary tale. Hussle was murdered in the parking lot of the clothing store he owned in his neighborhood.

“You can’t stay in the city you damn near from. That’s where the hate comes from first, your own city. You gotta be a dummy to stay in your own city. It even happened to [Nipsey Hussle] in his own city,” Rooga told Vlad TV in a 2021 interview. “That’s the only way you’re going to secure the bag and secure your family and secure yourself.”

Of course, not everyone left. Chance the Rapper’s music is heavily influenced by gospel and House, two Chicago imports. Also, it appears he didn’t need to dwell over a tough decision to leave the city like rappers from previous generations did.

Chance packing in crowds at his recent United Center performance celebrating the tenth anniversary of his seminal mixtape, Acid Rap, shows that Chicago rap artists can blow up while maintaining a local presence.

Influential artists like Pac Man, whom some folks recognize as the innovator of drill music, and Chief Keef are names who stand out. Your favorite drill artists, whether in the states or overseas, probably view Keef as a legend but have no idea who Pac Man is.

Pac Man, who died in 2010, released

the track “It’s a Drill” shortly before the world discovered Drill music (and around the same time when Chicago became a pejorative for right-wing talking points). Sometimes, especially with Black creatives, the inventor is cast aside in favor of the much more popular artist.

As I explained in a 2021 series of social media posts regarding adults providing teens with safe spaces, some of us felt ostracized by the city’s gang culture, larger and more well-known cliques and crews, and the House music scene.

We didn’t feel the love, so we created our own communities. Along the way, as we were creating spaces for ourselves, we—of course not everyone—may have engaged in soft forms of homophobia and misogyny (and misogynoir, a brand of misogyny that specifically targets Black women) within hip-hop’s extremely competitive culture.

Englewood-raised emcee Psalm One says as much in her article “Ain’t No Human Resources in Hip-Hop,” regarding the ostracism she received during her time at Rhymesayers Entertainment, and in her book, Her Word Is Bond, where she describes the systemic issues within the culture: “She’s allowed in the boys’ club temporarily, with a chaperone, but she’s alone, she’s prey.”

Chicago has been left “outside” when it comes to our contributions to hip-hop.

As much as folks love to focus on the negative, so much great music is being exposed to the masses. Also, many South Side artists are utilizing their platforms to let people know about the social justice issues they care about most.

Whether it’s through politics and nonprofit work (Rhymefest), expanding Black folks’s blueprint in the ever-growing cannabis industry (Vic Mensa and Mick Jenkins), fusing activism and mental health awareness (Nikki Lynette), to hosting block parties in their own neighborhoods (Noname), South Side artists are more than just their music.

The city’s hip-hop scene has a lot to say and many more places to go. Tell your stories because, otherwise, someone will tell them for you. ¬

Evan F. Moore is an award-winning writer, author, and DePaul University journalism adjunct instructor. Evan is a third-generation South Shore homeowner.

Space is the Place

BY IMANI JOSEPH

The album opens with a shadowboxing Black girl, shining blue in the moonlight, with enough to say to write a book! This is Sundial, the new album by Noname.

She’s an influential female rapper from Chicago, and a founding member of the slam-poetry-to-critical-thoughtSoundcloud pipeline. As a fan, I do not associate her art with a brand—but if I had to describe her public persona, I would say she is fiercely pan-African and feminist.

Sundial was five years in the making. During that hiatus, she built a nonprofit, the Noname Book Club, that is radically educating Black people, both free and incarcerated. She released a single, “Rainforest,” that spellbound me with its samba base. And while she’s always been comfortable diverging from a typical rap composition, on her new album she has expounded it into a softer pocket.

Let's journey into Noname’s—aka

Fatimah Nyeema Warner's—Sundial

black mirror” is a choral hum layered with soothing strings. The beat breaks between verses feel ceremonial. Idealistic and ambient, yet dainty on the surface, the song is freeform, rolling in groovy grassroots. Avant-garde centered in the rhythm and blues. The term “socialism sister” made my heart melt. She spits:

“Like my

rent’s paid? The devil dead”

The fight Noname is alluding to resonates. How many of us will become the devil, and how many of us will it take to stop them? But to call something immoral, you should tell the people why. This track dances over the answer. The second verse has gender and race holding hands at white supremacy’s money-laundering tables. There are multiple worlds. Material reality and the various social constructs we believe into reality. Hip-hop, once a counterculture’s

subculture, has aged into the mainstream. Rappers literally pull themselves up by the bootstraps, which creates the dissonance of an aesthetic philosophy. Noname wants liberation in this piece, acting as a public service announcer and professional dissenter.

“Yeah, I'm cute and compassionate

Flakey as a bitch, the witch inside the broom

Motion sick, driftin' in and out of consciousness like the rappers do She a rapper too”

It was important when Megan Thee Stallion declared she was a rapper, “not no mutha fucking model,” because language is power. In a world where femininity is a prized possession and Black women are disposable, our art becomes meta, in that we must project power instead of holding it. Noname must also reckon with that distortion as a political and proBlack artist. She is ping-ponging around manifestations, trying to land on some peace. The first track bleeds right into the

second, “hold me down.”

“I hope you understand, everybody scams”

We are dropped right into a finessing backstory. The track feels like an old-head’s version of love that’s just respectability. The omniscient chimes flickering across the rumble of snare drums blend well with the emergence of a chorus. The thought that Atlanta is a Black-run district and can still succumb to being a police city is heartwrenching. This album personifies joy while seeing so much evil.

The third song is “balloons,” featuring Jay Electronica. Noname paints the shadow of her past pseudonyms in the first verse, reminiscing on the freshness of fame and the adrenaline rush of rising out of the mud. Jay Electra’s mid verse wields a typical hiphop machismo with some Nation of Islam rhetoric sprinkled in, and playfully mystifies his rag-to-riches story by wrapping success in righteousness. Noname’s second verse was politically hollow to me. It felt like she was talking to white people.

Who is she explaining voyeurism to?

The slam poetry circuit in Chicago runs on voyeurism, the same place that poetically birthed Noname. Picture the grimiest microphone controllers you know, but they are in high school, spitting trauma poems for snaps. You speak your truth and people score you instantly. In the 90s, niggas came up by battling in ciphers, and now young adults tap dance through literary obstacles to win nothing but local recognition.

“Analyze the gumption, monopolize the landscape she just another artist selling trauma to her fanbase”

This album’s interiority is different from her previous projects. Telefone was firmly grounded in material reality; it transports listeners sonically and philosophically into the South Side of Chicago. I listen to it when I miss home. Room 25 is a step into a meta-mindfield. In contrast, Sundial is explicitly speaking to an audience. Noname isn't playing around; she's striking out. Gumption means shrewd resourcefulness, and public performance is just that. Noname should start ignoring her white demographic because this song is preaching to a hollow choir.

The hook on “balloons” is circular, melodic, and tenderly sad. The repetition of “hit me back" reads desperate at some points and aggressive at others. The motif of balloons as tears or as sirens is prolific. Sun Ra’s influence is all over this joint! Space is the place where balloons float upwards forever. Outer space is a neverending blackness, unknown yet accessible to navigate with extreme wealth.

“boomboom” is a bomb dance track! Ayoni’s voice on the hook is inciting, groovy, and romantic. Noname skates into the melody, scatting in jazzy fashion. She pops her consonances, Ayoni’s voice swirls upbeat, and French horns blast for the conclusion. Side effects of this summer bop include whining, twerking, and juking. The bridge of the song is bouncy with

A review of Noname’s new album.

ILLUSTRATION BY VIVIAN JONES

immaculate wordplay.

“W.E.B., stay with the boys

I faded the noise, I echo infinity joy

Build and destroy, build and rebuild

Build and destroy, build and rebuild”

W.E.B. DuBois invented a model for respectability politics with his “Talented Tenth”doctrine,then changed his philosophy later in life, leading him to renounce his U.S. citizenship to live in Ghana. DuBois was a pan-Africanist and, eventually, was rocking with socialism. Other notable African American revolutionaries, such as Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr., were not rocking with capitalism either. Generational cycles of struggle, when seen in an optimistic light, can be like an echochamber of liberating critical thought. This song is political, because pleasure activism is real! Destruction before reform is change, but only with intentionality. Noname repeats the sentiments of staying close together, remembering people’s names, and exploding shit.

“potentially the interlude” is a grating and foreboding piece. The repeated line in the song reminded me of the phrase “young, gifted, and Black.” Exceptional Black children can be treated as commodities because our people were historically valuable. The phrase brings a sense of doom to adulthood. It’s a sentiment of conditional love that has been passed down. Growing up feels like a life sentence in this context. The drums are harsh and abrasive. When Noname says “happy one,” her voice distorts and echoes into the following line. The song is a chant, a feedback loop, and a sullen hymn.

“People say they love you, but they really love potential

Not the person that's in front of them, the person you'll grow into”

On the song “namesake,” Noname hopscotches delicately in a hot mess. She name-drops Jay Z, Rihanna, Beyonce, Kendrick Lamar, the NBA—and herself. Diss tracks are a part of the culture. It’s not good etiquette to throw someone’s name out there. If there’s a genuine problem, put something conclusive on wax. Noname does the exact opposite. The whole song is evasive. The beat hides the prose almost intentionally. It’s strange, because Noname’s

style echoes Kendrick Lamar—yet she’s shading him. Also, she’s dissing Jay Z, like her man’s Jay Electronica isn’t his homie. I can’t find a sense of couthness within the rhapsodic paradox.

Capitalism is the subject of criticism, and the solution is our accountability, but where’s the love ethic? Once someone falls down the intersectional rabbit hole, how do they get back home? Afrofuturism isn’t painting anti-capitalist pictures, but drafting a body of work that’s abundantly Black. Noname is alienating a lot of Black fandoms, and if she’s going to do so, I would hope she has a thesis. The song’s message is a hollow scapegoat.

“beauty supply” opens with Noname rapping in a high pitch. The beat is slinky, the saxophone hypnotizing, and the soft vocal runs are dreamy. Beauty supplies are an industry, run for us but not to buy us. It is a place of transformation yet personal

the work as a Chicago thang. Oblivion can mean unconsciousness or forgiveness. The last line of this body of work: “To oblivion we gon’ dream.”

Conscious hip-hop (or conscience hip-hop) isn’t profound because it’s anticapitalist, but due to its artful storytelling. I was taken aback when the album ended because I was just getting immersed in the soundscape. The best songs on the project are interludes, and the ending could be more climactic. The project is missing a sense of adventure, so I don’t consider it a classic like her previous albums.

Noname’s use of language is her persona, meaning she never puts on the character of a celebrity. This makes her refreshingly relatable. The thing with commerce and art is that authenticity is a double-edged sword. Words mean things, so audiences rightfully judge an

individual. Discussing the Black nationalist religion’s antisemitism, homophobia, or sexism is important, but it is not specifically relevant when discussing Noname’s art.

Still, on Sundial, Noname shames rap music’s tendency towards trauma porn—yet her work platforms someone who unapologetically uses bigoted language. Being friends with a hoe doesn’t automatically make somebody a hoe. However, the thing with capitalism is that money lies with morals. As an independent artist she intentionally curates her features. The most controversial voice on the album also being on the breakout single means she’s directly lining morally bankrupt pockets.

Sometime in July, Noname responded to her fans’ concerns via tweets. She said: “niggas legit rap about actual murder and sexual assault that they commit in real life and y’all can’t take a jay elect verse? Please drink water and be safe out here [praying hands emoji] i’ll see y’all when my album drop in a few weeks. sending love and prayers.”

policing. It’s a Black internal battle with only physical ramifications. The song’s bedrock is its chilling repetition. Hip-hop needed the song “Toxic” because it perfectly encapsulates these niggas! Noname is holding her breath in distaste, and then expels fire. The song is a ghetto fabulous spectacle. She illustrates the ages-old tale of how a terrible partner can ruin a baddie’s life. Every time she repeats “fuck you,” I feel it harder.

“afro-futurism” sounds like it’s being pulled through a subway station. Noname softly grumbles against the percussion, while the throbbing background is stiff and clunky. The lyricism was crisp, but the track felt like an interlude. Similarly, I wanted the choir to be sharper on the second to last song “gospel?” When $ilkMoney slid onto the scene discussing the Fugees-FBI connection, I was gagged. I also enjoyed the soft piano breakbeat supporting Billy Wood's verse.

“oblivion” is the last song on this almost thirty-two-minute album. Of course, Common popped up to truly complete

artist based on how they wield their sword. On Jay Electronica’s 2012 song, “Bitches and Drugs,” he refers to himself playfully as “Jaydolf Spitler.”

Influential artists should not allude to systemic injustices in vain, whether it directly affects a category of people they identify with or not. The first holocaust happened to Black people. In the spring of 1904 in modern-day Namibia, German General Lothar von Trotha of the Second Reich perpetrated genocide against the Indigenous Herero and Nama people. Adolf Hitler’s mentor, Dr. Eugen Fischer, created the medical experiments Nazis would later use in concentration camps against African people. I think it’s wrong to make light of genocide just to flex.

Anti-Blackness exists simultaneously with antisemitism because not all Jewish people are white and all people are culpable to the influence of white supremacy. Farrakhan is a problematic religious leader. I interpreted Jay’s reference to him on “balloons” as an ode to his personal religious fever, not a glorification of the specific

I have listened to NWA songs performing rape culture my entire life and I just recently watched Ladies First: A Story of Women in Hip-Hop, a documentary streaming on Netflix about the history of hip-hop. I learned how Dr. Dre publicly beat hip-hop journalist Dee Barnes. Oppression is systemic and cultural. That public force of misogynoir is rooted in and inflamed by the mass distribution of their rap music.

That example is not to say anyone is inherently violent, but to exemplify that violent language is connected to reality for a reason. Mystifying the connection between art and real life is a cheap tactic. The ability to turn brutality into beauty can be camp or it can be counter-revolutionary. It can only be a flex if disassociation is the base. Noname isn’t explicitly in the wrong, but I don’t think she’s right.

Sundial is about cultural storytelling, Black materiality, and generational progress. The music shows us what freedom isn’t and assumes the act of performance will create meaningful answers.

I’m listening, but still feel like there’s no conclusion in the room. ¬

Imani Joseph is studying creative writing and politics at Oberlin College. She works as a museum educator and novelist.

Noname is holding her breath in distaste, and then expels fire. The song is a ghetto fabulous spectacle. She illustrates the ages-old tale of how a terrible partner can ruin a baddie’s life. Every time she repeats “fuck you,” I feel it harder.

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The University of Chicago is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity/Disabled/ Veterans Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national or ethnic origin, age, status as an individual with a disability, protected veteran status, genetic information, or other protected classes under the law For additional information please see the University’s Notice of Nondiscrimination at http://www.uchicago.edu/about/ non_discrimination_statement/. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should call 773-702-0287 or email ACOppAdministrator@uchicago.edu with their request

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The University of Chicago seeks Senior Manager Technology & Innovation for various & unanticipated worksites throughout the US (HQ: Chicago, IL) to dev product strat & roadmap, detailed work plans, schedules, proj estimates, resource plans, & status reports rel’d to social sci research, instruct design, & ed tech proj’s Bachelors in

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The University of Chicago is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity/Disabled/ Veterans Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity national or ethnic origin, age, status as an individual with a disability protected veteran status, genetic information, or other protected classes under the law For additional information please see the University’s Notice of Nondiscrimination at http://www.uchicago.edu/about/non_ discrimination_statement/. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should call 773-702-0287 or emailACOppAdministrator@uchicago.edu with their request

Dying and Disabled Illinois Prisoners Kept Behind Bars

BY CARLOS BALLESTEROS (INJUSTICE

This article was produced by WBEZ, Chicago’s NPR news station, and Injustice Watch, a nonprofit news organization in Chicago focused on issues of equity and justice in the court system. Reprinted with permission.

Phillip Merritt’s dementia is so advanced he’s lost the ability to speak. But with the help of his cellmates at Western Illinois Correctional Center, the seventy-one-year-old still manages to get on the phone with his brother every few weeks.

“He has to have someone call me, and then I don’t know what to say to him because he can’t understand anything, so I’ll just talk,” said Merritt’s brother, Michael Merritt, in an interview. “All he can say are two words. … I mean, he’s just gone.”

Merritt’s deteriorating condition makes him a prime candidate to get out of prison under the Joe Coleman Medical Release Act, a pivotal criminal justice reform bill touted by Gov. JB Pritzker and Illinois Democrats as an effective way to alleviate the state’s decrepit prison health care system, reduce the “staggering” costs of caring for ailing people in prison, and reunite families with frail loved ones.

Under the act—named after a decorated Army veteran who died of prostate cancer while incarcerated—Illinois prisoners can request early release if they’re terminally ill and expected to die within eighteen months or if they’re medically incapacitated and need help with more than one activity of daily living, such as eating or using the bathroom.

But a year-and-a-half since the Coleman Act went into effect, an investigation by Injustice Watch and WBEZ found far fewer prisoners have been released under the law than expected, as the medical release process has become mired in the charged politics of criminal justice reform in the post-George Floyd era.

Behind the lower-than-expected numbers is the Prisoner Review Board, a state body appointed by Pritzker and confirmed by the Illinois Senate with final say on medical release requests.

As of mid-August, the board had denied nearly two-thirds of medical release

requests from dying and disabled prisoners who met the medical criteria to get out of prison under the Coleman Act—including Merritt.

“I couldn’t believe it,” his brother said. “How could they deny him? He can’t even talk!”

More than half of the ninety-four denied applicants were older than age sixty, and half had spent at least fifteen years behind bars, according to an analysis of state prison data. At least two died in prison, including an eighty-one-year-old who had been incarcerated for more than three decades and was scheduled to be released in 2025. Another man died five

days before the board denied his request.

Meanwhile, the Prisoner Review Board has only granted fifty-two medical releases—a rate of fewer than three releases per month on average since board members began voting on those requests, records show.

Advocates say the board is undermining the Coleman Act and forcing ill-equipped prison staff to care for dying and disabled prisoners, even those with families practically begging to take them off their hands.

“Our prison system is now completely overburdened by people who pose absolutely no risk to public safety but are tremendously expensive to care for,” said Jennifer Soble, lead author of the Coleman Act and executive director of the Illinois Prison Project, a nonprofit legal group that represents dozens of medical release applicants.

“From a cost-saving perspective, from a government-efficiency perspective, and truly from a moral perspective, we need to be doing something differently here,” she said.

Donald Shelton, chair of the Prisoner Review Board, declined an interview request, but he defended the board’s record on medical release requests in an email sent through a spokesperson.

“Each case that comes before the board comes with its own set of circumstances to be studied and evaluated by members,” he wrote. “Due diligence is given by the board to every person who sets a petition before them.”

A day after this story was first

WATCH), SHANNON HEFFERNAN (WBEZ), AMY QIN (WBEZ)

Environmental activists on the last couple of years, the progression of their organizing, and what they want to see next.

Illinois’ medical release law was supposed to reduce the “staggering” costs of caring for ailing people in prison and reunite families with frail loved ones. But so far just a few dozen dying and disabled prisoners have been released. ILLUSTRATION BY VERÓNICA MARTÍNEZ

published, Pritzker defended the board’s decisions in medical release cases.

“The Coleman Act is, in fact, being carried out as it should be,” Pritzker said when asked to respond to Injustice Watch and WBEZ’s reporting at a press conference.

“I’ve encouraged the Prisoner Review Board to do the right thing, to encourage release wherever it’s appropriate,” the governor added. “But we’re not just going to push everybody out the door just because there’s somebody who complains that we haven’t done it the way they would like it done.”

More medical releases could save taxpayers millions

It’s unclear exactly how many of Illinois’ nearly 30,000 prisoners could qualify for medical release. Under the Coleman Act, the Illinois Department of Corrections is required to keep track of that number, but department officials said they don’t have it yet. A department spokesperson said the data would be published by year’s end.

What is clear, from years of scathing reports from an independent monitor appointed by a federal judge, is Illinois prisons are unfit to provide health care for the thousands of aging, disabled and incapacitated prisoners.

Half of the state’s prison medical staff jobs are currently vacant. Prisoners with mobility issues suffer bed sores and frequent falls because no one is around to care for them. Some are even left sitting in their own waste, according to the monitor’s reports.

“Prescriptions go unrenewed, cancers go undiagnosed. In the worst cases, as everyone here knows, people die painful deaths because of the lack of care,” attorney Camille Bennett with the ACLU of Illinois said at a recent hearing on health care in state prisons.

Even this substandard care is expensive. Illinois paid $250 million last fiscal year to Wexford Health Sources, a for-profit company contracted to provide health care to state prisoners, according to state records.

Wexford’s ten-year contract expired in 2021, but the company continues providing care as Illinois seeks new bidders.

Releasing more people under the Coleman Act could bring down the long-term cost of prison health care, said Alan Mills, executive director of the Uptown People’s Law Center, a legal clinic in Chicago whose lawsuits against the state led to the appointment of the independent monitor.

“The more prisoners there are who are medically needy, the higher the cost of caring for them, and the higher the bids will be,” Mills said.

Conversely, if the Prisoner Review

average to incarcerate a single person for a year. Experts say terminally ill and incapacitated prisoners are much more expensive to care for. Prisoners whose medical needs can’t be met in prison infirmaries are escorted to and from hospitals by guards. With prisons shortstaffed, officers already routinely require overtime pay.

By refusing to release more ailing prisoners, the Prisoner Review Board is also making it harder for prison medical

But prisoners often wait weeks or months to know whether they’ll qualify, records show. In one case, a prisoner at Illinois River Correctional Center waited 152 days before finding out he didn’t qualify for release, records show.

Prison medical staff have said 240 prisoners who applied were unqualified for medical release. At least a handful of those prisoners lived in a prison infirmary, used wheelchairs, or had terminal diseases like end-stage liver disease; and at least three died in prison, records show.

There are other frail and disabled prisoners who don’t see a doctor on a regular basis, “so there’s no way for the doctors to know about their condition,” Soble said.

Michael Merritt knows the limitations of the prison health care system all too well. His brother Phillip Merritt hasn’t received proper medical treatment in prison for years, he said, and he’s afraid of what could happen as his brother’s dementia worsens.

He wishes the state would let his brother die at home, where his family can take turns caring for him, instead of a prison cell, where he’s unsure whether there’s anyone to properly look after him.

“I don’t know what the problem is,” Merritt said. “They know they can’t take care of him in there the way he is supposed to be taken care of.”

Medical release decisions dictated by politics

The Prisoner Review Board never told Merritt why they denied his brother’s medical release request. Their deliberations happen behind closed doors, and the law doesn’t require them to provide an explanation.

Board approved more medical releases, the cost savings for taxpayers in the long term could be in the millions, Mills said.

Daniel Conn, chief executive of Wexford Health Sources, did not respond to an interview request. LaToya Hughes, acting director of the Illinois Department of Corrections, declined to comment.

There are other, more immediate savings for Illinois taxpayers if more ailing prisoners were released, Mills said.

A recent government report showed Illinois spends more than $76,000 on

staff to care for everyone else, Mills said.

“What limited resources we have are being devoted to people who are most seriously mentally or physically ill, and that doesn’t leave any health care for anybody else at all,” he said.

At the same time, the overburdened health care system is also blocking more prisoners from getting out under the Coleman Act.

Prisoners must be found qualified for medical release by a prison doctor or nurse before the board votes on their case.

Board chair Shelton said members weigh many factors when voting on medical release requests, but they primarily focus on an applicants’ prior convictions, where they plan to live once they’re released, and testimonies from the victims of their crimes.

An analysis of the board’s decisions shows there’s likely another factor at play: politics.

Under state law, the board is required to be roughly evenly split between Democrats and Republicans. The twelve current members include former law

By refusing to release more ailing prisoners, the Prisoner Review Board is also making it harder for prison medical staff to care for everyone else, Mills said.

JUSTICE

enforcement officials, educators, attorneys, and counselors. Pritzker appoints all board members, who are then confirmed by the state Senate.

Medical release requests are decided by panels of three board members; at least two must agree to either approve or deny a request. Shelton said board members are “chosen randomly” for the panels.

But so far, Republicans have cast more votes in medical release cases than Democrats—and they are much more likely to vote to deny those requests, an analysis of voting data shows.

Three out of the four board members with the highest denial rates—Jared Bohland, Kenneth Tupy, and LeAnn Miller—are Republicans. Each of them voted to deny release in more than seventy percent of the cases they heard, and each voted on more than a third of all medical release requests, voting data shows.

Bohland and Tupy, along with Democrat Matthew Coates, were on the panel that denied Phillip Merritt’s medical release request in July. They voted to deny six out of seven requests that day, records show.

A month earlier, Bohland was part of another panel, this time with two other Democrats, when they heard the case of eighty-two-year-old Saul Colbert.

Like Merritt, Colbert developed dementia while serving time for armed robbery. They both also had previous violent convictions, records show; Merritt had a conviction for attempted murder, while Colbert was convicted of murder.

Both had family ready to take them in, and both were represented by the same attorney with the Illinois Prison Project. But the board voted two-one to release Colbert, with Bohland voting against.

“The only difference between those cases was the panel,” Soble said.

Through a spokesperson, Bohland, Tupy, and Miller declined to answer questions about their voting records.

Lisa Daniels, a former board member and a restorative justice practitioner, said she believes some of her former colleagues are ideologically against letting anyone out of prison early.

They “simply believe that a person should complete the entirety of their sentence, no matter the circumstances they present in their petition, no matter how that person may have shown themselves to be redeemed, and no matter (if they’re) no longer a threat to public safety,” Daniels said.

Daniels resigned from the board in January, one of six Democrats to step down or fail to be appointed since 2021. In the past few years, the state GOP has turned the board into a new front in the ongoing debate over criminal justice reform.

Democrats, who have a supermajority in the state Senate, have failed to muster enough support among their ranks to get Pritzker’s appointments through, leaving the board with three vacant seats.

Pritzker declined an interview request before this story was first published.

But in the press conference last month, he expressed confidence that board members “are people who care deeply about criminal justice reform (and) who care deeply about making sure that we’re being fair to prisoners—and to the community in which we’re releasing people.”

In a statement sent in response to follow-up questions, Pritzker’s

spokesperson said “there are undoubtedly improvements that should be discussed among stakeholders and the General Assembly as the law continues to be implemented.”

encourage the Prisoner Review Board to release more people.

Lawmakers should require board members to visit prison infirmaries to see firsthand the state of prison health care, advocates said. The board should also receive more training on how to evaluate the medical conditions of prisoners applying for release.

Advocates also want the state to provide prisoners who are applying for medical release with an attorney to argue their case. Guzzardi said he’ll advocate for funding for that in the upcoming fall legislative session.

Lawmakers should also allow prisoners to reapply for medical release sooner than currently allowed, said William Nissen, an attorney who represents prisoners pro bono, including on medical release requests.

Prisoners denied medical release currently have to wait six months before they can reapply, unless they get a special exemption from the board. Shelton has only approved three out of ten requests so far, according to figures provided by the board’s chief legal counsel.

Coleman

Act has ‘failed to live up to its promise’

The day Pritzker signed the Coleman Act, its main sponsor, state Rep. Will Guzzardi, D-Chicago, said in a press release the law would transform Illinois’ prison system and allow families to properly say goodbye to their loved ones.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t afford this mercy to Joe Coleman, but I’m proud that we’ll be able to do so for hundreds of other Illinoisans,” Guzzardi said.

Criminal justice reformers celebrated the Coleman Act as a model for other states to follow. In a report last year, FAMM, a prominent national advocacy group, said the Coleman Act was one of the strongest “compassionate release” laws in the country.

But so far, the act has “failed to live up to its promise,” said Mary Price, FAMM’s general counsel and the report’s author.

Advocates want lawmakers to institute several changes to the Coleman Act to

“If you’re representing a terminally ill person, then a large part of their remaining life is gone before you can even apply again,” Nissen said.

Nissen said lawmakers should also require the board to explain why they denied a medical release to “instill a certain amount of discipline in the decisionmaking process.” If board members have to articulate their reason for denying someone release, maybe they’ll reconsider the decision, he said.

Phillip Merritt’s attorney is in the process of refiling his medical release request. His brother Michael doesn’t know whether he’ll get out this time. And he hasn’t been able to reach Phillip in three weeks— the cellmate who had helped facilitate the calls was apparently transferred.

But he’s certain he and his family can give Phillip a more humane send-off than any prison could.

“At least he could go peacefully,” he said. ¬

WBEZ reporter Alex Degman contributed reporting.

Jennifer Soble, founder and executive director of the Illinois Prison Project, a nonprofit that advocated for the Joe Coleman Medical Release Act and represents prisoners seeking release.

PHOTO BY MANUEL MARTINEZ / WBEZ

BULLETIN

Envisioning Liberation Exhibit

Opening

Inner-City Muslim Action Network, 2745

W. 63rd St. Friday, September 22, 7pm–10pm. Free.

bit.ly/EnvisioningLiberationOpening

Join the Inner-City Muslim Action Network to celebrate the opening of Envisioning Liberation: An Exhibit on Healing, Resistance and Imagination curated by local artist and arts activist Shirien Creates, with a special performance by IMAN Roster Artist and Lakota Rapper Frank Waln. Hors d’oeuvres and drinks will be served. (Zoe Pharo)

Rising Tide Equinox Social

Promontory Point, 5491 S. DuSable

Lake Shore Dr. Saturday, September 23,

5pm–9pm. Free. bit.ly/EquinoxSocial

Rising Tide Chicago, a midwest climate activism coalition, is hosting an equinox social with bonfires, music, food and climate conversation “about stress and abundance.” Discussion will be followed by a radical book swap, arts and crafts and time to socialize.

Masks are required. (Zoe Pharo)

Chicago Water Lantern Festival

Humboldt Park, 1400 N. Humboldt Dr. Saturday, September 23, 5:30pm–9:30pm.

Tickets are $27 in advance and $56 at the door. bit.ly/ChicagoWaterLanternFestival

The Chicago Water Lantern Festival is a family-friendly event that allows participants to design their own lantern and launch it, lighting up the water. The event will also feature food trucks and music. (Zoe Pharo)

EDUCATION

Finding True Happiness

Whitney M. Young, Jr. Branch, Chicago Public Library, 415 E. 79th St. Saturday, September 23, 2pm–4pm. Free. bit.ly/FindingTrueHappinessevent

Meaningful Conversations South Side Chicago is hosting a virtual conversation on what it means to be “happy,” meaning one that is not just temporary but that also nourishes and develops us. This conversation will discuss the spiritual perspective offered by the Bahá’í teachings on true happiness and how to nourish it in our individual and collective lives. (Zoe Pharo)

Book Club Run/Bike of Isabel Wilkerson’s The Warmth of Other Suns

South Shore Cultural Center, 7059 South Shore Dr. Saturday, September 23, 2pm–4pm. Participation is on a sliding scale, a $20 donation is encouraged.

bit.ly/BookClubWilkerson

Join Read & Run Chicago and Chicago nonprofit the L.Y.D. Foundation for the final installment of a three-part series inspired by Isabel Wilkerson’s “The Warmth of Other Suns,” which traces the history of three African Americans from the U.S. South. This series focuses on Ida Mae Brandon Gladney, a Mississippi-born woman who leaves Chickasaw County Mississippi and eventually lands in Bronzeville, Chicago. Runners should read the indicated sections in the registration link prior to the run. (Zoe Pharo)

Early Preservation in Chicago: Challenges and

movement in 1960s Chicago, focusing on issues connected to the Pullman legacy. This includes events such as the designation of the first historic districts, of which Pullman was the third in the city, and most recent preservation efforts at Second Presbyterian Church, where the Pullman family worshiped. (Zoe Pharo)

South Side Science Festival

Gordon Center for Integrative Science, University of Chicago, 929 E. 57th St. Saturday, September 30, 12pm–7pm. Free. bit.ly/SouthSideScienceFest

The second annual University of Chicagoheld South Side Science Festival features an afternoon and evening of fun science exchanges, live experiments and demonstrations, food and music. All ages welcome. (Zoe Pharo)

ARTS

Chicago South Asian Film Festival

ShowPlace ICON Theatre & Kitchen at Roosevelt Collection, 1011 South Delano Court East. Thursday, September 21–Sunday, September 24, 11:30am–10:30pm. Tickets for individual screenings start at $10. www.csaff.org/

The 13th Annual Chicago South Asian Film Festival will screen premieres, hold panel discussions, give out various awards and provide other opportunities for filmmakers and film lovers to connect over films from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Singapore, Vietnam and a number of other different countries. (Zoe Pharo)

DuSummer Jazz: Simone Green

The DuSable Black History Museum and Education Center, Roundhouse Plaza, 740 E. 56th Pl. Thursday, September 21, 7pm–9pm. Tickets are $20. bit.ly/DuSummer

community. (Zoe Pharo)

10th Annual Latin American Guitar Festival

Piano Forte, 1335 S. Michigan Ave. Friday, September 22, 9pm–10:30pm. Free. bit.ly/LatinAmericanGuitarFest

The 10th Annual Latin American Guitar Festival features artists from Mexico and Argentina: Ivan Resendiz, Lucie Delahaye, Atanacio Enriquez and Cutberto Cibrian performing classical guitar with a repertoire from Latin-American composers from the baroque style to contemporary. The festival will also offer master classes and lectures.

(Zoe Pharo)

Beverly Art Walk

Between 95th Street at Damen Avenue and 111th Street. Saturday, September 23, 1pm–6pm. Free. bit.ly/BeverlyArtWalk

The 10th Annual Beverly Art Walk brings the free family-friendly festival of art, creativity and music to the Beverly and Morgan Park neighborhoods, featuring the works of 200 artists across forty venues. The day features a craft market, a street painting festival, live music and public art activations. Use the online guide and interactive map to navigate the art walk. (Zoe Pharo)

The Magic Carpet at Kenwood Gardens

Kenwood Gardens, 6929 S. Kenwood Ave. Saturday, September 23, 7pm–9pm. Free. bit.ly/MagicCarpetKenwood

The free concert series at Kenwood Gardens continues. Next up is Chicago ensemble Magic Carpet, which “honors ancient music while taking a bold step into the future,” blending jazz, funk and reggae with the musical traditions of Africa, India and the Middle East. (Zoe Pharo)

University of Chicago and the Hyde Park Jazz Society returns this year, with a highlight on female artists. The festival takes place at a variety of venues across Hyde Park and features artists such as the Bethany Pickens Trio, Meagan McNeal, Sam Thousand & Justin Dillard, Melanie Charles with special guest Marquis Hill, Tomeka Reid and Junius Paul and more. One performance will also pay tribute to 40 years of the South Loop establishment, the Velvet Lounge. (Zoe Pharo)

Soule of the Arts

Zhou B. Art Center, 1029 W. 35th St. Sunday, September 24, 4:30pm–9pm. Tickets are $25 for presale artist-sold tickets and $30 at the door. bit.ly/SouleOfTheArts

Soule of the Arts brings and event highlighting sneaker culture, in collaboration with other artists — poets, musicians, vocalists, sketch artists, painters, sculptors and more. All will work together alongside the audience to develop a presentation to be showcased in the evening’s finale, and each individual artist will also produce their own artwork, some of which will be available for purchase. (Zoe Pharo)

Jazz’n on the Steps

St. Moses the Black Parish, 331 E. 71st St. Sunday, September 24, 5pm. Free. bit.ly/JazzOnTheSteps

The South Side Jazz Coalition is hosting a series of free monthly jazz performances this summer on the steps of St. Moses the Black Parish in Greater Grand Crossing. Bring a lawn chair, snacks and hear music from the Chicago jazz community. Each performance ends in a jam session. (Zoe Pharo)

Wordfetti Open Mic

Bethany Union Church of Chicago, 1750 W. 103rd St. Sunday, September 24, 6pm. Free. bit.ly/WordfettiOpenMic

Arts Lawn Grand Opening

The Arts Lawn, 337 E. Garfield Blvd. Saturday, October 7, 3pm–8pm. Free. bit.ly/ArtsLawnOpening

Arts + Public Life, an initiative of UChicago Arts at the University of Chicago, will announce the grand opening of The Arts Lawn, nearly an acre of green space to Garfield Boulevard and the Washington Park neighborhood. This new outdoor venue features a performance pavilion, native garden, rain garden, great lawn and a vending. The inaugural ceremony will include remarks from leadership from the University of Chicago and the City of Chicago, performances by Kuumba Lynx and a South Side Marching Band. The day will also feature family activities and a photo booth by Glitter Buts, and the evening will conclude with an outside screening of a short film by D-Composed. The first 50 people to arrive will receive free. Bags. (Zoe Pharo)

Black Harvest Film Festival

Gene Siskel Film Center, 164 N. State St. Friday, November 3–Thursday, November 16, 7:01pm–6:01pm. Festival passes are $30 for members and $60 for the general public. bit.ly/BlackHarvestFilmFest

The 29th Annual Black Harvest Film Festival will showcase films that “celebrate, explore, and share the Black, African American, and African Diaspora experience.” This year’s festival highlights “Revolutionary Visions,” the history, politics and art honoring the legacy of revolutionary struggle across the diaspora, and the intersectionality of Black experiences worldwide. This year’s festival is being curated by Jada-Amina and Nick Leffel, in honor of film critic and Black Harvest Film Festival co-founder and consultant Sergio Mims, who passed away last fall, this year the Gene Siskel Film Center is also establishing the Sergio Mims Fund for Black Excellence in Filmmaking. Festival lineup coming in early October. (Zoe Pharo)