February 22 - 28, 2021 Vol. 29 No. 08
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Arts & (Home) Entertainment
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SportsWise
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Cover Story: Jean Baptiste Pointe dusable
We are replacing our usual calendar with virtual events and recommendations from StreetWise vendors, readers and staff to keep you entertained at home! Discovering Negro League baseball team, the Chicago American Giants.
StreetWise celebrates Black History Month with the story of Chicago's first non-indigenous settler: the Haitian-French Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable, who was educated and charismatic.
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From the Streets
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Inside StreetWise
The Cook County Board unanimously passes the Residential Tenant Landlord Ordinance (RTLO), giving 245,000 households the same protections that exist in Chicago, Evanston and Mount Prospect. Vendor A. Allen shares his thoughts on DuSable's legacy.
The Playground ON THE COVER: A mural featuring Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable in Hyde Park by Rahmann Barnes, part of a 2008 work entitled "Instinctive Movement" (Susan Hack photo). THIS PAGE: The DuSable statue, created by Erik Blome in 2009, was donated to the Chicago Public Art Collection by Lesley Benodin to commemorate DuSable (CVB photo).
Dave Hamilton, Creative Director/Publisher
dhamilton@streetwise.org
StreetWiseChicago @StreetWise_CHI
Suzanne Hanney, Editor-In-Chief
suzannestreetwise@yahoo.com
Amanda Jones, Director of programs
ajones@streetwise.org
Julie Youngquist, Executive director
jyoungquist@streetwise.org
Ph: 773-334-6600 Office: 2009 S. State St., Chicago, IL, 60616
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ARTS & (HOME) ENTERTAINMENT RECOMMENDATIONS Since being stuck inside, which shows have you been watching? Which movies? Have you read any good books lately? Any new music releases have you dancing in your living room? StreetWise vendors, readers and staff are sharing what is occupying their attention during this unprecedented time. To be featured in a future edition, send your recommendations of things to do at home and why you love them to: Creative Director / Publisher Dave Hamilton at dhamilton@streetwise.org
Author Talk!
Virtual Author Reading: 'Dear Black Girl' by Tamara Winfrey Harris In "Dear Black Girl," Winfrey Harris organizes a selection of letters, providing "a balm for the wounds of anti-black-girlness" and modeling how black women can nurture future generations. Each chapter ends with a prompt encouraging girls to write a letter to themselves, teaching the art of self-love and self-nurturing. Winfrey Harris's "The Sisters Are Alright" explores how black women must often fight and stumble their way into alrightness after adulthood. "Dear Black Girl" continues this work by delivering pro-black, feminist, LGBTQ+ positive, and body-positive messages for black women-to-be--and for the girl who still lives inside every black woman who still needs reminding sometimes that she is alright. Join this free virtual author reading on February 23 at 6 p.m. Register at www.crowdcast.io/e/dearblackgirl/register
(HOME) ENTERTAINMENT
Dancing as Art!
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'Interim Avoidance' The dancers of The Joffrey Ballet have found themselves all dressed up with nowhere to perform. Six dancers emerge in a void, unsure of their purpose. A beam of red light beckons them like a stage manager on opening night, offering a moment of respite from their collective solitude. Never ones to give up an opportunity, they launch into the movements and shapes for which they have trained for so long. A determination to bring joy, to excite, to spark inspiration with dance, the performers urge us all to remember that even in the darkest times, loneliness is nothing more than an "Interim Avoidance." The project "Interim Avoidance" seeks to provide a sense of closeness during the waning days of the pandemic. It is the inaugural work by the Chicago-based production company Action Lines, in partnership with The Joffrey Ballet. The exhibit is open to the public through April 30. Visit 150mediastream.com for viewing hours and more information.
Save the Earth from Home!
How to Avoid a Climate Disaster with Bill Gates In this urgent, authoritative book, “How to Avoid a Climate Disaster,” Bill Gates sets out a wide-ranging, practical—and accessible—plan for how the world can get to zero greenhouse gas emissions in time to avoid a climate catastrophe. Gates has spent a decade investigating the causes and effects of climate change. With the help of experts in the fields of physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, political science, and finance, he has focused on what must be done in order to stop the planet’s slide toward certain environmental disaster. In this book, he not only explains why we need to work toward net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases, but also details what we need to do to achieve this profoundly important goal. Gates joins Chicago Humanities Festival on February 25 at 7 p.m. for a conversation about the solutions we have and the breakthroughs we need to save the planet. Tickets are $36 and include a copy of the book at semcoop.com/bill-gates-event-book-ticket
Streaming Theater!
'Where did we sit on the bus?' Jeff Award-winner Brian Quijada's “W here Did We Sit on the Bus?,” directed by Chay Yew, returns for a two-week streaming engagement! Co-presented with Geva Theatre Center in New York, this electric one-man show is pulsing with Latin rhythms, rap, hip-hop, spoken word, and live looping. Originally recorded during its performance run in spring 2017 as part of VG's "Up Close and Personal series," “W here Did We Sit on the Bus?” made its world premiere in 2016 at Teatro Vista and won multiple Jeff Awards, including Best Solo Performance and Best Sound Design. During a third grade lesson on the Civil Rights movement and Rosa Parks, a Latino boy raises his hand to ask, “W here did we sit on the bus?” and his teacher can’t answer the question. This autobiographical production examines what it means to be Latino through the eyes of a child, turned teenager, turned adult. The show is availible for streaming starting February 22 to March 7. Streams are $30 for the general public and $10 for students. Visit victorygardens.org for booking and more information. .
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At One with Nature!
Virtual Winter Tree ID Walk Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter – learn about city trees throughout the seasons with Openlands. Participants will virtually explore the trees of beautiful and historic Garfield Park. Register at https://garfieldconservatory.org/event/virtual-tree-id-walk-winter/. Interested children are welcome, but must be accompanied by an adult. Pre-registration is required to send the link. The program is free but donations are appreciated to offset programming costs. All donations will be split 50/50 between the non-profit educational organization Openlands and Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance. Registration closes at 10 a.m. February 26. Automated live captioning is available.
Shakespeare's Bloodiest Play!
Macbeth and the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 To many modern audiences, “Macbeth” is about personal ambition and revenge. Yet Shakespeare’s tragedy also engages directly, though subtly, with the politics of Elizabethan England—and especially the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, in which a group of English Catholics conspired to blow up Parliament and kill King James I. In this virtual program on February 23 at 4 p.m., actress Erin Sloan will speak with members of the Shakespeare Project of Chicago about how the real-life events of the Gunpowder Plot and the figure of conspirator Guy Fawkes wove their way into Shakespeare’s bloodiest play. The event hosted by the Newberry Library is free, but registration is required. Reserve your spot at www.newberry.org/programs-and-events
Stand-out Architecture
Historic Tours of the Auditorium Theatre The Auditorium Theatre, designed by famed architects Louis Sullivan and Dankmar Adler, opened on Dec. 9, 1889, and was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1975. Historic Tours take patrons behind the scenes to view it as few do. The tour includes legendary accounts of how and why the theatre was built; stories of the many artists who graced its historic stage; and a closer look at the brilliant 24-karat gold-leafed ceiling arches, hundreds of Sullivan’s beautifully restored intricate stencil patterns, the stained glass muses at the entrance, and murals by Charles Holloway and Albert Fleury. Visit tickets.auditoriumtheatre.org to book a socially-distanced tour until May 24 for $15.
-Compiled by Hannah Ross
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Vendors Russ Adams, John Hagan and Donald Morris chat about the world of sports with Executive Assistant Patrick Edwards.
SPORTSWISE
Baseball's
great
Patrick: Some weeks back, a gentleman I will refer to as Sc (StreetWise customer) called the office and noted he didn’t want to tell us how to run our magazine, but it would behoove us to write about the Chicago American Giants, an originally-independent Black baseball team, that, eventually (in 1920), became a Negro Leagues’ team. To be honest, I’d never heard of the team; I’d heard of the Negro Leagues, but not the Giants. According to Sc, an 85-yearold white man from the North Side and a longtime StreetWise customer (Gwendolyn Freeman is his vendor), the Giants were THE best team in Chicago for a time. Initially, they played at South Side Park (West 38th place and South Princeton avenue) through 1940; 1941-1956, the team shared Comiskey Park with the White Sox (showcasing there when the Sox were traveling). Sc and his family would attend the games, and, every time, until he finally asked about it, he would curiously stare at the stands full of only white people in suits—no other obvious races in sight. The next day, he would wonder why the game was never reported in
Chicago American Giants
the main newspapers—only the Chicago Defender newspaper carried it. Unfortunately, instead of a true, all-out, separate-butequal situation, disparities continued. It’s one thing to be civil in one’s own space, but if the one in power fights against a change, e.g., someone from the less-powerful faction wants the opportunity to play in the “power” league, then that’s a problem. When Major League Baseball (MLB) began opening its doors to those of all races— especially Blacks—there was a struggle on all sides. From the Negro Leagues’ side, specifically in the case the American Giants, the owner instructed the team to sign white players in order to keep the Black players on the team from defecting to the Majors. The Chicago American Giants' last year as an organization was 1956. 1947 was the year that Jackie
Robinson officially broke the major league color line. He signed the contract in 1945 and, officially, joined the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1947. So, the Dodgers were the first; the Boston Red Sox last in 1957. Today, we celebrate the improvement over the past seven decades, but there is still much needed change in regard to Major League Baseball's racial breakdown on front office positions, including managerial and coaching spots. Patrick: I can’t help but to think back to those Black players who, though they enjoyed success in the Negro Leagues and elsewhere, were denied the opportunity to play in the majors. While I’m buoyed by the fact that diversity is becoming more naturally-attained, that the physical breakdown of the racist wall wasn’t that long ago is still troubling.
John: Well, I have to agree that it is troubling that it really wasn’t that long ago when Robinson broke the barrier. When he did break the color line, it was a watershed moment not only in baseball, but in all of sports. That he was able to disprove the notion with his talent, plus the gelling of Black and white teammates, shows us that, overall, sports is a unifying tool. Donald: Mr. Jackie Robinson was chosen to be the one because of not only his physical talents, but also because he was believed capable of enduring the hate that would be hurled at him. To this day, Robinson continues to work hard for Black empowerment. Russ: Here’s to you, Jackie Robinson, for helping to lead us into a new phase. Any comments or suggestions? Email pedwards@streetwise.org
#KNOWTHEPAST #SHAPETHEFUTURE #YWCAEEI
SAVE THE DATE!
BLACK HISTORY MONTH SERIES
The History + Future of Black Wealth WEDNESDAYS| FEBRUARY 2021 12PM CST
Follow: @ywcachicago Economic Empowerment Institute
THE LEGACY OF CHICAGO'S FIRST NON-INDIGENOUS SETTLER
JEAN BAPTISTE POINTE DUSABLE by Suzanne Hanney
The Haitian-Frenchman Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable is important not only as Chicago’s first nonindigenous settler, but because he established a new European trading network with native peoples on top of their existing ones, says Dr. Christopher Reed, emeritus professor of history at Roosevelt University and Black Chicago expert on WTTW’s “DuSable to Obama” website. “He lived like a Frenchman even though he was a mixedblood person,” Reed said. “Think in terms of a charismatic figure who could get along with everyone and make money and have paintings on his walls and eat off of china and pewter. He could have been ‘The Bachelor’ if he wasn’t married. Think of somebody who looks like [President] Obama. He was a cosmopolite.” DuSable was born about 1745 to an African slave and a French mariner, and was possibly educated in France, according to the WTTW website. He spoke French, English, Spanish and several Native American dialects, which served him both as a trader and negotiator. In the early 1770s, he sailed to New Orleans and then traveled up the Mississippi River to Cahokia, where he married Kittihawa (Christian name Catherine) in a Potawatomi ceremony and later, a Catholic one. They had two children, Jean Baptiste Point DuSable Jr. and Suzanne.
Above: There are no known portraits of Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable made during his lifetime. This depiction is taken from A. T. Andreas' book History of Chicago (1884). Right: The Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable stamp was issued Feb. 20, 1987 in the year of the 150th birthday of Chicago (United States Postal Service). Opposite Page: Map of the United States as it was from 1795 to 1796 (Golbez Gallery).
By 1780, DuSable had settled on the north bank of the Chicago River at about what is now Pioneer Court, (the area between Tribune Tower and the Apple store), but his land extended as far west as what is now State Street and as far north as Chicago Avenue. Suzanne’s wedding to Jean Baptiste Pelletier in 1790, and the birth of their daughter Eulalia in 1796 at the homestead, were Chicago’s first nonindigenous marriage and birth, according to the National Park Service application for Pioneer Court historic status in 1975. Otherwise, there are no monuments to DuSable in Chicago. Late last year, the Chicago City Council proposed renaming Lake Shore Drive after DuSable; Transportation Committee Chair Ald. Howard Brookins (21st ward), said a vote could come by April. Meanwhile, a 3.4-acre parcel of land at the mouth of the Chicago River near Ogden Slip was set aside for DuSable Park in 1987 by Mayor Harold Washington. The site has undergone environmental remediation for radioactive thorium, a byproduct of a past lamp factory there, but it is otherwise dormant. DuSable put down roots over two decades and traded goods like metal pots that he received from his French network as well as items produced at his own homestead, Reed said. His customers were British and French explorers and traders, and members of the Potawatomi, Chippewa and Miami tribes.
“The key thing to remember is that this is all documented, not subject to conjecture,” Reed said. “For the longest period, up to 100 years ago, people were saying that DuSable was part of legend and myths.” The earliest reference to DuSable’s Chicago residency is Arent Schuyler DePeyster’s description of him as a “handsome” Black man, “well-educated and settled at Eschikagou but much in the French interest” in a “Speech to the Western Indians” DePeyster claimed to have made on July 4, 1779. DePeyster had been a British officer who commanded posts in northern Michigan and Detroit and who retired to Scotland after the Revolutionary War ended in 1783. The speech appeared in “Miscellanies,” his 1813 autobiographical volume of fanciful verse. But while he may have set up an outpost here in 1778 or 1779, the DuSable Heritage Association says that DuSable was arrested in 1779 during the American Revolutionary War by the British lieutenant Thomas Bennett and sent to Fort Mackinac. Released for good character after several months, he managed The Pinery, a British trading post on the St. Clair River near what is now Port Huron, Mich. He remained there until 1783 or 84, when he returned to Chicago.
DuSable was prosperous, as shown by the inventory of his property when he sold it to Jean Lalime in May 1800, Reed noted. He owned a 40-foot by 22-foot wooden house; a 20foot by 18-foot bakehouse, a millstone for grinding grain, a 10-foot-square dairy, an 8-foot-square smokehouse, a 15-foot-square poultry house, a workshop, a stable and a barn. His livestock holdings included 30 head of grown cattle and two spring calves, 38 hogs, two mules and 44 hens, according to the French document quoted by Milo M. Quaife in the Mississippi Valley Historical Review in June 1928 (but only discovered in a Detroit archive in 1913). Interior furnishings included a large feather bed, several copper kettles, a French walnut cabinet with four glass doors, a couch and seven chairs, two mirrors, two pictures, a pair of candlesticks, 20 large wooden dishes, pewter basins, various household and farm tools and two bullet molds. Why did DuSable leave in 1800? There is one theory that having lived among the Potawatomi and married within the tribe, DuSable was disappointed when he was not elected a subchief, Reed said. Another possibility is that DuSable’s wife died. www.streetwise.org
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Left: Drawing of the former home of Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable in Chicago as it appeared in the early 1800s. Right: A map of the Chicago Portage at the Chicago Portage National Historic Site. Examples of the Portage site in March, when it is wetter (Rick Drew photo) and swampier in August (Alan Scott Walker photo).
But the biggest reason was likely that he saw American settlement coming and he knew that “Americans after 1795 had no interest in seeing a non-American, wealthy Black man controlling trade in this area,” Reed said. The year 1795 was important because that’s when native tribes surrendered their land rights after being defeated by an American army at the Battle of Fallen Timbers the previous year. The American colonies had been settled along the Atlantic seaboard, but the Treaty of Greenville opened up the Northwest Territory, which became the states of Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin and Illinois. “The racial thing is important for DuSable,” Reed said. “He left because he wasn’t going to be a big man in Americancontrolled territory because wasn’t white. Every colony had slaves at the time of the American Revolution. They weren’t going to be happy to see a guy like DuSable in charge of anything.” DuSable moved to Peoria and then to what is now St. Charles, Mo., where he died in 1818. This was French country, along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers. “The French did not discriminate to the extent the English did,” Reed said. “He could live in peace [in Missouri]. The English were color-conscious, built up their empire on color-consciousness.” The Treaty of Greenville also permitted U.S. Army outposts at Detroit, Fort Wayne and “one piece of land, six miles square at the mouth of the Chicago river, emptying into the south-west end of Lake Michigan.” Three years after DuSable’s departure, in 1803, the American government built Fort Dearborn there, on the south side of the Chicago River, across from DuSable’s former compound. The next year, John Kinzie bought the property from Lalime. DuSable didn’t establish his own colony, so once he was gone, there were no people of African descent here, Reed said, until free people of color began to come from adjoining states in the 1830s and 1840s. They worked in saloons, hotels, as servants and as riverfront and lakefront dockhands.
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Reed maintains, nonetheless, that as an influencer of the Euro-American trade network, DuSable helped create the city’s reputation as a place where go-getters could slowly gain an economic foothold. Perhaps also, with people-to-people contact being the only recreation on the frontier, oral history cherished an origin story of a man who looked like them. John Jones was an entrepreneur in the next phase of Chicago Black history. A free man of color born in North Carolina, he learned tailoring in Tennessee and came here in the 1840s; by the 1850s, he had a store at Washington and Dearborn Streets and a Chicago society clientele. “By the time of the Civil War [1861-65], there was a Black business tradition,” Reed said. “Even though Black people were discriminated against, they made the best of every opportunity afforded them.” Although the 1860 population showed roughly 1,000 Blacks, or 2 percent of the population, they had established a significant foothold, with tailors, barbers, a carriage service and a few other small businesses. DuSable had become an iconic figure by 1884, when A. T. Andreas wrote his “History of Chicago,” according to the online Encyclopedia of Chicago. Although no portrait of DuSable exists, Andreas created one for the frontispiece of the book’s first volume, along with an imagined drawing of his riverfront home. The drawing, however, was only about a tenth of the home’s actual size, when compared to the 1800 bill of sale.
The evolution of the Chicago Portage
Situated between the Chicago and DesPlaines Rivers, Eschikagou was known to the Native Americans as a “portage,” a transportation shortcut revealed to the French explorer Louis Jolliet and Father Jacques Marquette in 1673. In the days before planes, trains and automobiles -- or even good roads for wagons -- most travel was by water. Jolliet quickly realized that goods shipped across the Atlantic could travel down the Great Lakes and connect successively with the DesPlaines, Illinois and Mississippi Rivers. All that stood in the way was a few miles of land, the portage. In wet weather, traders could float their canoes from the south branch of the Chicago River across Mud Lake, a swampy area, to the Des Plaines. In dry weather, it was an arduous process over several days to push canoes from what is now 27th and Leavitt Streets in Chicago to 47th Street and Harlem Avenue in Lyons: the Chicago Portage National Historic Site. Maintained by the Forest Preserve District of Cook County, “it is the only place where you can stand on the same ground walked by all the explorers, early settlers and creators of Chicago. It is certainly Chicago’s ‘Plymouth Rock,’” according to the Chicago Portage Tours website. Over 160 years later, the Illinois & Michigan Canal, built by the state of Illinois and the U.S. government, replaced the portage. Today, the Stevenson Expressway parallels its route. Fur is what motivated the French traders, specifically warm and waterproof beaver abundant in the Great Lakes area. Jean Baptiste Pointe Du Sable and Antoine Ouilmette, who had a trading post at Grosse Pointe (Wilmette), were just two of many French traders who married Native American women, whether for romance or better economic alliances with their kin. The women contributed to their husbands’ success, often running the post while they were away on trading expeditions. Their mixed blood children, or “Métis,” further bridged the two cultures, European and Native American, for nearly the first two decades of Chicago history, in what was called the “middle ground,” according to the online Encyclopedia of Chicago. Wolf Point, where the north and south branches of the Chicago River meet to form a Y before flowing into the main channel to Lake Michigan, was the scene of Middle Ground entertainment, like drinking French brandy, American bourbon and British rum and betting on card games, shooting matches and horse races. Méti women danced with their husbands to Creole music played on fiddles and mouth organs while single women eyed bachelor traders. “The War of 1812 marked the death knell for the middle ground at Chicago.” Native Americans had ceded land in the Treaty of Greenville that enabled construction of Fort Dearborn in 1803. In August 1812, however, troops were unable to hold the fort and evacuated, along with civilians. Enroute to Fort Wayne, they were killed by pro-British Potawatomi. John Kinzie had been the third owner of DuSable’s property, but he and his associates lost their holdings and did not fully recover when the fort was rebuilt in 1816; “the pace of change overwhelmed them.” The next year, Congress passed a law that excluded foreign traders from U.S. territory. The Great Lakes fur trade was taken over by John Jacob Astor’s American Fur Company. Kinzie and Méti traders were given secondary roles but found themselves alienated from the “more aggressive, highly organized and systematic Yankees” --New Englanders arriving in Chicago. “…the old way of life disintegrated….Within two decades both the Native Americans and the Métis found that they no longer had a place at the Chicago portage.”
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Far Left: Modern grave marker for Baptiste Pointe DuSable, placed by the Illinois Sesquicentennial Commission in 1968 (photo by Nicholas Lemen). Above: a map depicting the site of the Chicago Park District's DuSable Park at the blue pinpoint. Right: The DuSable Museum of African American History in Washington Park (DuSable Museum photo).
By 1920, the DuSable origin story was common knowledge and inspired Black organizational pride, Reed said. Two Black Chicago banks controlled 1/3 of all Black banking assets in the United States, as he wrote in “The Rise of Chicago’s Black Metropolis: 1920-29” (University of Illinois Press, 2011). There were ice cream parlors, barber shops, haberdasheries, theaters, dress shops and cab services up and down South State Street, as well as several major insurance companies. The Black population continued to grow, despite white efforts to restrict it to certain areas: from 100,000 people in 1920, to 200,000 in 1930.
FROM THE STREETS
“People hear stories of Black success in Chicago and they keep flooding to the city, many bringing capital,” Reed said. “The myth is everyone comes impoverished. The reality is some did, some came with pockets filled with gold. It’s easier to go with the myth of Black incompetence and lack of contributions to the City’s growth and development.”
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and showcased at his annual Hi-Jinks show. The building now houses Bronzeville Scholastic Institute, Williams Prep and DuSable Leadership Academy. The last 50 years have seen a revival of interest in DuSable, Reed said. He cited a WFMT ad created by the Leo Burnett agency for United Airlines in 1971 that said “DuSable had a vision that’s led the Chicago economy progressively forward.” In addition, the Museum of Negro History and Art, founded as the Ebony Museum in the home of Dr. Margaret Goss Burroughs and her husband Charles, moved to new headquarters in Washington Park in 1973 and was renamed the DuSable Museum of African American History.
One indication to the contrary was that the elite Union League Club sent members of its commerce committee to the South Side in the 20s to report on areas of both poverty and prosperity, he said.
Another example is the 1975 National Park Service application for historic status for DuSable’s homestead. Afro-American Bicentennial Corporation’s Historical Projects Director Lynne Gomez Graves wrote that DuSable was nationally important as one of the most prominent fur traders and independent entrepreneurs of the colonial and revolutionary era, “representative of contributions of Afro-Americans in the initial economic and developmental stages of the nation’s growth.”
African-American groups managed to get a story about DuSable as “Chicago’s First Citizen” into the “Official World’s Fair Weekly” at the Century of Progress Exposition in 1933. The fair also exhibited DuSable’s cabin – the small 1884 version envisioned by Andreas, however.
Nowadays, Reed points to Kenneth Chennault, the CEO and chairman of American Express from 2001 to 2018, and Andrea Zopp, who stepped down as CEO of World Business Chicago in December after being appointed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel three years before.
Meanwhile, to relieve overcrowding at the existing high school in Bronzeville, a new one opened in 1935 at 4934 S. Wabash Ave. that was named for DuSable. It became a “who’s who” of Bronzeville, with attendees like singers Nat King Cole and Dinah Washington, Mayor Harold Washington, entertainer Redd Foxx, publisher John Johnson and hundreds of musicians trained under Capt. Walter Dyett
“Leading Black business minds have joined in with the big conglomerates, they’re not heading Black companies. Maybe that’s good. Maybe we’ve come full circle, because DuSable was not a Black man doing something, he was an entrepreneur doing something and then something built on him for all people.”
Residential tenant landlord ordinance provides protections in the suburbs by Suzanne Hanney
The Cook County Board unanimously passed the Residential Tenant Landlord Ordinance (RTLO), January 28, extending guidelines and protections to renters and landlords in 245,000 suburban households like those that have existed in Chicago since 1986 and more recently, in Evanston and Mount Prospect. Commissioners Scott Britton (14th district) and Kevin Morrison (15th district), were chief sponsors of the ordinance, which provides suburban Cook County renters with common sense lease termination notices, basic habitability guidelines, protections against lockouts, against snowballing interest rates on back rent and against excessive move-in fees. Security deposits will be limited to 1.5 month’s rent, which landlords must hold separately. “For the hundreds of thousands of renters across Cook County, this will mean that more people are able to stay in their homes at the time they need support the most,” said Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle. Britton said during a December press conference that when he was elected to the board in 2018, 30 people in unincorporated Glenview – people on respirators and with special needs children – were having a huge problem with a landlord regarding mold, heat and air conditioning. “There was no recourse for them to deal with it other than move. It’s much more problematic for people at lower income strata of society. It was up to us to address constant problems with some bad apples, because people were dealing with unfair fees, entry without notice, basic repairs that don’t get done.”
“Renters’ rights are a matter of fairness and equality, and despite heavy opposition, I’m proud my colleagues today stood up for vulnerable and low-income renters during this moment of crisis,” Morrison said of the 16-member board after the unanimous vote. “Among other benefits, the RTLO will finally prevent suburban housing providers from charging unjustifiably high security deposits and move-in fees that lock countless families out of healthy and safe housing options,” said Michael Chavarria, community engagement manager at Housing Choice Partners. “Across Suburban Cook County, people with disabilities often have to search for months, if not years, to find a housing unit that meets their needs, is accessible and is affordable,” said Larry Biondi, manager of advocacy at Progress Center for Independent Living. “Because housing is such a precious commodity, it is important that we have regulations such as the RTLO, which helps ensure that people with disabilities have the protections to maintain their housing.” The RTLO goes into effect June 1, but the anti-lockout provision takes effect immediately. The RTLO: • Protects owners against property destruction and abandonment • Restricts undisclosed landlord entry • Provides consistency on how and when landlords can safely evict renters • Prohibits lease terms that waive written notices, rights to a trial, and disclosures
Physical lockouts and utility shut-offs to push tenants out of units are illegal in Chicago, as is landlord retaliation for complaints; suburban renters should not face housing insecurity because they lack the same fair protections, Morrison said at the December event. “No one should be locked out of their homes, especially now.”
• Improves procedures for completing minor repairs in a timely manner
Britton said they began crafting the ordinance before the pandemic and made 20 changes based on input from realtors, landlord and property owners’ groups since it was proposed in July. He and Morrison have also worked with housing advocates, tenants’ rights and legal aid groups, as well as Cook County Commissioner Peter Silvestri, chairman of the Zoning and Building Committee, to ensure the RTLO protects both tenants and landlords.
• Blocks landlords from charging exorbitant late rent fees
• Guarantees fair security deposit returns • Prevents nontransparent move-in charges • Defends tenants from landlord retaliation • Allows landlords a two-business day right to cure noncompliance with leases To view the RTLO, visit: https://bit.ly/3iT0VQQ
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FROM THE STREETS
Maria Ocampo described during the press conference how her Maywood landlord in 2006 hid rather than return her security deposit. She took him to court and was only granted a portion. There were also times she didn’t have heat.
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Vendor A. Allen on DuSable by A. Allen
When we hear the phrase “Black Lives Matter,” it is good and acceptable, considering the overwhelming devastation of white police officers afflicting pain, suffering and even death upon Black and Brown people.
INSIDE STREETWISE
Blacks have suffered so many things for so many years. Yes, “Black Lives Matter” and have always mattered.
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I feel proud and honored to write about the founder of Chicago, Jean Baptiste Pointe Du Sable. He is regarded as the first permanent, non-indigenous settler of what later became Chicago and is recognized as the founder of Chicago; yes, before the famous Chicago hot dog or the Chicago-style deep dish pizza and, yes, even before the 1920s gangster, Al Capone. He was a Black pioneer trader from St. Marc, Santo Domingo, now known as Haiti. It feels good to know that Blacks have contributed to positive discoveries and cases, such as George Washington Carver and uses for the peanut, Daniel Hale Williams and heart surgery, or even Madam C. J. Walker (the first Black millionaire) and hair products, Garrett Morgan and the three-position traffic light, and many more contributions to better living as we know it. I said all of this not to undermine or negate the accomplishments of others but to celebrate the accomplishments of Blacks during this Black History Month 2021. I’m grateful for the StreetWise platform giving us vendors a chance to express our opinion. And I would like to thank our customers for reading and supporting magazine sales.
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Streetwise 2/15/21 Crossword To solve the Sudoku puzzle, each row, column and box must contain the numbers 1 to 9.
Sudoku
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Grimm villain 35 “Enchanted Spawning fish April” setting Makes lace 36 Like some Wood stork losers Still-life 41 Hosp. feeders subject 46 Shopping 23 Fall flower centers 24 Dependable 47 Harem room own 25 Mouse catcher 48 Divers’ worries 27 Camera 49 “Woe is me!” 1 Rod-shaped setting 51 Bouquet 28 Record germ 52 Pavarotti, 2 Squabs company notably 29 Larders 3 Teen idols, 53 Touch on 30 Middleonce 54 Wife of Zeus 4 Kitten’s Eastern bread 55 Oomph 31 “Ohs” in plaything 56 Nephew of Berlin 5 Pinochle word Cain 6 Kind of seal 32 Half (Prefix) 57 Off-pitch 7 Ore suffix 33 Trudge 59 Beaver’s work 8 School org. 34 Names for 60 Unlock, clownsPuzzleJunction.com 9 Shoe strings poetically Copyright ©2021 Diving bird Caspian feeder Snakes, e.g. Shots, for short Beach shades Clutter Romanov ruler
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Sudoku Solution last week's Puzzle Answers
Solution
Sudoku Solution
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Crossword Across 1 Fair share, maybe 5 “The Haj” author 9 Skier’s aid 13 Humdinger 14 Chinese zodiac animal 15 Sacramento’s ___ Arena 16 Nevada city 17 Unchaste 19 Open horsedrawn carriage 21 Quartz variety 22 Proof goof 23 Building facings 25 Diet choice 29 Cronus or Oceanus 30 Red Cross and 58 Advantage the like, in 59 Phileas Fogg’s brief creator 31 Plum part 60 Hearty party 34 John Irving’s 61 Roger of “A Prayer for “Nicholas ___ Meany” Nickleby” 35 Fragrance 62 Assist in crime 37 Kind of list 63 River of 38 Publicize Flanders 39 Simpleton 40 “Get ___ of Down yourself!” 1 ___ d’oeuvre 41 Easily 2 Dill seed frightened 3 Siberian river 44 Surfing stop 4 Figurehead for 48 Mars (Prefix) a scam 49 Adage 5 Camera 50 Actresses on support the way up 6 Dash 54 Robust, like 7 Old White some wines House 57 Auditory nickname
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8 Cambodian coin 9 Northern subarctic forests 10 Vast 11 Critical 12 Kentucky Derby prize 14 Incline 18 Carpet fasteners 20 Song of praise 23 Not soft 24 Pond dweller 25 Ancient gathering place 26 Fuzzy fruit 27 Roman road 28 Sullen 31 Needy 32 Inactive 33 Mrs. Lincoln’s maiden name
35 Hopped off 36 Function 37 Study of religion 39 Scale 40 Allege as fact 42 Underlying 43 Decree of the former Sultan of Turkey 44 Thin biscuit 45 Give off 46 Ship part 47 Undersides 50 “Your majesty” 51 Greek letters 52 Scrabble piece 53 Mark left by Zorro? 55 Egg cells 56 Cotillion girl
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Soluti
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