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AUSTIN WEEKLY news ■
Rep. La Shawn K. Ford proposes naming I-55 after Barack Obama,
Vol. 31 No. 10
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March 1, 2017
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austinweeklynews.com
@AustinWeeklyChi
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Also serving Garfield Park
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Davis: College costs too high, page 8
Experts: ACA repeal would hurt W. Side
Elected officials, health care experts say that getting rid of the law would cause undue suffering By IGOR STUDENKOV Contributing Reporter
The officials who spoke at a Feb. 15 hearing on the possible fallout from the repeal of the Affordable Care Act didn’t mince words. Getting rid of the law would hurt major hospitals, healthcare providers and the ability of low-income residents to secure medical treatment. The hearing was convened by the Chicago City Council’s Committee on Workforce Development and the Cook County Board of Commissioner’s Committee on Workforce, Housing and Community Development. During his first week in office, President Donald Trump signed an executive order
saying that ACA should be repealed and replaced as soon as possible. Cook County Commissioner Bridget Gainer (10th), who chairs the workforce committee, said that, although there is no way to know what would actually happen if the law were repealed, she and her counterparts in the City Council wanted to hold the hearing to get a sense of what the worstcase scenario would look like. City employees, medical professionals and public health advocates in attendance said that repealing the ACA would increase the number of patients who use emergency rooms, straining the budgets of every single See ACA REPEAL on page 4
Lawmakers decry CVS closing
Closing the East Garfield Park store would turn area into ‘pharmaceutical desert,’ says state rep By MICHAEL ROMAIN Editor
CVS Health recently announced that it will start the process of closing 11 of its Chicago stores this month. The Rhode Island-based company is undergoing restructuring, according to a report in the Chicago
Tribune. In all, the company plans to close about 70 of its more than 9,700 stores this year. But the planned closing of one West Side CVS in particular, located at 3146 W. Madison St. in East Garfield Park, would mean more than just business as usual, said Congressman Danny K. Davis (7th). Davis, who held a press conference in front of the location on Sunday, said that his records show that over 5,000 senior citizens live near that West Side CVS. “We are concerned that areas like East Garfield Park continue to lose resources,”
WILLIAM CAMARGO/Staff Photographer
‘COINTELPRO killed Fred, Trump wants it back’ Bill Hampton, the brother of slain Black Panther Fred Hampton, pictured in his Maywood home last Friday. Hampton and his longtime attorney, G. Flint Taylor, say that Fred’s assassination and the FBI’s COINTELPRO operation that contributed to the leader’s death, are lessons for navigating Trump’s America. Read the story at austinweeklynews.com.
See WEST SIDE CVS on page 8
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