The racial divide in reopening has added tension to the debate about whether schools should attempt to reopen during the pandemic. It also has been a point of contention in the labor standoff between Chicago Public Schools and the teachers union.

One Chicago teacher took to a blog to complain that even CDC recommendations for returning to schools were insufficient, and alleged “nice white families” would kill black families with their emphasis on in-person instruction. Comment: Be sure to watch the video.

David Greising, president and CEO of the Better Government Association, said the turnover in Lightfoot’s mayor’s office hasn’t quite reached the “revolving door” during former Mayor Jane Byrne’s single term but it’s “part of a pattern.”

Though Lightfoot has positioned herself as a friend to bars and restaurants, especially after Pritzker closed down indoor dining in October, she has faced criticism for implementing tighter rules than the state.

One high school student said this week, “I was so gone to a depressed episode. And my teachers, they didn’t really know how to handle that. Even when I didn’t go to school for like two weeks, when I came back to school I had a load of homework, they didn’t know how to assist me, they didn’t know how to help me. They didn’t have any mental resources for me.”

While injustice continued across the country, Pritzker emphasized former President Donald Trump never listened to Americans in need. “There was a moment there where we really, I think all of us, took the opportunity to begin the process of change. It’s ongoing and there’s more to do.”

Stephen F. Boulton, chair of the Chicago Republican Party: “Cancel culture is at root a Marxist-based model, and as with all Marxist theories, pits different groups of people against each other in bitter, unending conflict. Adopting such doctrines in government results in expanding hatred, suppression of speech, economic decline and social disintegration, as we are already seeing in parts of America today.”

The better scenario for students is a deal, but even with one, Monday could be a stretch. Teachers already have taken to social media to show pictures of their classrooms untouched since last spring when campuses across the state shuttered abruptly.

The Commission did not publicly identify which monuments raised those concerns, and did not reveal what the commission would recommend to address those issues. Instead, it gave examples of monuments that commission members said accurately reflected the community, including several in Pilsen that reflected the Mexican immigrants who made the neighborhood their home earlier this century.

“CPS’s plan is not really a plan, and it’s passing the buck onto schools, principals, and communities to figure out how they’re going to solve things like what does everybody eat? How do you create enough space and divide the space? How do you keep the schools clean? The schools didn’t have enough custodians to maintain their schools clean before the pandemic,” said K-5 technology teacher Jose Frausto.

The Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing and Loyola University Chicago estimated there could have been as many as 21,000 evictions filed in January if not for the moratorium. That would have been more eviction cases in one month than the number filed, 18,200, in all of 2019 in Chicago.

“Chinatown was an unlikely neighborhood for the land bank to step in. The agency was created to help get vacant, blighted and tax-delinquent properties in downtrodden neighborhoods back in use, paying taxes. But the plaza and the corridors connecting them through the two-story mall weren’t abandoned. And Chinatown was hardly blighted.”

The Chicago Teachers Union also is emboldened by a decision by a Cook County judge in another school district case. The judge on Wednesday rejected Cicero School District 99’s effort to declare a job action by teachers illegal and to order them into schools to work. Like Chicago teachers, Cicero teachers are refusing to work in person.

“Our concern is we’re going to have more stagnation in investment and potentially further divestment if businesses find it too onerous to come back within our communities, and that’s a downward spiral,” said Kristi DeLaurentiis, executive director of the South Suburban Mayors and Managers Association.

Three 14-year-olds face felony charges in connection to a string of carjackings across Chicago, including one teen accused in nine carjackings and robberies since July.

“Because board members, via mayoral appointment are ultimately responsible to the public. The Chicago Teachers Union is not, yet it thinks it should run the schools.”

“And Mayor Lori Lightfoot? She’s that kid being bullied in the schoolyard by Sharkey and his pals. But there is no school, is there?”

A police spokeswoman explained why it might be hard to get through on the phone: “Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Chicago Police Department’s Alternative Response Section (ARS), which takes non-emergency reports, has been temporarily relocated to the Education and Training Academy facility… (T)here has been a reduction in how many calls ARS is able to take at one time.”