Prove it. Want to dine, exercise at a fitness center or see a movie or concert where food’s served indoors? Effective today, Chicago and Cook County are requiring a valid ID and COVID-19 vaccination documentation.
■ Axios Chicago: Beware “ad hoc testing centers … collecting mountains of sensitive medical and financial information … with little to no apparent regulation.”
■ Need a new driver’s license? Thank COVID-19 for a break until March 31.
Positively skeptical. Chicago Federation of Police boss—and threatened mayoral candidate—John Catanzara said he has COVID-19 …
■ … and cast aspersions on vaccinations, prompting a Northwestern University expert to conclude Catanzara “doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
Hey, kids! Boosters! The FDA has approved extra shots of the Pfizer vaccine for children as young as 12 …
■ … but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention needs to give final approval before those needles go into those arms.
■ The Chicago Teachers Union plans a vote Tuesday on a potential walkout Wednesday, demanding a return to remote learning …
■ … but classes resumed today, even as the schools’ CEO said he expects a COVID surge among kids …
■ … in the aftermath of a home-testing program that proved a clusterf__k.
■ Sun-Times columnist Laura Washington cheers Mayor Lightfoot’s plan to keep Chicago restaurants from offering kids sugary drinks by default.
‘People shouldn’t buy these cars.’ A convicted carjacker tells the Sun-Times that traveling Chicago’s streets in high-end Porsches, Mercedes-Benzes, and Jeep Cherokees, Dodge Challengers and Chargers with super-charged engines is “like riding around with drugs, holding them in your window.”
■ Restaurant valet parking attendants are targets, too.
■ Last year was Chicago’s most murderous since the mid-’90s.
Corporations behaving not-so-badly. Popular Information reports that, contrary to accounts elsewhere, “corporate PAC contributions to Republican objectors [to the 2020 presidential election] have plummeted by nearly two-thirds” since Jan. 6.
■ President Biden and Vice President Harris planned to speak at the Capitol Thursday, commemorating the anniversary of that deadly insurrection.
■ Columnist Neil Steinberg: “Wait until the Republicans take over the U.S. House next year and maybe the Senate, too, and then put Dr. Anthony Fauci on trial. That’ll be grim.”
Ready to treecycle? Chicagoans can drop off their Christmas trees at any of 27 mulching locations.
■ Boulder County, Colorado—ravaged by a wind-whipped firestorm last week—is home to one of America’s top climate science and meteorology research hubs.
■ A Sun-Times editorial sounds a global-warming alarm: “Why is Illinois still building natural gas-powered power plants?”
■ Remember those predictions for 5-9 inches of snow over the weekend? More like 4.
We’re No. 1. A new Illinois law tops Tedium’s list of five signs 2022 will be better than 2021.
■ Other new state laws include a ban on discrimination against student hairstyles.*
■ New to the public domain as of Jan. 1: Winnie-the-Pooh.
Ad hack decision. Letterwell, a U.K.-based company that had been placing advertisements in Chicago Public Square for the last few weeks of 2021, is ending that beta program and the revenue it generated …
■ … but readers keep Square coming with their support …
■ … and, of course, you can still buy an ad directly.
Are you reading this in Apple’s Mail program on a Macintosh? If the first sentence of each Square section is no longer teensy-tiny, thank designer Juanita Dugdale, who took time to flag and help troubleshoot the problem.
_____
* A personal sticking point for your Square columnist.