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Good news, Chicago: The city’s beaches open Friday and pool season is less than a month away. Plus, a busy City Council day and more stories from WTTW News. |
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Chicago City Hall. (Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News) |
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Seventeen members of the Chicago City Council joined together in an unprecedented show of force yesterday to block a vote on a measure to allow Chicago Police Department officials to preemptively impose a curfew anywhere in the city and begin enforcing it with just 30 minutes notice in an effort to stop large teen gatherings.
It takes just two City Council members to use a parliamentary procedure to block a vote until the City Council’s June meeting. But Ald. Jason Ervin (28th Ward) and Ald. Andre Vasquez (40th Ward) said 15 other members of the City Council had signed on to the letter stopping the vote.
If 17 members are firmly opposed to the proposal and eventually vote against the measure, it could still pass with 33 votes.
But it would take 34 votes for the City Council to override a mayoral veto.
Before the vote, Mayor Brandon Johnson repeatedly questioned whether the measure is constitutional and frequently said that he does not believe that expanding the city’s curfew would stop teen “trends” or “takeovers,” large gatherings organized on social media and popular among teens, from turning violent.
More on the proposed measure:
If the measure is approved, it would vastly expand Chicago’s curfew law and set a template for other cities struggling with public safety challenges.
The measure gives Chicago Police Supt. Larry Snelling the power to unilaterally declare a snap curfew.
The original version of the ordinance required Snelling and Deputy Mayor for Community Safety Garien Gatewood to have “jointly determined that there’s probable cause to believe that a mass gathering will occur.” The ordinance sets no limits on how large an area could be covered by the “snap curfew.”
The version of the ordinance approved Tuesday by the Public Safety Committee would require Snelling only to “consult” Gatewood.
That change prompted Ervin not just to drop his support for the measure that he had co-sponsored but to join the leaders of the City Council’s Progressive Caucus in trying to stop its passage. |
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A Chicago parking meter is pictured in a file photo. (400tmax / iStock) |
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The Chicago City Council unanimously agreed yesterday to pay $15.5 million to the private firm that leases the city’s parking meters to compensate the firm for taking parking spaces out of service during the stay-at-home orders issued by city and state officials to stop the spread of COVID-19.
But taxpayers will pay an additional $9.7 million to resolve the claim filed by the company that will lease the city’s parking meters until 2083, bringing the total cost to $25.2 million, officials said.
In all, changes ordered by former Mayor Lori Lightfoot to remove thousands of meters during the pandemic and to stop citing drivers for parking at expired meters during the stay-at-home orders earned the city $26.2 million, Managing Deputy Corporation Counsel James McDonald told the City Council’s Finance Committee on Monday.
“This is pretty much a wash,” Ald. Jason Ervin (28th Ward) said.
Initially, the parking meter firm demanded $322 million from the city, according to the mayor’s office. An appraisal, ordered by the city, determined Lightfoot’s decisions cost the meter company $120.7 million, officials said.
The much-loathed 2008 deal requires the city make “true-up” payments to Chicago Parking Meters to compensate the firm for lost revenue when meters are removed, temporarily taken out of commission with the city’s permission or used by motorists with disabled parking permits. |
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A green flag posted at a Chicago beach means swimming is permitted. (Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News) |
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Chicago’s beaches are opening Friday, marking the unofficial start to summer. Grab a towel, some sunscreen and maybe a jacket, with temperatures expected to top out at 60 degrees over the holiday weekend.
The Chicago Park District announced it has recruited enough lifeguards to have all 22 beaches open for swimming seven days a week, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., through Labor Day, Sept. 1.
The city’s pools are expected to open June 21.
More good news:
A shortage of lifeguards had curtailed hours and locations in recent years, but the Park District said the number of lifeguard applicants in 2025 had exceeded the district’s goal and had rebounded to pre-pandemic figures. |
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Back in the Day: May 22, 2009 - Mancow Is Waterboarded |
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Erich “Mancow” Muller is a conservative shock jock radio DJ who hosted a morning talk show in Chicago from 1994 to 2018. In 2009, he had been a supporter of the Bush administration’s waterboarding program in the war on terror, arguing that the use of the “enhanced interrogation technique” that simulates drowning isn’t actually torture. To prove his point, he subjected himself to a waterboarding session on this day 16 years ago. "I want to find out if it’s torture," Mancow told his listeners that morning, adding that he hoped subjecting himself to it would prove that waterboarding ”did not, in fact, constitute torture." Alongside a Chicago Fire Department paramedic and a Marine sergeant who would administer the waterboarding, he tried it out. Though he was told that the average person only lasts 14 seconds under waterboarding, Mancow held on for 6 seconds. According to a report, he “thrashed on the table, and even instantly threw the toy cow he was holding as his emergency tool to signify when he wanted the experiment to stop.” Mancow later said, “It is way worse than I thought it would be, and that’s no joke. It is such an odd feeling to have water poured down your nose with your head back...It was instantaneous... and I don’t want to say this: absolutely torture.”
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This Week’s Arts and Culture Events
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Each Thursday, WTTW News arts correspondent Marc Vitali highlights the city’s must-see cultural events.
Want to immerse yourself in the sculpture work of a World War II veteran? What about a Scottish folk musician who decided watercoloring was his medium of choice? That and more in the selections below.
“H.C. Westermann: Anchor Clanker” – Art Institute of Chicago
Get to know the incredible story and artwork of a great Chicago-based artist. Wooden sculptures show off the craftsmanship of a creative, haunted mind. It’s all informed by the artist’s years in the Marines, when he saw hair-raising combat in the Pacific during World War II. The works can be playful or deadly serious but always engaging. Westermann is a must-see. Through May 2026.
Rory McEwen: A New Perspective on Nature – Driehaus Museum
He was a successful Scottish folk musician who abandoned his career to devote himself to making botanical art. McEwen applied a kind of minimalism to his work, and his watercolors and drawings of plants look like individual portraits. More than 100 of his works are presented inside the Gilded Age splendor (some would say excess) of the Driehaus Museum. Through August 17.
“Six Men Dressed Like Joseph Stalin” – A Red Orchid Theatre
A wounded Russian soldier is brought to the Kremlin because of his resemblance to Stalin and gets trained to be his body double. An exploration of power and identity with a dose of absurdity, this Chicago premiere stars Red Orchid ensemble member Esteban Andres Cruz and David Cerda, founder of Chicago’s campy Hell in a Handbag Productions. Count me in. Through June 22. |
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What’s your favorite Chicago-area farmers market? Let us know and tell us why. |
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Email DailyChicagoan@wttw.com with your responses and your answers might be published. |
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5:30 PM | 10:00 PM |
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Newsletter Producer: Josh Terry |
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