Pirate's Cove

Priorities!

Fighting climate change in the Windy City

From the start of his quest to become mayor of Chicago, progressive Brandon Johnson made environmental justice a personal issue.

The former Chicago public school teacher talked about his own battles with asthma — “I grew up with asthma. I still suffer from it.” — a condition known to be exacerbated by pollution. And everywhere Johnson went, he talked about how he was raising three children in Chicago’s Far West Side neighborhood of Austin, a majority-Black area that is ranked as one of the most polluted areas in the Windy City.

“For too long our communities have been seen as dumping grounds for waste and materials that no one seems to know what else to do with,” Johnson said at a mayoral forum held in the heavily Latino neighborhood of Pilsen.

Those sound like environmental issues, nothing to do with Hotcoldwetdry.

Johnson’s first test would be how much he could deliver on the building emissions ordinance that Chicago’s green groups have long waited for. The mayor-elect promised “a climate justice buildings ordinance” — which would tackle emissions but keep tenants’ energy bills low — as a top priority of his administration.

If passed, the ordinance would compel buildings and historic skyscrapers in the nation’s third-largest city to choose between reducing emissions — or paying a huge fine. The idea is to create “pollution-free” homes and buildings in the city, where such structures are responsible for 69 percent of the city’s total emissions. (Buildings account for a majority of emissions for most big cities — 70 percent in New York City and 80 percent in St. Louis.)

I wonder how well that will work out

(WGN) Walmart plans to close four stores in Chicago by mid-April, the company announced Tuesday.

Officials with the department store cited profit margins as the reasoning behind the closing.

“The simplest explanation is that collectively our Chicago stores have not been profitable since we opened the first one nearly 17 years ago – these stores lose tens of millions of dollars a year, and their annual losses nearly doubled in just the last five years. The remaining four Chicago stores continue to face the same business difficulties, but we think this decision gives us the best chance to help keep them open and serving the community,” a press release stated.

All four stores are in high crime areas of the city. The violent crime rate is over double the Illinois and national rates.

(Illinois Policy) Theft is driving the overall increase in crime. Car theft is up 114% since 2018, and other thefts increased by 32% since 2018. Just last year, motor vehicle theft increased by 102% and theft by 56%.

In 2021, Chicago saw more than 45,000 people stop calling the city their home. Only two other big cities had more residents move away compared to Chicago. New York and San Francisco both experienced greater populations losses than Chicago, with New York losing over 305,000 people.

What happens when the mayors silly focus on ‘climate change’ drives out tax paying citizens and businesses, especially as the city continues to avoid dealing with the crime?