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My life. We,
Uh, good morning everyone.
Thank you for your patience.
Uh, we are one member away from Quorum,
and that member is Alderwoman to Barez.
Uh, she is walking towards chambers right now.
So, uh, we'll begin momentarily. Thank you.
The meeting of the public safety committee is
hereby call to order.
We will begin with the roll call to establish quorum
and a motion for Rule 59, participation for some members.
Vice Chairman Yancy present, alderman Chico.
Alderman Gutierrez, alderman Lopez. Thank you.
Uh, alderman Curtis Alderman. Tab Barez. Alderman Cin Lopez.
Alderwoman Fuentes. Oh, uh,
alderman Cinio Lopez is present.
Alderwoman Fuentes. Where is she? She in the back.
Uh, alderman Talia Farro.
Alderman Pdo Alderman Vasquez.
He is also present in the back. Uh, alderman Knutson.
Alderman Gardner. Alderman
Martin Alderwoman.
Minna Howorth. Alderwoman Hadden.
Alderman Silverstein.
Chairman Hopkins is eight.
So we just need Alderwoman Fuentes
and Alderman Vasquez to walk in the room for quorum.
Someone getting them. Oh, okay.
Oh, uh, Alderwoman Nugent is present under the, uh,
president Pro tem status.
Uh, okay. Go ahead.
Chairman. Pursuant to my role
as President Pro temp under Rule 36, I intend to participate
and vote on this matter as an EXOFFICIO member. Thank you.
Okay. Pursuant to my role as chairman of the committee,
I welcome your participation and we're glad you're here.
You are actually the ninth member for Quorum, so thank you.
Uh, the meeting is hereby convened.
We will begin with, uh, public testimony.
Uh, we have a full, uh, Alder Alderman Chico present.
Uh, we have a full slate of public speakers.
Uh, we will begin with, uh, Patricia Puente Puente Chair
Chairman, pursuant to Rule 59.
Um, sorry. Right. Okay.
Uh, pursuant to Rule 59, we have requests, uh,
for remote participation from Alder Alderman Yancy,
uh, Alderwoman to Barez, alderman Farrow,
uh, and Alderman Curtis, do we have a motion?
Al to authorize And Alderman Moore.
Alderman Moore is a non-member.
Uh, alderman Moore is a non-member for participation.
Do we have a motion? So authorizing, so moved, uh,
hearing no objection.
We will call the, uh, call the names
to verify their participation.
Let's see who's up there on the board. Uh, alderman Moore.
Well, you already spoke. Alderman Alderman Moore is here.
Yes, we got Alderman Moore is here.
Alderman, uh, Talia Farrell. Alderman Teles Present.
Alderwoman Tavarez.
Sylvan, can you unmute? We got you.
Okay. We'll come back to you.
Uh, the first public speaker is Patricia Puente
Puente. I have
a concern. So the city does have the monies
to give away inmates incarcerated for 37 years,
who is authorizing
and giving millions of dollars million to inmates coming.
You know, these, these monies are coming from the taxpayers.
Uh, wrongful conviction convictions cost Chicago
taxpayers $1 billion.
Okay? These monies,
these divert funds from public services, creating a cycle
of debt and distrust
to the law enforcement
and city hall,
whoever is authorizing these monies.
So the city of Chicago is giving free monies
and taking away monies that could be used
for the homeless people, Medicare, Medicaid,
and our youth programs that this meeting is about
who is beneficiary from these,
who's authorizing this millions of dollars.
And then asking the people that worked for their monies,
rich people, middle class,
and poor people to pay for more taxes.
I feel that whoever the law enforcement, whoever did wrong,
this money should be taken out of their pension, not out
of the taxpayers, out of their pension.
Thank you very much and happy New Year to everybody.
The next speaker is Dennis White.
Good morning. Well, 2026 is a year
of violence already.
You got 29th, got shot already.
Two people got stabbed on the CTA red line this past week,
and then this bu this dumbfounding mayor over here
saying that crime is down.
So he going to say it's all,
it's gonna be an all time low again for 2026.
Like he lied about 2025.
So, you know, some of us are getting tired of the shooting,
the violence, these criminals based off of the lack
of leadership of JB Pritzker and Brandon Johnson
and some of you council members right here.
So when the president from Venezuela got captured,
who was the first one who spoke on that fi,
Joe Lopez, he spoke on that.
But he never speak on the violence
that's going on in Chicago.
He don't make no ordinance of how to stop the violence.
He, he voted for the curfew not
to be, not to be enforced.
He voted against it just like if leader Brandon Johnson did.
So what we going to have to do, people, do we have
to take laws in our own hands since
the policeman's not going to do it and stuff?
Uh, what is it that's going to take to get some
of you guys' attention around here?
Well, you got less than one calendar a year.
Now them seats gonna be vacant.
We going replace somebody who are more
of adult than these than you.
Kids are Ralph Hand. I'm a veteran.
I'm a combat veteran, and I'm gonna put this on notice.
I still know how to use combat training out in the streets
and my sanctuary home,
since you all got make this a sanctuary city.
My sanctuary home is the gun range.
So this Second Amendment is going to be enforced
if you all don't get it together,
curve the violence, which you're not.
Hire more police
and most importantly, impeach Brandon Johnson
because he's doing the most criminal act There is Ralph Hay,
maybe deportation, some of these illegals outta here
that might curve the crime.
But you know what? Nobody ain't gonna do it.
Because you know why? Everybody's in the CTU
uh, pockets right now.
They're the biggest gang members, Ralph, him
and CTU doesn't mean Chicago Teacher Union.
It mean the clown Communist China Teacher Union.
That's what it is. And I also forgot confused,
because that's all they do is snap their fingers and stuff.
Half of 'em don't have a job. They don't smell too good.
Anyway. So you all need to really make good legislature
and make this city a more safer than what it is,
because everybody's starting to move outta Chicago.
Everybody leaving Illinois.
I mean, it's up to you guys now,
but it's up to us to make our own faith
because we're tired of being victims.
Uh, the next speaker is Nada Abbott.
Good morning council members. My name is Nada Abbott.
Um, I live in 44th Ward, and, um, I want it.
Um, thank you so much. Um, I am a mom.
And you know, I always think, um,
when we make policy, it's really hard for people
to know all the things that go into, you know, complex,
regulatory, operational, all of the systems
that will be actually working in real life.
So I think of any policy
or any rule, as in, is it good enough for my child?
And if I can understand the processes
and the enforcement that goes into it
and how it will play out in real life,
then it's good enough, right?
Uh, when we look at, um, what was used to be Snap curfew
and what it is now, some different type of name curfew,
we're looking at process and has a lot of steps in it.
If we can correctly identify the location,
if we can correctly predict what's going to happen,
if we can give correct instructions to the law enforcement,
if people can actually learn about it in time,
every step in the process,
and opportunity for it to break down
and for things to go wrong.
And the one thing I don't want to live
with on my conscience is another child being killed.
So as a mom
and as a person who lives on the north side, right?
And last year
after, um, the Pride Parade, we saw hundreds
of police officers on Belmont policing, literally a couple
of dozen of black children.
And it looked like the footage from South African Apartheid.
And it was hard to look at.
And I don't want to be part of the system to think
that it is okay.
If you live in Lakeview or Lincoln Park
or any other part of the city.
It's okay to make children not feel safe
and not feel welcome in our city,
because that's the worst thing we can do.
And all the research and all the data shows
that punishing people does not improve outcomes.
Investing in people, investing in education,
investing in programs, investing in healthcare, investing in
training, and creating spaces for young people
to go is what works.
So I would really like to ask this council
to seriously consider the consequences of policy
that can potentially result in tragic outcomes
and really think about investing in our children,
investing in underserved communities.
And as someone who lives in Lakeview, I really would like
to invest in programs where children from different part
of the city are welcome, can work together,
can play together, can learn together,
and can feel loved and cared for.
Thank you so much for your time.
Uh, the next speaker is Chris Abbott.
Good morning. My name is Chris Abbott.
I'm a retired US Air Force Chief, master Sergeant,
a healthcare executive, and a resident of the 44th Ward.
Thank you for the opportunity
to address the Chicago City
Council's Public Safety Committee.
My goal today is to encourage you
to reject the proposed ordinance offered
by Alderman Brian Hopkins
and William Hall, that would establish a so-called time
and cite curfew.
As a senior non-commissioned officer, I pledged
to uphold the Constitution.
I spent much of my career in the Air Force
as a Cold War warrior fighting an author, excuse me,
an author, an author authoritarian regime
that worked tirelessly
to prevent its citizens from having the rights we enjoy
as Americans, restricting free speech
and assembly, granting police additional powers to detain
and arrest young people,
and relying on social media, mass surveillance,
our violations of the First Amendment
at a time when our rights
as Americans are being further eroded on a near daily basis.
And Chicago citizens are being attacked illegally, detained
and kidnapped by ice agents.
While CPD stands idly by.
The last thing we need on our city is a repressive
ill-intentioned ordinance
that further targets predominantly black and brown children.
We do not need to deploy additional ways to criminalize
Chicago's teens or create unnecessary
and potentially unsafe interactions with police
like the misguided snap curfew before it.
I don't see police superintendent Snelling asking
for more tools for CPD police officers.
As Mayor Johnson correctly stated, the fact
that we did not have an incident over New Year's Eve without
any additional tools is proof positive
that a revised curfew ordinance is not needed.
Our efforts should instead be focused on expanding programs
to engage teens, provide job opportunities,
and protect our libraries and community spaces.
Alderman Hopkins, the residents of the North Side see you
and we see this proposal for what it is, a tired,
racist effort that we have grown to expect from Republicans,
but not from Democrats.
In closing, again, I would urge you
to reject the proposed ordinance
to establish a so-called time in inside curfew.
And I would say in comparison
to my other veteran brother here, I don't have guns.
That I do not propose violence. It's a wrong answer.
This should be a city of peace,
and we need to work on that in many, many ways.
Thank you for your time this morning.
The next speaker is Apostle Sandy Norman.
Good morning, um, honor to the city council
and honor to God first
and all of our respectable organizations that are here.
And so I'm here. Um, as you guys know,
my name is Sandy Norman.
I'm the founder of Life Beyond Limits, uh, VIP, which stands
for Violence Intervention
and Prevention, uh, chain Breakers, outreach Ministries.
And so I don't come, you know, today from a perspective,
you know, of being behind a desk,
but I come from a perspective
of actually being in the black community, uh,
being in the streets,
and also, um, as a person that spends a lot of money helping
to bury, you know, young people that are ages 14
and 15 that are dying in the streets premature.
And so, I wanna say, um, to the council,
I have an opportunity where we partner
with the police department.
We go to all the hotspots.
In fact, we'll be out, um,
in Lawndale on Friday if anybody wants to join us.
Uh, we had three, uh, shootings on 15th
and 16th and, and Holman.
And so when we start, you know, we talk about, uh, violence.
We talk about, you know, curfew.
I'm in agreement that we do need curfews
and we also need programs.
When I was young, there were programs that we had, uh,
you know, late at night.
And one of the things that I wanna say to the council,
we continue to say that crime is decreasing,
but when you really have an understanding of the street,
we know that crime listen in our communities, I wanna say,
is not decreasing at enough.
And when you have young men that, you know, kill each other
where we have gang wars, the cycle continue to repeat itself
because the younger generation normally takes over.
And you have the children that are 14
and 15 years old that are on social media.
You have, uh, the entertainment, you know, companies, uh,
that promote, you know, the violence.
And again, I think that when you're in the situation
and you experience these things,
you see things a lot different.
These children are popping pills, you know, they are,
you know, doing things in the street, you know,
that's causing premature death.
And so I do feel that we do need, uh, curfews,
we need more funding.
We need people like myself
that really care about the community that's in the community
that actually deal, you know, in the community
with the children to actually be voices
that understand what's actually going on.
And so, people like myself, I'm here
because we don't, I don't get any funding.
I've been for the past seven years.
As I continue to say I've been coming here,
I still haven't gotten a meeting with the mayor.
But I do wanna thank, um, alderman, uh, SPTO for his help.
Even though I don't work in some
of the alderman communities like Gardner,
they have taken the initiative to say, Hey,
what can we do to help?
And they've made phone calls.
They have actually done things that have been instrumental.
So again, I say, uh, to those of you, you know,
that sit on the council even though it,
All right, thank you for your comments.
Uh, please add Alderman Gardner to the, uh,
attendance roll call for purposes of quorum,
and let the attendance record reflect the presence
of Alderman Cardona and Alderman Hall.
Uh, and also, uh, alderman Curtis,
I see you are on the Rule 59 zoom list.
Uh, can you acknowledge please so we can add you? Yes, sir.
Thank you. Thank you Alderman Curtis.
Uh, the next speaker is George Blakemore,
One black alderman that I see that's present.
And this curfew is specifically Target the black youth.
Now, I did see Mr. Y, but he's not here.
This absentee rule. It, it's something wrong here.
And I'm walking around and I'm counting the people.
The people are not here. I think it's by 20 black people.
And most of those people are representing, uh,
go red and flip red.
And, uh, and I, I, I can't understand what's going on here.
It's something evil here. It's something corrupt here.
But people are not here. The people are not here.
The people should be outraged, especially black people.
That curfew is specifically targeting black youth.
And black lives matter to me.
It's something wrong here
and are always say, what about the French Revolution?
Maria, feed the people cake.
They ended up killing her.
The American Revolution was violence.
The taxation without representation. What did they do?
They start fighting. You are setting up a war here.
A against the various ethnic groups here.
Something is bad here. It stinks Here.
Somebody put a, you know, Mr.
Bmore is old and, and, and he smell or whatever.
And, and he needs a, a caretaker.
All of us need a caretaker.
We all need somebody to take care of us
because all of us are out of control.
This is a successful here.
We are all out of control. So what should we do?
We should work together to try to clean this.
SHI up all hands on deck.
We all have go. We are short.
Look, look, look at the empty C Cheryl,
look at the empty C Cheryl.
Something is wrong with Mr. Blakemore. And it's f*****g him.
It, it's f*****g with all
Of them here.
All of them. Every one of them,
Including me, you, and us.
And we, we have to stop this
and clean this SH up.
Clean it up. When do
You want clean up Now? All of you.
When you wanna clean up now? All of you.
All us.
The next speaker is Zoe Lee.
Another one bites the dust.
Jill Jurowski is out of here. Yeah.
Mm-hmm. Stacey Mayor Stacey Davis Gates administration
is just crumbling.
Happy New Year though.
Uh, anyway, we are here for public safety.
Uh, the whole city of Chicago is the public safety threat.
The whole, a whole threat.
Um, how many more deaths will it take
before Lake Shore Drive is treated like the
high speed roadway?
It is and built to actually protect the public.
Two young people, prince Jermell Sullivan
and Deanna Kay lost their lives on South Lake Shore Drive
after their car stalled.
Their deaths were not an accident. They were foreseeable.
Consequences of a road without continuous guardrails
or safe pull off soldiers shoulders, a known
and deadly designed flaw.
The city has repeatedly failed to fix this infrastructure.
Drivers have no safe shoulder cars
that stall are left in live.
Ve traffic lanes exposed to high speed vehicles, cameras,
enforcement, and studies will not protect a stalled
car at four in the morning.
Only proper guardrails and emergency pull-off zones.
At the same time.
Governor Pritzker, Illinois had just passed SBO
5 0 8, which allows individuals to sue
and it's undocumented individuals
to sue federal immigration agents for un
for constitutional rights violations
that they don't have any rights to.
Um, and protected spaces like hospitals, schools,
and courthouses with statutory damages
of at least 10,000 per violation.
This law recognizes the right to safety
and accountability, even when federal authorities
fail to protect the public.
The owner of the Kia
and the murderer that's still out is an undocumented
man from Ecuador named Miguel Angel.
Navarrate Palacios, you know,
but y'all know it is an illegal alien.
And from Ecuador, and it's still out here being protected.
We have a, uh, a legal alien, uh, criminal crisis,
you know, because the man that thanked God, president Trump,
uh, went and got the other night while we were all asleep.
Um, and, and you got, uh, Brian Ci Lopez, who's out there
standing defending him next to someone with a trans, um,
flag, uh, at their rally that they did.
No American flags.
Venezuelan flags
and trans flags, yes, rebels without no cause.
Um, anyway, uh, I need somebody to check on that.
Uh, I know you don't care the Hopkins,
but this is your last term.
The next speaker is Danielle Carter.
Okay? Like we just said, this is not going away.
We are here for justice for Stephanie Hardley, her son
that Zoe just talked about, who was killed
by an illegal alien.
We want justice for Prince Jamele Sullivan
and for Breonna Kay.
And we had Ms. Stephanie on our show,
on our YouTube channel, and this is not going away.
So these were Chicago students.
I mean, citizens and students.
These teens or these people went
and they did everything right.
Went to school, graduated from college,
and were in their careers,
had their lives mapped out, best friends.
And it was taken away from an illegal alien.
They graduated from dealer sale.
And you have the nerve
to people be protecting an illegal alien
and not comforting the mom who lost her child.
So we are telling you right now, we need
investigator Jay Wilson to get back to her
because the thing about it is you all haven't even contacted
her since the death of her child.
And you all are protecting the illegal alien.
So this is not going away.
Miss three holidays, Thanksgiving, Christmas,
and New Year without her child.
And you all won't even contact her, get back to her
or let her know anything about the murderer
who murdered her child.
An illegal alien that you all are protecting.
So we are telling you, this is not going away.
We are not going to allow it to go away.
We are going to keep this story in the forefront
because we are the media.
The fake news won't take it,
but we will, we are demanding
justice for her son.
'cause see, he wasn't a gang bang.
He wasn't out here in the streets doing things
that you all wanna say that we do.
He was, he was a graduate.
He worked for people gas after he graduated from college,
nor then he got it NIU.
So he was, he did everything that you all tell us to do
what we need to do as an American citizen.
Everything right? An illegal alien can come, right?
Come here. A low life, an illegal alien can come here
and take his life and he's protected.
Yeah. So we are putting you all on notice.
If Jay Wilson don't get investigative Jay Wilson,
don't get back to her.
We will be down there at the precinct.
And we are asking you, superintendent Snelling,
make sure you talk to this grieving mom.
Uh, next speaker is Aisha Davis.
Good morning, chairman Hopkins,
vice Chair Senior Committee members.
My name is Aisha Davis
and I'm Senior Policy Counsel at the A CLU of Illinois.
And I'm here today to oppose the propo proposed ordinance
being considered by this committee that would create time
and sight curfews for minors.
While this proposal would not permit snap curfews
as defined within the draft ordinance,
it is still an expansion of the Chicago,
Chicago Police Department's existing authority
to disperse groups or to utilize other practices
that risk criminalizing the already over police black
and brown youth in our city.
First evidence shows
that curfews do not affect crimes committed by
or targeted against young people.
These measures relics from a time where people
of color were labeled as super predators do not meet the
needs of the present day.
We know that these policies do not work.
And doubling down at a time
where our city is under a microscope
and where our communities of color
and immigrant communities are facing heightened targeting
and demonization is not only dangerous,
it does not make our community safer.
Second, the ordinance would permit officers
to issue a citation
or make an arrest based on reasonable belief.
This does not meet the required probable cause standard
for law enforcement officers to arrest someone.
And there's nothing in the ordinance
that would permit a defense for a minor who was not aware
that there was a curfew in place.
The combination of these pro provisions means
that law enforcement officers are permitted
to act without meeting a recognized and enforced standard.
While young people are required to adhere
to a curfew they may not even be aware of or risk arrest.
Finally, there's no way to ensure
that this ordinance will be applied fairly for Chicagoans.
When looking at the arrests
after the very first night of the 2020 curfew, 93%
of minors arrested for curfew violations were black.
There's no evidence
that there will be any reduction in the discriminatory
application of this or any other curfew.
While we do appreciate the acknowledgement
that exercising First Amendment rights should be an
effective defense to the curfew
that does not negate the historical
and current disproportionate criminalization of black
and brown youth, including in those instances
where these young people are in fact
exercising their constitutional rights.
While section I purports to ban snap curfews, we acknowledge
that there is a shift in requirements for imposing a curfew.
This does not erase the affirmation concerns,
nor does it require or mandate posting information about the
curfew in public places, uh, subject
to the declaration of the curfew.
Additionally, while law enforcement officers may repeat the
verbal notice, it's not required as written.
This ordinance gives more flexibility
to the law enforcement officers trained in handling crowd
crowds safely and without violence than the minors
who are literally just walking
around the city that they call home.
As we saw last week with New Year's Eve,
there can be success with our current curfew ordinance.
The mayor, reiterating the existing weeknight curfew worked.
It's clear that we do not need a new, more restrictive law.
And in addition, requiring posted written notice
by law enforcement officers
and verbal dispersal orders
with clear instructions will create
better safeguards for young people.
In our,
Uh, the final speaker is Jessica Jackson.
Um, the biggest threat
to public safety is city council.
You all are the biggest threat to public safety.
The mere fact that you all have the power
to manipulate the police the way that you do.
It's a issue of public safety anytime
that the police here in City Hall can be utilized
to harass us,
to keep us from coming into the meeting on December 29th,
because you all didn't want us to get to the mic
to talk about all the money in that budget
that was still in there.
The line item for new arrivals for over $200 million
to illegal immigrants
after you all have already put this city in the ground
financially, you did not want us to alert the public
about the inflated property taxes
that are unevenly distributed through this city
where the black communities were targeted
with extremely high tax, uh, increases where
downtown and the north side got moderate to none as less
as 5%.
The fact that you all did not want us to get to this mic
to talk about the fact that despite the fact
that you all have grossly mismanaged the city of Chicago,
but you're still going to give yourself raises,
you didn't want that.
So you violated our rights and you
and manipulated the police department to attack citizens
and to keep three unarmed women
and children out in the hallway.
And you all have no shame about it whatsoever.
You all are the biggest threat to public safety.
Now, in addition to that, your line,
your runners up are your preachers, those black preachers
that lied in front of Trump towers saying
that Trump is the cause of these property tax increases.
Those are the public safety threats
that they would stand in front of Trump towers
and lie with the hopes of inciting a riot.
Hopes that they would incite the public.
We calling on them black preachers that stood
behind Brandon Johnson that are members of the Cook County
Boards that know all about these property taxes.
'cause they sat in there just like the black alderman sat in
here and allowed that disproportionate tax to go that way.
Or we are dealing with them.
Those are the threats to public safety.
Anytime a preacher will use his
voice to tell the public a
lie that Trump did.
Okay, this concludes our public speakers.
Uh, the first item on the agenda is approval
of the Rule 45 report from the Public Safety Committee
meeting of November, 2025.
Do have a, um, so moved
by Alderman Chico hearing no objections.
So order the Rule 45, uh, report is approved.
Uh, the first item before us is, uh, the time
and place curfew proposed ordinance number 2 1 8 9 8.
Uh, I just want to, uh, by means of opening, uh,
call your attention to the, um, checklist sheet
that was handed out that shows, uh,
the near identical similarities that this proposal has to
what Mayor Johnson and Superintendent Snelling, uh,
implemented on New Year's Eve as a control measure
by means of background.
It did come to the, uh, police department's attention
that a teen trend gathering was being planned
for New Year's Eve, uh, at
or near the site of the city's official event.
Much discussion took place internally involving, of course,
the Deputy Mayor for Public Safety
as the ordinance prescribes.
And it was determined that imposing that curfew at 10:00 PM
as the current law allows and announcing it.
And this is the important part,
and that's what this spreadsheet shows, uh, announcing it
and communicating it through social media channels,
through traditional media channels,
through oppress availability that the mayor had,
where he went into some detail about
how the curfew would be enforced at 10:00 PM
as the law allows the only difference between
that policy decision and the ordinance before you.
Uh, as you can see at the bottom,
this ordinance allows the flexibility
to impose the start time of the curfew, uh, at a time
that's more congruent with the anticipated event.
So if a curfew works at 10:00 PM and the mayor
and his public comments did acknowledge the curfew worked,
uh, it would work at 8:00 PM If a curfew was constitutional
at 10:00 PM it is constitutional at 9:00 PM It is
constitutional really anytime.
Uh, and the law on the books that has been well established,
uh, defended by our law department
and in practice for a number of years now,
is in fact constitutional.
The only change that this ordinance
before you makes compared to the one that passed out
of this committee, uh, a few months ago and, uh,
and was approved by the city council
and unfortunately, veto vetoed by the mayor.
The only change is the 12 hour period of time
that is now required between the time that the, uh,
announcement is made that a time
and place curfew will be imposed.
And the actual effective time of the curfew,
12 hours is the minimum in practice.
We expect it will be much longer than that.
Going back to the New Year's Eve example, uh,
the mayor started his, uh,
public relations campaign days prior, uh, to New Year's Eve.
The message was adequately sent out via, you know,
a a variety of media channels.
Um, and as the mayor and his team have
acknowledged it worked.
Uh, we did not have a team trend take
place on New Year's Eve.
Uh, and to the extent that the curfew announcement was part
of the reason, I think we can all, uh, agree
that there were many other factors involved,
but certainly, um, the curfew was a big part of that.
And so the ordinance before us, uh, actually is, uh,
in compliance with everything
that happened leading up to that decision.
And leading up to the announcement, again,
the only thing this does is provide needed flexibility, uh,
for a start time of the effective time
and place curfew, uh,
to make more sense based on the conditions on the ground.
And with that, will open it up
to any questions or comments from
members. Alderman Vasquez.
Thank you, chairman. Um, first,
just wanna make sure I'm counted for roll call.
Um, 'cause I don't believe I was present.
Thank you, Your Honor. Um, uh,
this is a separate question and a tangent.
I'd gotten some information that
although the ordinance had been vetoed,
it's actually published in the municipal code.
Yes. And so as passed, not as vetoed.
And so I just didn't know if we had a process for
addressing situations like that
where something was gonna move.
A mayor actually vetoed it,
but it still got published in the municipal code
as if it didn't get vetoed.
And if we have a formal response
or anything from law about what
to do in situations like that.
Yeah. Uh, thank you Alderman for bringing that up.
Uh, the, immediately upon realizing that that was the case,
in fact, prior to the New Year's Eve event itself, um,
we recognized the potential for some confusion.
Um, in the event that there were curfew apprehensions
that night, under what law would that, would those, uh, uh,
apprehensions be affected to my knowledge there, in fact,
were no curfew apprehensions on New Year's Eve.
However, uh, at least 24 hours prior to that event,
the, he was corrected.
Uh, the American Legal Corporation,
who is the private contractor
that publishes our municipal code, uh, corrected the error,
put a, an error notice on their landing page, acknowledging
that an error was made.
The clerk's office was aware of it as well.
Um, at this point, I'm not clear whose error it was.
Was it the clerk who normally communicates
with American Legal, or was it American legal on their own?
That who, who monitors the proceedings of this body
and has standardized procedures
for incorporating measures that pass?
Sure. Uh, and a
and a veto, as we all know, a veto is uncommon.
Somehow that rare event missed the various people involved
in publishing, uh, these ordinances.
So we are not aware of any legal implications going forward.
I'm confident that there won't be,
there are procedural implications
because we have to make sure this does not happen again.
Uh, and I will communicate with the clerk's office, uh, on,
on a, through the chair basis to get a response from them,
uh, to kind of figure out how this error happened
and what steps have been taken since
to make sure it doesn't happen again.
'cause frankly, that's, it's a little
embarrassing to all parties involved. Yeah,
I, I appreciate that. I also
think, like trying to figure out through the council
a way to properly address a situation like that.
Because I think what was concerning
to me when I heard about it is then
somebody could arbitrarily delete change parts
of municipal code and just publish something different.
And when you're making those kind of corrections,
how do you put that on the public
record that, that occurred?
And we're making the adjustments in a way that is, you know,
for, on a good government led lens working properly.
And so I, that was just a concern when I'd heard it,
I think, um, related to the matter itself
and the ordinance, you know, I, I still have my takes
and concerns about it.
Um, but I do appreciate that you've made the changes to kind
of take into consideration some of that.
So, I, I don't, I'm gonna vote, I'm gonna vote on it,
but I'm not planning on, you know,
raising up a whole thing about it.
But I, the other part about the publishing was a concern.
So just wanna get that answer. Thank
You. And we'll get back to this
committee, uh,
with a response from the clerk's office,
and they will reach out to American Legal, uh, for,
for their position as well.
Thank you for bringing it to our attention.
Uh, further comments. Alderman Lopez,
Thank you chairman, and
good morning members of the committee.
Um, I look forward to
yet again supporting another tool in the toolbox
for our police officers.
But I also think that to
what we've heard from our public speakers, um, there's a lot
of misguided
narratives being thrown out.
And what we're trying to do by ensuring that we're able
to legally and consistently apply changes
to the curfew when they happen, what we saw advocated
for New Year's was the mayor taking it upon himself
in a unilateral decision.
This, I think, would codify those
proceedings moving forward.
So when we talk about the need for recognize
and enforce standards, this is it.
When we talk about, uh, this is an attack on black
and brown, this applies to any group.
This could equally come to back of the yards.
If we have someone trying to do a team takeover
or a mass gathering
or something along those lines,
that's gonna endanger people in our community.
And rightfully so,
because what we need to also focus on is when we talk about
the principles that we live by, is that people deserve
to live, uh, in communities that are safe in area
and be able to engage in neighborhoods where their life
and liberty is not in danger.
That's what we need to get back to.
And to the apostle's point,
if she's still here, I don't know.
Okay. Um, yes,
she's a hundred percent correct.
When you see this in person,
it's a lot different than pontificating it
from a nice, cozy office.
I'm actually glad, if you can see,
I have my light in the night sweater on today,
because I've been there as well.
When the bad crap happens,
when we're talking about everyone says,
we need more programs, you need more investment.
What you need to do is better use your money on programs
that go hand in hand with the laws so that you are
actually making sure that people are out there on the
streets doing what they need to do,
and not just cashing a check or causing more violence.
This is one more step in the right direction.
And I think that as we continue to move forward
with ordinances that try
to address this in a meaningful way,
this is one step that does that.
It's easy to try to
gaslight enforcement.
It's easy to try
and say that there's something nefarious
behind what's going on.
But good, decent law abiding Chicagoans,
which are the vast majority of everyone,
know that you need tools.
And they also know that there are some programs
that are not gonna convince a, a group a youth
or 500 youth not to go destroy things for the sake
of becoming social media famous.
It's just, that's the world we're in.
And we need to be able to adapt, change,
and react in a way
that is both constitutional and effective.
And I think that though not perfect,
this is definitely a step in the right
direction. Thank you, chairman.
Uh, thank you. Alderman Alderwoman. Min Howorth.
Thank you, chair. I had a question about
what happened on New Year's.
Are you saying that the mayor called
for a curfew? Is that,
Well, to Alderman Lopez's point,
that it was the mayor's announcement
and the assumption that it was the mayor's decision.
Uh, you know, I'm, I'm not gonna go that far
because I do know that the mayor, the superintendent
and the Deputy Mayor for Public Safety were all very
involved in not only the process of making that decision,
but implementing the announcement protocol
and trying to actively get the word out to CPS families
and others that the curfew was going
to be enforced at 10:00 PM The mayor's not obligated
to tell us how he makes decisions.
So I, was it his unilateral decision or,
or, you know, was the superintendent more influential?
Who's to say? Um,
but it does, uh, allow me to highlight the piece
of this ordinance that I think is important.
It mandates consultation with the Deputy Mayor
for Public Safety to, in order to make this decision,
these are not easy decisions to make.
And I'm going to, in good faith, assume that the best
and brightest minds that we have on a matter
of such importance
as New Year's Eve when we were on the national
spotlight on live television, you know, the potential
for things to go wrong and embarrass
the city was certainly there.
We all know it. So I'm, I'm prepared to assume
that this was a high level discussion among all
of the players involved.
They came to a consensus that not only were they going
to enforce the curfew the minute the law allowed,
which is 10:00 PM but they were going
to engage in this public campaign to put the word out there,
to try and discourage the activity from happening at all.
And of, of course, that is the intention of this,
uh, ordinance before us.
It is to prevent these events.
And the only way you can reasonably have a chance
to prevent the events is with public relations,
public communication,
and actively putting the word out so
that people hear about it the same way
they hear about the team trend.
They hear about it on Facebook,
they hear about it on TikTok,
and we're gonna talk about that next with Alderman Hall.
That's how they hear about these events.
So they have to hear the same message that it's a bad idea,
or the event is canceled, or the curfew will be enforced.
And that's exactly what the, uh, the mayor did
and what the public safety department
and the police did. We
Do have curfew in place already.
Yes. 10:00 PM Yeah.
And so how is that different on New Year's?
Well, I, you know, I would like to think that
because the, the, uh, social media campaign
to promote the teen trend had an earlier start time
that had, the mayor's team had the flexibility
that this ordinance would allow to
make the curfew start time earlier than 10:00 PM They
would've done so, or,
or at least they would've had the option.
Again, going back to the fact
that they didn't make this decision lightly,
and I'm sure there was a lot of discussion
behind closed doors
that would've been a part of that discussion.
Should we start it at eight? Should we start it at nine?
Whatever, you know, if they, it gives them the
Option. Were they invited
to this hearing, the deputy mayor
or the superintendent?
Yes, they were. Uh, in fact, I,
I had a conversation in the mayor's office yesterday.
Um, our conversation will be ongoing.
That's all I can say, but you, they're fully aware of it.
And, uh, alderman Hall
and I were on a, a Zoom call yesterday at four o'clock.
So the discussion is ongoing.
Did the deputy mayor
or the superintendent ask this body to create more tools
for them because they cannot do their jobs?
I wouldn't say that. Um, I can only say months ago, uh,
the superintendent himself, uh, told me he wanted this tool.
Um, I know he hasn't said as much publicly
because of the controversy surrounding it,
but I'm basing my belief on
what the superintendent wants on a personal
conversation I had with him.
Um, and he has, uh, he's never told me otherwise.
Um, so I believe we're going forward with the full support
of the superintendent, the, the mayor's comments, you know,
I'll, I'll let him speak for himself.
We've all seen what he said,
and, uh, his comments have been reflected,
and I think they actually even had a press briefing today.
So, um, we'll see what happens.
Yeah, I do wish that they were here themselves
to speak for themselves.
Yeah. I mean, I remember when we, you told me about a 18
teen event that was happening on 31st Street Beach.
Was that in the summer? Yeah.
And so I, I, I rode my bike
and it was a lovely day.
It was warm, it was sunny.
A lot of people were out, a lot of families.
And the closer I got to the beach, you saw the,
the increase in, in police presence.
You saw them walking, you saw the vans, you saw
bicyclists, um, and we saw a helicopter.
There were, there were so many officers on the ground and,
and there were families who also wanted to go to the beach.
And that kind
of environment doesn't it, it doesn't welcome people.
It doesn't welcome people,
and it doesn't make people feel like they belong.
And I can't imagine what that might feel like
to, to other kids.
I'm concerned about the noticing of something like this.
Maybe if the families knew about it,
they could understand not to go to that area.
But that's not what we want. We want people
to actually use our public spaces,
and we, we don't want to deter them from coming.
I, I don't, I don't know.
I, I, I, I, um, heard
what a CLU said about, you know,
how is it that people
are understanding when the curfew is in place?
How are people being noticed? When, where is this happening?
When is it over?
Like, what procedures are in place to document
how well this is going to work?
Those are the questions that I have.
And I don't know who can answer those.
Uh, let me take the last question first.
Uh, the ordinance mandates a quarterly report
to this committee, uh, from the police department,
from the superintendent himself.
Uh, and they've indicated
to me they'll have no problem complying with that.
So as we go forward with this, we will get, uh, feedback,
we'll get input from the, the police,
uh, on how it's worked.
Um, as far as the communication aspect of it, uh,
it works best when we really lean in
to communicating a curfew, which again, is the,
the New Year's Eve example, uh, provides that.
There was, uh, quite extensive communication,
um, that was provided.
Um, some of the other more recent examples, uh, that met
with limited results was, uh, on November 21st,
that was the, uh, the night of the shooting where, uh,
a young 14-year-old Mari Floyd lost his life.
Um, we communicated,
we thought adequately there was a sufficient notice given.
It was publicized. There was an email blast that went out
to CPS families.
A lot of communication went into that.
And yet teens showed up and had the teen trends.
So, um, it's not perfect.
But as we go forward with this, I think we learn the types
of communication tools that are most effective, uh,
using the different social medias.
Um, again, you know, alderman Hall will talk about it
during, uh, his, um, his remarks,
but he actually had a conversation yesterday
with leaders of TikTok.
Uh, so we are looking at ways to not only, uh, remove
the social media posts for the illegal events, um,
but to communicate, uh, to the teens on alternatives.
Don't come to this, come to something productive instead.
So that work is ongoing.
Um, and, uh, and I think as we go forward, we're,
we're going to see some improvements in how we handle that.
But, uh, again, I give the mayor
and his team credit on New Year's Eve.
They did a pretty good job, uh, of putting the word out.
Um, and it, and the team trend that was being organized,
and by the way, we know the, uh, the young people
that were involved in the effort to organize it, um,
we had reason to believe that their effective
influencers within their peer group,
when they organize things, they tend to happen.
So we took it very seriously
and responded appropriately, and it worked.
So, um, you know, we, we know how to do this.
Uh, and, uh, and as time goes on under this ordinance,
I think you'll see improvements. So
Does this ordinance, uh, does this ordinance address
that part that you're talking about holding the
organizers accountable?
No, it does not. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. Uh, further comments, alderman Gardner,
Uh, thank you, chairman.
Um, you brought up, uh, the success of New Year's Eve, um,
while on the NA National Spotlight.
And, um, I was just for curious, do we know what,
what the numbers were for CPD staffing that night compared
to, say, an average weekend?
Um, do we, do we, do we know what those numbers look like?
I, I don't have a specific number.
Uh, I did inquire as to whether, um,
we incurred significant overtime costs that night,
and the answer was yes, which is a topic for another, uh,
another committee, possibly budget committee.
'cause we've talked about police overtime.
Um, but, uh, I don't know exactly how many, uh,
patrol officers, I know vacations were canceled.
Personal leave was canceled, um,
in a very aggressive deployment from other police districts,
was brought into the first district
and the 18th district, uh, for this event.
And it, and we did incur overtime costs.
So, um, I can make that inquiry, uh, alderman, uh, as a,
through the chair and, and get the specific number for you.
Um, and I'll be happy to do so. Please.
Uh, so would it be safe to say
that we had more than our average, uh,
CPD staffing that night? Oh,
Sig significantly more. Significantly,
Yeah. Yeah. Anytime you cancel vacations
and personal leaves and it, it puts the word out, uh,
to the rank and file patrol, uh,
that everybody who's available to work
that day will be working that day.
Um, because frankly, it wasn't just the deployment
to downtown in the first
and 18th districts, you know,
new Year's Eve stuff happens all over the city,
and we didn't want
to bring in resources from the outlying districts
neighborhoods like the one you represent, sir.
Sure. And, and leave a shortage in any community
where if something happened in that community,
immediately the neighbors would be like,
you took our police away and we had a problem.
And that's unacceptable. So you can't let that, uh, occur.
Uh, which is why we had to cancel all, uh, paid time off
and all, uh, vacation time for New Year's Eve.
And, and that's a great point you brought up as far as,
um, you, you know, obviously we're all happy to see, um,
that the operation was successful.
Um, but the last thing that, uh, alderman,
like myself on the outer laying districts of the,
of the city would wanna see is more police officers, uh, out
of their own district.
Um, with that being said, with the obvious uptick in,
in police presence there, I am probably, um,
less inclined to give credit to the curfew per se,
and more inclined to give credit
to the police presence downtown.
Um, with that being said, um, I would,
I would hope that when Ryan Seacrest and a BC
and the rest of the national spotlight leave Chicago, um,
that we put the same amount of value in our residents, um,
uh, on a consistent basis when the national
spotlight is not on.
Um, just curious, what is the penalty
for a curfew if somebody is, uh, taken in
for a curfew violation?
The, uh, the law prescribes a, uh, fine of up to $250.
Uh, to my knowledge, that's never been imposed.
Uh, it's, it's a judgment call made.
And in the, uh, district police station
where the youth are transported, um, in 99% of the cases,
from what I, what I can tell, uh, there is no follow up,
there's no citation contrary to some
of the public testimony you heard earlier.
It's not an arrest.
Uh, it, it's not even, uh, a custody situation.
You know, it's an apprehension with the immediate release
to a responsible adult when they
show up, there's there, okay.
There's no booking, uh, there's no fingerprinting,
no mugshots, none of that.
Um, so we don't enforce the punitive piece
that currently exists in the curfew law right now.
Mm-hmm. Um, as a matter of policy, that may be something
that we want to talk about in the future.
There's been a lot of consideration of, you know, looking
for ways to make the parents
responsible and things like that.
I'm open to those ideas,
but I, I didn't think it belonged in this ordinance,
so it's not in this ordinance.
Sure. Um, but that is something
that we may want to consider in the future.
And so, from, from your explanation right there,
it's basically a slap on the wrist.
Um, and, and, and that's from what I understanding.
And, and so if we continue to do, um,
like say the slap on the wrist
where basically there's no fine,
there's no arrest, which you mentioned.
What happens if there's a second
or a third violation for same individual? Yeah.
Actually, uh, alderman Hall, uh, has some thoughts on
that, and he's done some, some at least preliminary work,
uh, in that direction.
Do you want to comment on it now
or do you wanna wait until your ordinance is up? Uh,
You know what, I, I can wait till the, uh, ordinance
Is, yeah. Al Alderman
Hall will address that,
but thank you for bringing it up. Sure.
So the, the reason why I, you know, that,
that I bring it up again, I, I think we can all agree
we wanna prioritize the safety of our residents.
And, and we also, we don't want
to do it just when the national spotlight is showing.
And, uh, to be frank, um, I, I don't know if really a curfew
violation has enough teeth, uh,
to ensure the safety of our residents.
I do think, though, that being said,
that doing something is better than doing nothing.
Right. The, the, the, uh, definition of,
of insanity is doing the same thing over and over
and expecting a different result.
So I do think it's, uh, uh, pastime, uh,
to try something different, um, to see what would work.
But my concern lies in the fact that New Year's Eve,
we wanna keep bringing that up as a success.
And I don't argue that, but I do.
I, I think the large part of
that success was inherently based on the number
of police officers that we had downtown and not on a curfew.
I really, and especially what you just brought up,
that it's, there's no arrest, there's no fine.
It's basically have somebody,
a guardianship come pick you up and you leave.
So I don't think it's a real deterrent.
Um, and I would like to see us to continue to move forward
and entertain ideas, which I know you will, um, of ways
that we can ensure the safety of our residents,
because just a, a simple curfew violation,
I really don't think that that, uh, really deters people,
uh, from continuing some of the problems
that we have experienced in our downtown area,
which you would know well because that's,
that's the area that you represent.
Um, uh, I, I, I will say I appreciate,
and I know the amount of struggles
that you have done throughout this time,
uh, to bring this forward.
So once again, I, I, I thank you
and I look forward to future legislation
that we can help enhance the safety
of our city. Thank you, chairman.
Yeah, thank you Alderman.
Uh, further co Alderman Vesquez,
and then Alderman Central Lopez.
Thank you very much, chairman. I,
I appreciate the privilege knowing that it had gone earlier.
Uh, just wanna follow up, uh, on a couple points there.
And really not to retort,
even though there's disagreement more follow up
on New Year's Eve itself.
Can we get through the chair? Um, how much staff was used?
What overtime, uh, was incurred that day?
Uh, I think as we think about the continuing costs
and we think about how budget is, and I've been,
and we'll continue to push for auditing in the departments,
understanding that is important as well as if I'm correct,
it's NBC that was sponsoring
or doing the event A, B, C, A B, C, my apologies.
Uh, we, uh, a lot of us missed it
'cause it wasn't aired properly.
Um, did they pay for anything
as far as security or anything?
Those things would be important just to know
and understand as we continue footing the bill for things
and then also having to figure out the concerns
and safety associated with it.
That was all. Yeah.
Uh, thank you Almar. I will make that request
and, uh, disseminate it to the members.
And I will also remind everyone
that we are owed a resource allocation study from the police
department that will address some of these topics.
Uh, and we're anticipating that in February.
So, uh, it's coming soon. Thank you. Alderman CIN Lopez.
Oh, I'm sorry. On a point of information. Alderman Lopez.
Excuse me. Al, just to add to that,
I also want if we could add to that
through the chair request, not just
for the police department, because we also know that Streets
and Sands out there, everybody
and their brother was out there.
So I think to get the whole true cost.
And then to Alderman Vasquez's point,
what the cost recovery,
'cause we did a whole lengthy discussion during budget
that we spend 20 million and get two.
This, how much of
that percentage are we expected to get back as well?
Thank you. Okay.
Uh, alderman Central Lopez,
Thank you. Uh,
thank you chairman, and I appreciate that you
and Alderman Hall, uh, having a, a discussion around this.
We all care about safety and,
and is, um, it is important that we get this right.
I think to me, it's important that we hear directly
from the police superintendent.
I think it's important that we have these direct
conversations from the law department.
I think that we also continue
to hear concerns from the A CLU on, um,
the constitutionality of this proposal.
So my, um, my question is that if this is something
that we already can do, I understand,
and correct me if I'm wrong, this is just codifying
something that police already has authority
to do. So, is that correct?
With the exception of the flexibility on the
time? Yes. Yes.
So my, what I'm hearing from different members
of the council is that there are, there is desire to
focus on the root cause, as of what is going to work.
My concern is that, and I, I appreciate residents
that come from the 44th Ward describing
what has happened in, um, the, the Pride Parade.
And, uh, I tell you that when we have, um,
an inability to enjoy even the, the public spaces
and difficulty even enforcing,
I think there has not even been one person even being fined
the $250 that you mentioned.
So we are putting all these resources without a real
analysis of the cost benefit to this.
Right. My other concern just yesterday was another report.
The Chicago Police Department, uh,
has spent $250 million in overtime,
yet we took out a management ordinance that oversees this.
These are funds that are going
to come from alternatives for public safety.
So my concern is that we rush in again, yet again, something
that I think it is, um, I think
that we should include all of us.
I appreciate that you and Alder Van Hall
are having those conversations.
Um, my concern again, entering, uh, legal disputes
with civil re uh, civil rights organizations, um,
with very little outcome.
Right. To me, seems, and something that already can be done
to me, I am very interested in hearing the
side on the social media.
I think that is important. I think Will has a lot to do
with this getting to in this next section.
But in this case, I mean, we're going back
and, uh, as other colleagues have said,
keep doing the same thing over and over again.
I, I do think this merits a conversation
with the superintendent.
This merits a conversation with the law department.
And I do think that given that you
and Alderman Hall already are having good conversations,
is it possible to have some more time
to have this conversation
and then move forward with something
that we can definitely assure, or young people
and our residents that we're taking this matter seriously,
bringing things back that are only qualifying things
that already been done, I think are, uh, not only a waste
of resources, but in the long run,
we are missing big picture items like police over time
that I think is in the eyes of a lot of our constituents,
especially with taxes and fines
and fees are being imposed on them.
So my question chairman, is if you will be willing
to maybe take, take some extra time so that we can work
with some of the members of the council with Alderman Hall
and you to, to see we can get to a better place,
because I'm really concerned about us rushing yet again
to something that, quite frankly can be already be done.
Yeah. Uh, thank you Alderman, uh, for your comments
and for your, uh, request.
Uh, our intention is, uh, to vote today on both matters,
and we're going to go forward with that.
But that is by no means the end of this conversation
or this dialogue, there's much more work to be done.
Uh, alderman Hall will address that, uh, presently, uh,
during his remarks.
But, uh, we were convening, uh, other voices, uh,
to this table, including the state's attorney's office,
by the way, uh, that we reached out to them yesterday.
Um, and started that conversation as well.
So the work will continue,
the discussion will continue, uh, in this committee.
We are, we are far from done, um,
but we all are also prepared to, uh, move forward today.
Um, any other comments before we, uh, get a do pass motion?
Hearing none, alderman, Chico, uh, moves. Do pass.
Uh, we'll take a roll call on it.
Vice Yancy Alderman Chico.
Alderman Lopez, uh, alderman. Curtis Fa.
Ramona, are you still with us Alderman?
Yes, sir. Yes. My answer is, uh, I
Alderman Tabes.
Is she still on? Okay. Uh, alderman Cicio Lopez.
Alderman Fuentes, uh,
alderman Talia Farrow, if you're still with us.
Remote
Alderman Pisano.
Alderman Vasquez. Alderman Knutson.
Alderman Gardner,
uh, alderman Minna Hop.
Penworth Alderwoman Silverstein.
Oh, Silverstein's an I, uh,
alderman Tabes is an aye.
Thank you. Uh,
alderman Hopkins is an I Did I get everybody?
Anyone else on the board? Alderman Talia Faroh.
One more time, sir. Okay.
And, uh, president Pro Tem Nugent,
uh, with the President Pro tem, the vote is
10 Aye to four nay.
Uh, motion carries. Thank you. Alderman Hall.
Uh, thank you so much, Mr. Chairman.
Um, today, uh,
before you all is an ordinance that is a statement
to not only Chicago,
but to the country that social media companies
are out of control.
Uh, social media companies did not pull the trigger
that killed Omar.
Uh, Floyd, uh,
social media companies did not, uh, close schools.
Social media companies did not close grocery stores.
Social media companies did not pump drugs into certain
neighborhoods, especially where in some neighborhoods, 90%
of the children are in poverty.
However, social media companies have preyed upon
P-R-E-Y-I-N-G have been preying upon these children
in ways that makes no sense.
Social media companies in America, to be honest with you,
have really taken over children's phone.
Almost 93% of children in Chicago alone have a social media
ages 13 through 17 account outta the 93%
that have social media accounts.
Again, 25% of children in Chicago are added beneath poverty.
The correlation between social media companies
and the reason why we are trying to protect our children is
because these companies have made over $175 billion, TikTok,
Facebook, Instagram alone,
and they make their money off
of advertising social commerce, as well
as video monetization.
What we see is essentially this is that children
are in distress
and not protected when they gather their phones.
And look at some of the images
that we see on these cell phones.
It has been proven, it has been proven that number one,
children are under more mental distress like never before.
However, social media companies have contributed
to the mental decline of our children, the lack
of development in brain activity, stress, A DHD,
and the list goes on and on, on
what these social media companies are doing to our children.
This ordinance is the first
step in holding social media companies accountable.
When I sat in the funeral of Amari Floyd, the 14-year-old
who was killed downtown, sitting next to the mayor in a room
that was literally over capacitated with children,
not only embody but the heaviness of their tears,
you can see that children need
to be protected simply
because one can only imagine if that image
or that invitation was taken down,
how many children would not have gone downtown.
This is not an ordinance under no circumstances
to Big Brothers social media.
This is a ordinance to make sure
that social media companies do their job.
On every social media, uh, account, there are guidelines
that prohibit sexual activity.
Moreover, violence, the promotion of violence.
And again, social media companies have failed.
Talking to Superintendent Snelling,
there was a time when social media companies were responsive
to Chicago, but they're no longer.
We do have a division in Chicago, uh, police
that essentially helps with getting information
to social media companies about teen trends, violent acts,
or other things that go against what they say.
They were willing to protect our children,
but it was only fell on deaf ears.
In conversation with our superintendent, he said
that the relationship has deteriorated in instances in which
no calls have been returned, emails not returned,
and yet the promotion of things
that go against their guidelines continue
to happen on a daily basis.
This ordinance is the gateway, I believe,
to rehabilitating our children that are being affected
by social media companies.
This ordinance says
that if social media companies won't protect our children,
Chicago will, and in doing so, we will work.
First of all, with our mental clinics here in Chicago,
we have literally so many mental clinics available free
for parents and children.
I think that it's only right that if a child
has been called making a mistake, which most children do,
that we focus on rehabilitating children in Chicago
and not condemning children in Chicago.
Indeed, what we want to provide for children
that are breaking the law, that have been inspired
to break the law by social media content is first of all,
offer them free mental health clinics opportunities to sit
with a therapist, parent, guardian,
and child to discuss the mental dilapidation stress burnout,
A DHD, social skills that are not being, uh,
developed in our children with the hopes that no child.
Going back to what was mentioned is a repeat offender.
The idea that we military, that we use a military strategy
to apprehend kids who come from communities in which,
number one, there is no schools we close, the majority
of which no grocery stores, no healthcare only furthers
the mental dilapidation and trauma that our children face.
Our goal is simply to protect children
when social media companies won't protect them.
In this ordinance, though it is in its infant stages,
this also op opens up the opportunity
for social media companies to sit down with us to say,
what is the way in which they're going
to protect children in Chicago if they don't wanna
protect children in Chicago?
I think it's our job, all 50 of us, to protect them.
In addition to social media companies preying on our
children, there's no commitment
and investment in communities.
What would the day be like if children could go
to a 21st century park
where the basketball rims are not just their rusted out,
but rather field houses show children how
to use social media in a positive way.
What would the day look like in Chicago if children
actually learned how to put together correct advertising,
participate in social commerce, as well
as get positive videos monetized?
It's the 21st century.
Children are innovative and children are competing
in a global economy.
But we want our children in Chicago
to not only be participants in social media's, uh,
participation, but we want our children in Chicago
to be positive influencers.
The same videos that you see promoting violence are also
videos used to advertise on social media.
These accounts are used in monetization, meaning
that social media companies even are making money
off of evil content.
And so your vote today is the beginning.
Are there things in this ordinance that are
of concern even for law?
Yes. And does that mean
that we have completed the partnership with our city
and other agencies?
It's the beginning. And if we don't make a step in the right
direction, the question now becomes
what child will step into a teen takeover?
What child will step into a
gathering that promotes violence?
And what could it be that what Chicago does
so does other cities across the country?
Because we want to make sure that the children
that are using these devices
and social media platforms are protected from promoting
violence that we've seen go wrong in our city.
And so your support today is protection of our children.
It's to stop the predatory behavior
of social media companies
and is also the beginning
of showing our children a better positive world
that can be seen in the neighborhoods that they live in
and the downtown that they travel.
Thank you so much, Mr. Chief.
Thank you, alderman Hall.
Uh, before we open it up to questions, I just wanna go back
to Alderwoman Minna Haworth's question about communication
channels and how we target youth with our message
and put the word out there when we have a curfew imposed.
Uh, in our discussion yesterday with the law department, uh,
some of the lawyers that have been working on this issue
pointed out that, uh, they're aware of the algorithms
that the social media companies use, Facebook in particular,
but the others, they're better at communicating
with youth than we are right now.
Uh, and they do it in a destructive way.
They promote these types of illegal teen trends
to at-risk youth.
The algorithm does it knowing who these kids are, knowing
who the targets are, and goes after them
and promotes an unhealthy message of violence.
That is currently what is happening right now.
This is the beginning of our response to that.
We cannot not allow this to continue.
We cannot allow the social media companies
to monetize promoting violent activity
with our young people today.
And that's the first step that we're taking right now.
Uh, alderman Hall's already heard from TikTok,
which I think is encouraging.
Uh, so that conversation is now beginning.
Um, we'll open it up to any further questions.
Alderman Lopez.
Thank you, Chen. I thank you again, chairman
and good morning members of the committee.
So I've read this
ordinance as shared.
Where is the content creator's responsibility
Is, is that to the possible? Yeah,
I I will gladly. So
to that, to to that end, alderman Lopez, one
of the things that, you know, legal has, um,
been working on and working through.
And when you, I'm sorry, when you say
legal, you mean our law department?
Law department in addition to outside too.
So the outside consultation as well as inside, the goal is
to make sure that social media companies don't wiggle away
with privacy and, uh, user agreements.
And so in the nuances of that, there are little loopholes
that allow users on social media platforms to get away with,
quote unquote the promotion of
because of marketplace as well as privacy,
uh, stipulations.
What again, this ordinance does not do is it does not
monitor, it's not Big Brother.
It's just to say that if the police department finds
something online, which again,
we have a whole entire division
that focuses on cybersecurity along with Homeland Security,
that if we identify this, help us keep our city safe.
So, okay. So if I may, so again, to the original question,
if I have a promoter, which we just talked about, again,
going back to the New Year's Eve example from the previous
item, we have someone who is putting out content, trying
to encourage a large gathering
or encouraging a street takeover,
as we've seen in our neighborhoods on the Southwest side,
where incidents are happening under this ordinance.
Assuming CPD catches it,
then they would be able to go to the platform
where the post encouraging the gathering would take place.
But nothing happens to the individual
that is promo creating this event.
And so today, and that's where the, that's
where we are going to again, further
what legal rights we can to pursue the individual as well
as the company, because,
So respect, so respectfully,
the ordinance right now does not go
after the individual that's putting the
content on the platform.
It is simply going after the platform once notified
that such content is there. So
There's been case law in which people have advertised
to buy guns online, in which they went
and bought the gun and then they killed someone.
So the question was, in that case, who's responsible?
Was it the social media company
or the person that sold the gun that allowed, you know,
the violent act to take place In this situation?
What we are constructing is, at the end of the day,
the liability of the social media company is adhered
to their guidelines.
And so, therefore, to answer your question, if you,
for example, decided that you wanted
to have a team takeover,
and you were promoting something
that was verifiably against their own safety guidelines
with the recommendation of the, uh, department
of Public Safety, ours with the recommendation of police
and other channels, if they don't adhere to it,
the liability first starts with the social media company.
Now, civil lawsuits about going after individuals.
That's not what we are here for.
We are here to say, what role did the social media company
play that they can be held liable for, for the promotion
of violence, which goes against their guidelines.
We are not implementing a new law over
social media companies.
What we are saying is, be responsible for what you set
as the guidelines failure to do
so against your own guidelines.
You got to be held accountable.
So we're not changing the guidelines.
We are just saying, if you're not doing your job,
then the liability is on you.
So I think through all of that, I hear the answer is no.
We are not after the individuals, no, I
From you are not going
after the individuals, the platform.
You're not going after event organizers.
You are not holding individuals accountable for
what they are trying to, I think,
incite in our neighborhoods.
I, I think that if you, lemme finish, I think
Then actually I was trying to finish respectfully,
sir, respectfully
Proceed Because you just mentioned you cited case law.
So what was the answer to the case law that you cited
that said that there's a, a determination of
whether you are as the o the originator
or as the platform?
Well, what did the case law say?
How do you hold those individuals accountable
If, if you sell something online, that's their e-commerce?
And that's which we are like looking into.
How do we assure that the e-commerce feature
of social media does not be used
as their platform amongst other things?
But I would be open to maybe even co-sponsoring something
that you put together that says that we go after individuals
and hold them liable if they put something on any
platform, text message included.
So I would love to work with you on going
after individual promoters that are promoting violence.
But this ordinance is about the companies
that are promoting in co in, uh, conspiring as well
as monetizing a
Platform. Well, well now you just said
that they're conspiring with them.
So I think that I would just tread very lightly
because we are mixing words and creating this giant salad.
We're trying to feed each other right now.
That is very questionable.
There's individuals whom I've dealt with personally,
I've experienced that are as individuals,
put events out into our neighborhoods, putting it out.
Whether they are texting,
whether they're putting it on Instagram, TikTok,
Twitter, you name it.
To get other individuals to come to a congregation
is to, we just had a conversation about curfew
and mass gatherings.
So if we're going to say that a two, an invitation
that does not explicitly call anything to violence
is now illegal, that's going to actually now open up.
For example, would something like
the unauthorized protest that we've seen all summer, would
that qualify as being something
that social media could be hit for,
for allowing an unpermitted un unauthorized gathering
to happen on Lakeshore Drive?
Would that be covered by this?
So again, I think what you are missing is what's been
stated and what's been written.
Oh no, I'm, I'm, I'm, I haven't missed
It. Finish respectfully.
So again, if this goes against
what they say is their guidelines, we are not writing a law
to change their guidelines.
If they say then that this was not against their guidelines,
then so be it.
But what we are saying is,
if your guidelines say no violence, no promotion
of violence, no nudity, no sexual such and such,
and the police superintendent
amongst others say they're breaking your guidelines, we
as a city then can move forward with liability.
Now again, you mentioned people, promoters, Texan.
If you wanna write a law that holds promoters, if you want
to write a law that holds individuals accountable,
then let's sit down and let's develop law.
Well, respectfully, sir, you're the one
who's presenting the law today. So
I'm, I'm, so I'm presenting respectfully is to say,
if you have guidelines adhere to your own guidelines,
this doesn't change the guidelines.
It's just our way as a city to protect children
and to make sure that they're doing their job.
But if you want to add on to something new, let's do it.
Well, thank you, chairman.
I'm not, I I think I've gotten one
or two answers outta my questions.
I do have serious concerns about this
because I don't think that, uh, the anticipation
of being able to have a full unit, uh,
go be devoted within CPD knowing full well
that Homeland Security is not gonna be watching Facebook
for us, um, is the best use in, in this ordinance.
You have to go where the cancer starts,
and that's the individuals who are putting this out there.
And if we're failing to address that in the hopes
of just hitting TikTok
or Instagram with $50,000 violations, um, then
that's all I think we're gonna be chasing. So now in the,
I will be in the ordinance, it does have liability.
I will be full Organizers
Voting no on this item. Thank you.
Uh, please add, uh, Alderwoman Lee
to the attendance roll call of Vice Chair Yancy
with a question followed by Alderman pdo.
Yeah, thank you. Uh, alderman Moore
has his hand raised as well.
Gotcha. Thank you for his presentation.
You walk me through how this works in process.
So, uh, child A makes a post
or person a makes a post about a teen trend.
How does this work in practice?
So essentially, if person A puts on the internet,
like what we saw when the, uh,
situation happened at the tree lighting
and which the advertisement said free drinks,
whatever the case may be, what then happens is, again,
police department, which has a whole division
in which they're already doing this work, they then
amongst other, uh, department of safety, uh, office
of safety, I'm sorry, Gary's office, again, they reach out
to the social media companies
and they say, Hey, this is against what you all say
as a, you know, safety
or whatever the, uh, guidelines that we identify.
At that point. If all
of this information is leading towards children doing
something violent or dangerous, again, it is
our responsibility to prohibit the gathering by
whatever means we can to stop them from gathering.
The other side of that is, at that point,
if something does happen, who's liable?
And so the promoters,
which the individuals are in the ordinance as well, um,
everyone must be something to see what did they do that
promoted and allowed such things?
So the goal is to again, say you all are not adhering
to your own standards,
therefore, you all will be held liable for the things
that happened when you all did not step up.
So if I'm reading this correctly, um,
law enforcement spots this, they contact,
let's say it's TikTok, right?
TikTok has, TikTok has six hours.
So the clock starts as soon as the email gets sent.
Absolutely. Right? If six hours to respond,
and it looks like the remedy is,
uh, the failure to provide acknowledgement
or written explanation under the subsection
constitutes a violation.
Um, so if they don't respond within the six
hours, it's a violation.
Right? What if two, two scenarios.
One, what if they respond with this written justification
with reasonable specif specificity, why the platform has
determined that it is not unlawful?
What happens in that conflict? I think
That's what we pay our superintendent.
That's what we have the Office of Public Safety.
And that's what you know this is about, is
that when you look at what happened
to the 14-year-old child, it was all on the internet.
Everybody was promoting to come down
and do violence again, if they did not see it as an issue,
that doesn't mean that we are not gonna be responsible
to step up to prevent it.
And I think that when you look back over that incident
and that tragedy, what could have happened if everybody was
in the room saying the same thing, office
of Public Safety from the mayor's office, CPD,
everybody's looking at this data along
with just common sense.
Mm-hmm. And so this is what this does, is to say,
this is one area that we check,
we check this other area, we check this other area.
And that's, let's not forget that again,
if a child is apprehended,
the goal is first of all, rehabilitation.
Because the children that are participating
and victims of this are coming from areas again,
where there is no basic amenity for a child to grow up.
In the city of Chicago, 40% of the children
participating are outta beneath poverty.
And so when we have a city where 40% of the kids are outta
beneath poverty, and they're going on these phones
and they're wilding out,
then if they make a mistake, we rehabilitate.
If companies make a mistake, we litigate.
Okay. So if I'm understanding, um,
the penalties only come if they fail
to acknowledge the penalties to the company.
The social media companies only come if they fail
to acknowledge the, uh,
notice from the city of Chicago,
or if they fail
to offer a written explanation for the subsection.
So if they, all right.
So with removal, um,
or person A puts this event out, let's say that part
of the process works, but 1500 other people share this
information on TikTok, what happens then?
'cause it does, it seems like it doesn't go away if the,
the city only is able to address sort of one person,
the original person who put this out. Well,
The, the flip side of it is $195 billion was made.
They got the technology at any given time to scan.
And as it was mentioned, the algorithms, they know
where this stuff is at on their platforms.
So the notion that social media companies don't know,
or that they don't have the
capacity to know, that's not true.
So the the point is that if they, again, don't want
to be the companies that they say they are,
litigation is all that we have.
And that litigation is prevented to save lives as well
as when we look at the amount of money
that is being spent since we want
to talk fiscal responsibility on all of the number one,
the services that we pay just to stop this stuff.
So someone, again, social media companies have
to be held accountable because they're not
doing what they say they're going to do.
So the goal is to, number one, hold them accountable
for further litigation from families
or anyone else that was affected by this.
And then for us to quit paying the bills when they're
failing us by protecting our children. Okay.
Alright. Thank you. Uh, alderman Sudo followed by, uh,
alderman Curtis online
and Alderman MITs also online. Alderman Sto. Thank you,
Chairman. Not a question, it's
just a statement.
So talking about all this bad stuff we see on the internet
and everything, there's certainly, there is a lot
of bad stuff, but I, this is more of a, a
of a federal thing, and we see it
on national news all the time.
It's these video games that these kids play,
these violent games.
I'm, I'm certain that has a lot to do with it,
and I wish there was some way
we could do something about that.
But, uh, hopefully the feds continue to crack down on these,
uh, uh, game designer people.
But that's it, it was just a statement.
So that's another problem that we had
with young kids sitting around playing,
sitting home all day on the internet. So, thank you.
Yeah, thank you Alderman. Uh, alderman Curtis.
Chairman. Chairman. I didn't want anything
but to be recorded as present
as a non-member for the meeting.
And I've been trying to raise my hand.
It's been up for a while, but that's all I wanted.
Thanks. Yeah, yeah.
We, we have you alderman mi you're on.
Did you wanna comment or just, uh, be recognized for,
uh, participation?
It was just to be recognized for the presentation. Okay.
Alright. Very good. You're, you are
on the attendance list.
Thank you, alderman Curtis.
Uh, thank, thank you chairman.
Um, I, um,
even though my colleague from the Sixth Ward, alderman Hall,
uh, our voting record is totally different,
but I could not agree with him more on this issue.
Um, I think that, uh, this ordinance
has a lot of room, uh, especially being at the infant stage,
a lot of room for growth.
And, and I, and I, and I,
and I honestly believe, um, what both of them are saying,
chairman Hopkins and Alderman Hall, that
we want your input into this ordinance.
So I don't really believe it's something to argue at,
argue about at this moment, is something to gravitate
around, to be another tool, uh, uh, to go
after the bad actors, uh,
which is those social media platforms.
Uh, so I would definitely be, uh, in support of this,
uh, even at this stage right now,
because there are a lot of room to grow. Thanks.
Thank you Alderman. Uh, staying online then.
Alderman Moore.
Thank you. Uh, uh, chairman. Thank you. Uh, alderman Hall.
Uh, this my questions along the lines where,
um, yes, he was going.
And I, I just wanna be clear, just walking through, I,
I think I get it, but I just wanna be totally clear.
So in a situation where the individual posts
and, uh, say, let's go down here
and, uh, gather
whether they say something negative, um,
but we know gathering,
'cause sometimes they use young cold words that may not say,
let's go start a fight, or let's do something illegal.
It just may say, gather, right?
So we know what tends to happen at these gatherings.
So from a, from a fine standpoint, if
then CPD contacts
the social media company
and saying, Hey, there's gonna be a gathering.
We want you to take this down. They don't take it down.
Step one, let's do the step one. They don't take it down.
They gather and cause, you know,
just say they don't even cause crime.
But it's just a, a gathering that a lot
of kids are hanging out.
No fight starts, but it, it,
those gatherings then cause disruption to the community.
How do we then find the, um, company,
how do we, something, what was the last question?
Negative. That something negative has to happen in order
for us to find the company
or the illegal gathering is the problem.
And then how do we find the company?
How do we then get
the restitution from the company, the city?
Yeah. So Alderman Moore, what I hear you saying is
walk you through the steps, and then
how do we get the litigation that leads
to some type of compensation.
And so, first of all, um, to answer your question before
You go there, so before you go there, there's every,
every, everything is gonna have to be litigated.
It's not just a fine, that's probably what I'm getting at.
So everything's has, every, every time we say they did the,
the company did something,
it's gonna take a litigation, not a fine,
Not, so what I mean by litigation,
that's also the implement fund.
So I do want to step back and answer all the questions.
Number one, if it's a promotion of something
that goes against their guidelines,
and again, this is not Big brother, this is not us,
you know, trying to police social media.
It is us observing the trends of our city, which is
what the job of, you know, our police department, the office
of, uh, safety from the mayor's office,
they're always on the pr violence interventions,
which is why those investments were very key
because we get intel about gatherings from every source.
But with social media companies in particular, if they say
that we don't do, we don't allow this.
So if social media's companies are saying they don't allow,
but they do, they are allowing, then we have
to call them out legally. No,
I get that. What's the
So they, they, okay,
they did follow their guideline.
I'm with you on that. I'm with you on that.
We are there now. They didn't follow their guidelines.
How do we find them? That's what I'm getting at.
How do we, is it a litigation first
or is it an automatic fine that they have to pay?
So that's what the law department will make it make sense.
But the legal liability that we are holding them accountable
for is number one, restitution.
And then also what accessory did they play in the,
the mayhem in the city?
And whatever that leads to then so be it.
But the goal is essentially, number one, to make sure
that they're not participating in the promotion of violence
that we are paying for through the loss of life, as well
as the excessive money that we get
To the police over. I get,
I get that, I get that part,
but they're only gonna change if they're fine.
I'm not seeing the, I'm just trying
to understand the fine portion
and I'm, and I I'm not seeing it.
That's all I'm saying. So today, something happens,
but we passed this today.
Today something happens against their guidelines.
Based on what you're saying.
How then do I hit 'em with that? Is it a $50,000 fine?
I don't have an ordinance in front of me. I'm sorry.
Is it a 50,000 fine, a hundred thousand fine.
So Is that automatic?
I'm just trying to understand the process.
Yeah, so the fine amount, implement the fine, that's
what lawyers do in front
of a judge, and then they figure it out.
But the fact that we have that tool is the point.
The point is that if necessary,
we can use it how it's activated.
Lawyers, judges, that's what they do. But
It's that, that's what I'm getting at.
Hold on, hold on. I don't mean to cut you off.
I don't, I don't mean to,
because what I'm trying to get to is the money issue
because, and then that's my second question then,
is everything litigate?
Because if I pay, if I, if I, if I
run a stop sign, I'm gonna be hit with a fine immediately.
What I'm saying is, are we gonna have
to litigate everything?
And then what's that cost of litigation?
If it's a fine and they gotta pay, that's one thing
because we know that they're liable.
But what I'm hearing right now is what you just said is
that we have to litigate everything.
And what is that cost of litigation?
Okay, that's the question. Yes.
Got you. So I trust
that we wouldn't be entering into lawsuits, um,
without number one.
Co uh, counsel number two, the, again, the lawsuit,
the litigation lawyers have figured that out.
I'm not a lawyer, so I can't tell you
what the intro will be when they going
to intro, how they going to intro it.
But again, what I can say is that we have the tool
and we have the protection to do so if necessary.
Thank you. All right. Thanks, chairman.
Okay. Uh, alderman Central Lopez.
Thank you. Thank you Chairman.
Um, I, I just have a quick question.
I think some of the questions that I had
were answered already.
Um, but there was a report around the issue of safety
and especially certain platforms.
Uh, just this Monday, the European, um,
the European Commission was really concerned about the,
the images that were circulating, especially in Elon Musks.
Um, you know, they just, the promotion of violence,
the promotion of, uh, um, violence,
especially around women and children.
So I do think that there's a, a responsibility
to act if federal government is, uh, unable to act.
However, um, I think in terms of the, in terms of the, um,
the enforcement of this, you know, in terms
of the enforcement of the, of the $50,000 per violation,
um, and you know, just in terms of how, how we can enforce
that and then just how do we come out with a number.
It seems like the, the six hours should continue
to separate, uh, each independent, um, offense
for what I see in the ordinance.
So, um, I do think that there's certainly, um,
concerns about the use of social media,
how this is becoming an issue preying on children and women.
Um, I do think that the corporation that this companies,
they owe that responsibility to every municipality in terms
of just like the, how do we come out with those numbers?
How do we do the enforcement?
I do believe that they do have a responsibility to act,
incorporate with our city.
Um, so that was just some of the logistics.
Some of the other questions that been a answered already.
So out hall your chairman can share about, you know,
how we can come out those with those numbers
in terms of enforcement,
Uh, when it comes to the enforcement number.
Thank you so much. Uh, chairman, uh, Lopez, the, the,
the amount of money that we will spend as it pertains
to restitution through litigation, again,
that number set is what it is.
But the flip side of it is the lawyers.
That's what lawyers, judges for the litigation purpose
of the implementation that's on them.
The goal is to essentially say that if we need to, we will.
And the will part of it is to assure that Chicago
is not continuously being used to pay
for things unnecessarily.
And if companies are making upwards
of just the three I mentioned, TikTok, Facebook
and Instagram have made close to $200 billion.
When we look at how much money we use
to number one step into these gatherings, to disperse crowds
to make sure that Chicago is safe,
we are constantly spending money on things that
companies are irresponsible with.
And so the irresponsibility of social media companies is
what got us here to the point where if necessary,
we will implement fines to recoup the costs associated
with police personnel
and other things that come
with violence post promotion on their platforms.
So if that's room for us to, you know, dot the i's
and cross the T, so be it.
But the goal is to again say that if necessary, we'll go
before a judge to hold them accountable for the wrong
that they allowed against their own rules.
Thank you. Thank you. Alderman Vasquez.
Thank you very much, chairman.
Um, yeah, I, I've got questions like a number
of our colleagues just, there's a lot of concerns in,
it feels to me like a freedom of speech conversation.
If it's related to, no one's gonna be like, Hey, come
to violence 2012 or whatever to come party.
That's not how they're promoted.
So they're gonna promote a party.
And I don't believe any platform would've guidelines against
people posting a party flyer out.
So it doesn't seem like it has the, I understand the intent.
It just doesn't seem like it
would actually play out that way.
And I guess a question would be, if the premise is
that we are going to go to a social media platform
because they are having people going against their own
guidelines, what would it stop the social media platform
from just changing their guidelines?
Well, again, that, that's their responsibility.
I mean, if they want to change their guidelines, so be it.
This is a third rail to say that you're not gonna continue
to do what you're doing now.
And what they're doing right now,
and again, this is not monitoring
because again, they are already, uh, within CPD talking
to Superintendent Snelling, they already
look at this content.
It's almost no different. If somebody writes a uh, letter
and sends it and says, I'm gonna blow up your house, right?
You are held accountable, okay. For that written note.
And then when you put it online, there's no liability.
So the, the goal here again, Andre, this infant,
sorry, in this infant stages,
Along those lines, if somebody mails a letter to somebody,
do we sue the post office?
How do you know what's in the letter?
Like you wouldn't know what's in the letter.
I guess that's my point. It's like
what it's targeting seems to be imprecise.
So for example, if somebody puts a party poster on a
building, do you sue the building?
Even though the person who put the poster up is the one
who promoted the thing?
I just don't think that has legal ground.
And I think trying to take that
to litigation would be a problem.
If we're saying that the social media companies have
billions and billions of dollars, are they more likely
to pay all these fines
or pay for the lawyers that are then gonna beat every case
that we try to bring upon them?
Well, I don't know. It doesn't seem to be to get it done.
I haven't had a conversation with 'em yet.
I do know that they're reaching out
to talk, which is a good thing.
But what we must put in place is a standard
to essentially say that we will not allow you
to break your own guidelines.
Right. But then I would change the guidelines.
Well then if they change the guidelines,
that's not, that's that's on them.
Our job ain't to be the police of the company.
But the police aren't obviously say that the company,
what you're doing right now is not protecting our children.
This is the part I'm trying to understand.
So we're not trying to police them,
but it's the police looking at them
to tell 'em when they're not following their guidelines.
But that's not policing them. That's
Not Andre. If you picked
up your phone right now
and you saw someone saying,
we gonna shoot up down the
street, what would you do with that?
You would send it to the police, right?
Right. I wouldn't sue the phone company
because I got a text message about
It. That's not, that's not what I asked
you.
If you saw an advertisement for somebody
to do something down the street, the first thing you going
to do is send it to the police, right?
Correct. So if somebody is seeing something online
and they send it to the police, is
that not the same thing? No.
'cause again, I would not have the police go sue the phone
company 'cause I got a text message about it. The police
Is not, I have them Investigate.
I'm answering your question. I would have them investigate
the person who sent the message. And that's
What Courtney says is
that if the police get a credible threat,
that they would investigate the threat.
The threat of this, our safety. Right.
The threat. Wouldn't it be Facebook?
It's the person who put the thing up.
If social media then is promoting what they say
that they would not promote, we find
that it's authentically a threat.
And we say, red light, this particular thing on this
platform is dangerous to the city.
It goes against your guidelines.
We are asking them to do their job.
It's so different enough to go to a restaurant.
If the table was dirty, you gonna ask somebody to clean it.
Right? Right. Okay, that makes sense.
Is through the chair, can we send examples of party flyers
that say they are going to cause fires and violence
and fights that then they would go off of?
Because my assumption is
that is not necessarily what the flyers would say.
They would say, come to party.
The original problem and the cancer as alluded to
before, is the fact that youth don't have
other places to do these things.
So some of them are throwing events
and can't control what's
happening. They try to target people. But
There have been instances in which there's been flat out
promotion for debauchery and kids have shown up.
Debauchery is a different term.
It it, well, whatever, violence or
Being specific at the end of the day,
whatever you wanna call it.
There have been instances in which people have used social
media companies, I mean used social media platforms within
these companies to say, come here
to participate in violence, act,
whatever adjective you want to use. I don't never see
That party. I've never seen
that party growing
up come to violence party.
Well, I mean, at the end of the day, we are not teenagers.
We are grown. And how we grew up ain't how they grow up.
We wasn't smoking, we, well,
we were smoking, we didn't have access,
We didn't have, we're trying
to tax him every legal activity. We, we didn't smoke.
We, the point is we didn't have access
to the drugs that they have.
We didn't even have access to social media as teenagers.
And so what we are seeing right now is
that this multi-billion dollar industry is preying on the
dilapidation of children
and they prey on them by again, monetizing some
of the accounts that promote the violence.
I, I don't disagree that there's obviously
welcome to capitalism.
Somebody's trying to find a way to ma uh, make money off
of exploiting people.
I don't disagree with that at all.
I just don't think that this method does anything at
all to stop any of it.
And if anything, it invites more legal challenge when we
can't even pay our own bills for half of this stuff.
So if we're gonna continue to try to go and,
and when we're talking fines
and fees, it's not litigation, fines
and fees are, hey, you got a parking
ticket in the mail, you pay it.
We don't have a method through which collecting those funds
from the social media companies actually exist,
which means we're gonna go to court
and they're gonna spend more money on lawyers.
We're gonna spend more money on lawyers.
They have more money to spend on lawyers.
We're not gonna win cases. It is not the way to go forward.
So I just don't think it makes sense.
And also, if social media companies aren't technically
publishers, we can't hold 'em
accountable 'cause they're not the ones who
publish it. They're a platform.
So you're telling me that if they put up a guideline
that says, on our platforms, we do not promote violence,
nudity, whatever else they say, you say that
as a city we should let it ride. If they do,
What we'll say what'll happen is we would take it to court
and they say they have the freedom of
speech to do what they would like.
Yeah. Uh, we wouldn't win the case before.
Before I get to your point, alderman Lopez,
alderman Vasque, if I may, uh, interpret your inquiry
as a request through the chair.
Uh, let me just add something to this discussion,
which I think might help.
Yeah. Uh, we're not inventing the concept here.
The Chicago police already have a precedent
for contacting social media companies
and asking them to remove posts for certain reasons.
It's an informal process.
We, it, this ordinance tries to formalize
what has in fact already occurred in some occasions, to
what extent I don't know.
And what internal criteria they use in order
to make those decisions.
Hey, we better call Facebook about this.
I don't know that either.
So if I could kind of crystallize your inquiry
and get a response from CPD on
that, I think that would help. And
Yeah, that, that would great.
And also I would almost anticipate pi prior
to voting on something like this for them
to be here at a hearing to answer those
kind of questions about their process.
So we actually understand what we're voting on. Okay.
Because we vote on something
that then puts us in further litigation
and we're not being fed, you know, responsible
as, you know, stewards.
That's a problem. So yeah, thank you for that.
I will get that inquiry. Thank you
Alman Lopez on your point. It just,
Thank you. So I do wanna
say this. I'm, I'm assuming in concluding,
'cause no one else asked questions
that the department of law,
Alderman Chico and Gardner, Sorry,
Alderman Chico filed by Alderman Gardner.
Thank you chair. Um,
and I enjoy this, this robust conversation going on
between my colleagues.
I think it's, uh, there's a lot of different moving parts
to this ordinance.
Um, so I definitely like to hear my colleagues' input.
Uh, somebody who, in his role as a police officer, used
to look at social media to find intelligence, to find things
that might direct our police officers
and put 'em in a spot to be successful and deter crime
or deter mass gatherings.
I kind of just wanna share my point of view and,
and my thoughts and what I've seen.
Yeah, please. And what I've, you know, what I've worked
through, um, in, in the fourth district oftentimes,
or what I saw was there were certain main players who
had their Facebook public, you know,
you could make it public or private that would
put out all the information, whether it be a mass gathering,
a gathering for a deceased gang member, a anniversary
of a date, uh, for a deceased gang member.
Those end up being mass gatherings
because, um, the, the block neighborhood would come out
and they would participate.
Um, what we found was going to the source
and going to the person making those posts
and telling them, Hey, is this your post?
Yeah, it is. Okay, well you need to stop it
because this is an exciting
and inciting, uh, the neighborhood to coming out
and participating in these events.
So I, I agree with Alderman Lopez
and I understand what Alderman Hall is saying is it's an
evolving and it's an evolving ordinance.
And then we should take a look at the actors
that are participating in this.
Oftentimes when we went to them, like I said, they were,
they stopped and now they probably created another Facebook
page, but it still made it difficult for them
to put out the information and,
and have it reach, uh, people in the neighborhood.
So that's just given my 2 cents.
Also, also as well, you know, CPD does have a unit,
but if something is found on social media from a,
a beat officer or somebody in the district, um,
because of the implications it might have legally,
and maybe in a court case, it, it has to be referred
to the social media team
and the social media group for them to do it
because they have certain certifications, certain training,
um, that allows them to go on social media and do that.
So I just wanted to clarify that up,
but that's just my 2 cents on, on what I see
and what I saw as a police officer.
And I look forward to kind of the ordinance, um,
maybe evolving to go
after the bad actors that really put the information out.
Yep. Thank you Alderman Gardner chairman.
Um, and my question, it, it's for Alderman Hall,
if he could answer, um, my question revolves around
where does the $50,000
and I mean, does the $50,000 go
towards, do we have an answer?
Brought this up?
So let me answer a couple of questions
and in, in on your question if you don't mind.
Um, the first thing I do want to note is that, you know,
going back to what was even mentioned by, uh,
alderman Vasquez, that again, we know
that social media companies got billions of dollars.
We know that they don't want to lose their billions.
We know that they prey on kids.
We know that they use their platform for means to sometimes
and ends that is not best for our children.
So is there a pathway to literally, um,
a legal defensible pathway to hold them accountable?
Yes, as my, both of my colleagues have said, is there a need
to evolve for sure,
but what we are not going
to do is allow social media companies to continue
to function the way they are in Chicago.
So to that end, is there a need to go to individuals?
This is one of many tools to stop the perpetuation
and the promotion of violence.
And to that end, the fine came the number,
$50,000 was a number that came up with,
and the means of that fund would be to invest
again in alternatives for our children.
One of the conversations that we had, myself
and Chairman Hopkins, was the fact that a lot
of our parks don't even have 21st century tools for kids.
And so could it be that we use this, uh,
fine if we stay to the fine structure
or if we find other resources
to build content creating studios?
So to answer your question, alderman Gardner, the goal is
to use all the money we can get, whether
through the institution of a fine
or through correct corporate responsible partners,
hopefully TikTok that can maybe invest in our children.
But again, to Alderman Chico's point, this is the beginning
of many tools that we must use, including social media
to keep our children safe.
I do want Min Howorth. Okay. No, no, no, no. I, oh, sorry.
No. So, uh, so the reason why I'm asking that question is
where does this money go towards is
because, you know, there's an, there's an obvious focus
and there's an obvious effort to try to impact the black
and brown communities, right?
And, and I just want to ensure, uh, that, that
that money is going towards those communities.
Um, let's invest in violence intervention programs.
Like, like Pastor Sandy has that chain breakers, VIP
that's focused on the south and the west side of Chicago.
Let's make sure, let's make sure that $50,000
or a hundred thousand dollars or $150,000
or whatever we talk about are actually going towards these
communities that we say that we're trying
to focus our energies towards.
My problem, my concern is not the fines.
It's weird that the funds go towards,
because once again, it's not a revenue problem
that this city has.
It's a spending problem.
But, uh, to, to that, you know,
Hang on, hang on a second.
I'm not, I'm not through alderman it.
And the biggest, the biggest problem we have is, is who
we prioritize
and we are prioritizing, I'll say it once again,
undocumented residents over real
true Chicagoans.
That's black people, brown people, even white people.
So what, what I would like to know,
and I would like some answers towards, and,
and I give a lot of credit to the young women
who come down here often
and talk about some of the struggles
that they have in their community, uh, is
that ensuring if we're gonna start assessing fines,
let's make sure that that money
is actually going towards these communities that we're,
that we're actually trying to help.
So, I, I do wanna say this and,
and I want to say it with the utmost respect towards,
unfortunately the child that was killed
was a 14-year-old child from the south side.
However, last time I checked, there are also white kids
that are using social media.
Last time I checked, there are still white kids
that have a DHD issues as a result of social media.
Last time I checked, there are white kids
that are struggling with socializing
because of social media.
Last time I checked, soccer moms are doing whatever they can
to try to keep these phones out their kids' hands as well.
So even though the face of poverty,
inner city is black kids, there are kids that are being
hurt, there are kids that are being traumatized
that are not just black.
And last time I checked there were more white kids in
America than there are black kids.
So that means there are more white kids
that are being impacted by social media, irresponsibility
and reregulation and whatever else you wanna
call it than there are blacks.
So to that end, the notion that this is a black ordinance
to protect black kids, you got a misunderstanding of
what we here for because there are kids all over the city
of Chicago, white, black, brown, uh, any other hue
that you want to name that are being impacted
by social media companies preying on them.
So this ain't just a bill to protect black kids.
So let's take that about this equation.
Number two, the notion of
where would the money go from the fine, my question is,
before we even get to finding companies,
let's find the corporations that are willing to invest
in spite of what challenges we are facing in Chicago.
And so our goal beyond corporations is
to find generous people in the city that wanna provide
and invest in alternatives in 21st century
experience in local parks.
So when we talk about where do kids go
that are facing the challenges that they face,
they can't even go to a park
because half the parks are behind
and outdated with technology as well as just internet.
So the goal here is
to essentially protect children, number one.
Number two is to make the right investments, private
and public dollars to get kids
to understand the different effects
and the positivity of social media.
And then lastly, any fines that are instituted in this city
with a red light cameras, uh,
stop light cameras board, whatever the case may be.
Fine. Then let's audit. Make sure all the money goes
to everybody equally and not just with this. Thank you.
No point of clarification.
This is, I mean,
I don't know if you misunderstood what I said,
What you were saying beneath what you were saying.
And at the end of the day, let's be clear about something.
This is not just an ordinance for black kids.
Unfortunately, a black kid got killed.
Unfortunately, every child in Chicago was facing this issue
from Lincoln Park to 79th and Langley.
Yeah. This is about protecting every child gardener.
This ain't about just making sure that black kids
and brown kids ain't the face of another act of violence.
You wanted to make that when I wrote this ordinance, it was
to make sure that every child
that grabs a phone is not being preyed on
by social media companies
that don't give a damn about their wellness,
but all they want is monetization.
All they want is advertisement dollars,
and all they want is an opportunity
to further their foolishness.
Sure. So this ain't just about black and brown kids. Sure.
Last time I checked this white kids bouncing off
walls in schools too.
Absolutely, absolutely.
And in neighborhoods setting stuff on fire too.
Sure. Are you done? Are you done? This
Is, uh, alderman Alderman Gardner.
I'll allow you to clarify your point. Yeah.
But this is the first warning to the gallery.
Uh, please respect the quorum.
I will clear this gallery if you don't. Thank you.
Alderman Gardner, you may clarify your point. Yeah,
I, I, I'm gonna clarify because I think
it needs to be clarified.
Uh, what I was saying about these fines,
which you went off into a tangent about, um, was about
ensuring that the, that money gold towards programs,
which I just said with, with Pastor Sandy
who works on the south and the west sides of Chicago.
So what I am saying is
that if our efforts are continuously trying
to help the black and brown communities, what I'm saying is
that I want that money to go
to the black and brown communities.
So what I'm saying is take that same effort
to every dollar we bring into this city,
and not just these dollars.
So if your premise is
that the money coming from this fine needs to be allocated
for black kids and brown kids Fair.
So the money from the stop signs, the, the red light,
every dollar needs to be allocated towards every child
and not just one target to say what you really trying
to say, because I'm gonna say what you really trying to say.
No, no, no. I don't need you to speak for me,
but I appreciate you trying a a and
So I don't agree with what you're saying
because you are saying that this money should only be used
for certain things, but not all of the money in the city.
So when somebody runs a stoplight
and we collect that money, should that not money not be used
for every child or every neighborhood
or every situation that we face?
So why you don't have that energy when we have collections
of fines and fees for all of the fines and fees in the city.
Sure. So you're trying
to pass an ordinance, is that, is that correct?
True. Right. So why don't we talk about your ordinance.
So One of the information chairman,
Is that Alderman Curtis?
Yes. Yeah, alderman Curtis State your point, please.
Yeah. Uh, I don't know if y'all realize this, uh,
hall and Gardner, you guys are on the same side really.
And you shouldn't be attacking each other.
Hold on one second. You guys shouldn't be attacking you
because actually I'm with Gardner now.
He said that, all I'm saying is I'm agreeing
with you on trying to put together
and grow the ordinance.
I just wanna see some of that money go to some of the people
instead of in a, in a city corporate fund.
Uh, but I wanna see some of that money go towards some
of these real programs instead of foolishness.
But, but originally you guys are saying the same thing
and you are on the same side,
but if you keep arguing, you're not going
to win your ordinance.
Amen. Alright. Thank you Chairman.
And let me just interject here.
As a matter of policy, uh,
anytime a revenue source is created by an act of this body,
and it is not a dedicated fund or an enterprise fund
or any other, uh, specific depository
where the money gets isolated by default,
the money gets deposited into general funds.
In the corporate fund, that's where it goes,
the general account, and it gets lost.
It's, it's fungible dollars.
Once the money gets put in there, you,
you lose its identity.
So you can't directly connect it to any kinds
of programmatic spending.
That's a entirely separate issue.
Alderman Hall's ordinance that establishes fines,
assuming we ever get to the point
where we're collecting them, the $50,000 fine
that we would get from a social media company gets deposited
in general funds period.
And it, and it gets lost in there.
So it's a separate conversation of
how you wanna spend the money that's generated by it or,
or any money at all.
It's, it's not in this ordinance, nor should it be. Right.
So my suggestion would be we, we end this part
of the discussion for now.
Um, and go on to the next point. No,
Well, no chairman, uh, to your point, I don't go ahead
And, but please wrap it up Al
Yeah, I, I will.
But I, I, a point of clarification is that
that was my original, so you answered my original question
without the, I don't know what that, what the argument was.
But, so, um, what I would just like to say, which I,
I don't think is that much more work is to make sure,
I was simply asking, and I thought I was being helpful,
but, uh, was that if we're going
to find these companies $50,000
or a hundred thousand dollars or $150,000, let's,
let's have them go towards these communities that we say
that we are trying to focus our energies on.
That's it. That, so I'm sure it's not much that,
that much more work to ensure that this money, again,
'cause I'll repeat what I said, which was the basis of this.
We don't have a revenue problem in the city.
We have a spending problem.
And one of my biggest problems is
that we're not spending money on Chicagoans, on taxpayers.
We are spending money on undocumented people in prioritizing
certain individuals before we're prioritizing other people.
So that's why I just wanted to make sure
that the money is actually going to useful, uh,
organizations or communities that can most use this.
That's it. Okay.
Thank you. Let's, uh, thank you.
Go to someone who hasn't yet spoke on this matter.
Alderman Minna, hop Penworth, who has been patient,
and then we'll go back to Alderman Vasquez.
Lenny, thank
You, chair.
I first want to say thank you to my colleague
for working so hard on this ordinance.
I think it's essential, especially in this moment where
the federal government is here in Chicago,
creating chaos every, every day, every day.
So we are trying to do what we can to protect all of our
kids, no matter their race
or income or where they live.
But we know all of Chicago is based on one map.
And so I appreciate all of your words, and,
and we, we should get this right.
We need to get this right. I have a lot
of interest in this.
I also have a lot of concerns about the end,
to your point, assuming that we even get to the point
where we can collect these fines
or fees, how do we even get there?
And I'm interested, I did not know
that CPD had a cybersecurity arm.
I don't know how they work. I don't know
what their criteria is.
I I have seen only one graphic for a teen event,
and that was many years ago.
And, um, to alter Vasquez Point, didn't say
that there was an attempt to cause violence
or there was gonna be alcohol.
It didn't, but it was flagged in,
in Andersonville of all places.
And we, we need better processes
to, I need to understand like, how, how do you explain to
the small businesses that are gonna be impacted by
what's supposed to happen in an intersection.
You know, at that time, I, I just wanna share that the
officers on the ground went into the businesses
and suggested that they close for the day.
That that's not because of a social media post.
I need to explain this to my community, how it works,
how we know, you know, what to look for so
that community can also help participate
in keeping our community safe.
So I hope that we consider continuing this conversation
and not end it today.
I would like to hear more about the cybersecurity team
and what they do, especially if they are working
with Homeland Security.
How does that work? And how do we make decisions?
So I hope that we consider, I hope that you will consider
continuing this conversation
and not ending it today. Thank you.
Yeah. Thank you. Alderman, alderman Vasquez,
Thank you very much.
Uh, just wanted to make a point of clarification, um,
because I've kind of heard a lot of narrative, uh,
that I take issue with,
and I'm trying my best to be mindful,
especially when we're talking about colleagues.
But for clarity, undocumented neighbors are Chicagoans.
They live in Chicago for clarity.
Undocumented neighbors also pay taxes
they don't benefit from.
So one can have issue with undocumented folks
to not say their Chicagoans is incorrect and false.
Please, please control the gallery,
or we'll have to clear it.
That was my whole point. They are Chicagoans.
They pay taxes. Thank you very much.
Okay. All right. Okay. Please.
We're, we're close to concluding here.
And, uh, let me say is, uh,
alderman Hall's co-sponsor on this measure.
Uh, I'm committed to moving this process forward, um,
and I do believe as Alderman Hoppen worth requested,
we need some more work on this.
Alderman Hall and I had a extensive discussion yesterday
with the lawyers in the law department.
They're working on it now.
So we have a couple of options before us.
Um, we could hold this in committee as is, uh,
we could take a vote today, which Alderman Hall
and I actually discussed yesterday.
We could vote on this, assuming that the votes are there
to move it, uh,
but not report it out in the next committee report.
In other words, we will not be voting on this
for Final Passage at the full City Council meeting
until such time as the law department makes the recommended
changes with, uh, to bring a substitute
for a vote on the floor.
That does two things. Number one, it keeps this motion
and momentum that we have,
but more importantly,
it puts the social media companies on notice
that this is real.
Uh, and it makes it easier for us to engage with them.
My point earlier about trying
to call customer service at Facebook, you know, good luck.
Good luck getting a response from them.
Alderman Hall has tried, the law department has tried.
He just finally had some success.
Was it today you heard from TikTok or yesterday?
Uh, so we need to do that.
My recommendation would be if there's support in this room
to do so, to pass this now on a due pass motion
with the commitment from the chair, that it will not be
reported to the full city council until such time
as a substitute, uh, is prepared, uh,
that can meet muster from both the law department,
the administration, and the supporters.
So I'll, I'll put that out there
as an option. Alderman Hall. And
In concluding, first of all, again, this is good dialogue.
Different doesn't mean divisive.
And I'm grateful for the dialogue.
And, you know, there is a path forward
and the path forward to again, make, uh, this ordinance
what I would say as an unnecessary target for litigation,
unnecessary target to be hang, hung up in court is the goal.
And so, hearing some
of the perspectives from my different colleagues, some
of which need to be added to the dialogue, I do like the,
uh, method of which you want to lead.
But again, you all, we do have a little work to do.
And these perspectives have opened up
and in concluding from the individuals, which is, is,
and I misspoke, but I do want to clarify
that individuals will be held accountable.
That is in the ordinance.
Um, secondly, again, some of the language used as we saw in,
uh, north Avenue North, uh, Oak Street Beach, I'm sorry,
in which they promoted saying, bring the water
to guns in boxing gloves.
Those little nuances led to, as we've seen over the past.
And so what we can agree on in principle, is
that we wanna protect our children
from the predatory methods of social media.
The particulars. I think we can get there.
So again, thank you so much, Mr.
Chair. Thank you. And my colleagues.
Okay. Alderman Lopez, I move,
do not pass on this ordinance.
Um, all right.
Uh, how, how about if we do this, uh, if,
if we hold this in committee without a vote, uh,
and we agree to that Alderman Hall,
would you withdraw your do not pass motion?
And we'll hold it in committee
for further study then.
Then there's, there's nothing to vote on if
we just hold it in committee.
You don't need to vote to do that.
I restate my motion chairman.
Alright. All right.
Well, motion on the floor to do not pass.
Uh, we will call the role, uh, alderman Yancy.
Alderman Yancy is a no. Alderman Chico. Did he?
Uh, alderman Lopez. Alderman Curtis
Alderman Curtis Alderman Var.
Alderman Cin Lopez Alder.
One woman, Fuentes. She still here? No. Alderman.
Talia Farrell.
Alderman Vazquez. Alderman Knutson.
Alderman Gardner, uh,
alderman Minna Howorth Alderwoman Silverstein.
She go, uh, and Alderman Hopkins is a no.
What do we have?
I have my hand up Chairman.
I'm sorry. Alderman Curtis. This was a do not pass motion.
Uh, what was your vote? No, no. On a, no. Okay.
Uh, the motion fails. Okay. The, uh, the motion fails.
So the matter will remain in committee as is, uh,
until such time as we can have further discussion,
uh, which I think we all want.
So thank you. Okay.
No further business to come before the committee.
Do we have a motion to adjourn? So moved by Alderman Lopez.
Motion carries. Thank you.
Well, that's wonderful.