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Save Lives Now
Stop Community, Workplace, and Prison COVID19 Deaths
People’s Response Demands
The COVID19 pandemic has hit Illinois hard with 84,698 cases and 3,792 deaths (May 13).
African Americans and Latinix have been disproportionately getting infected and dying 5X more than Whites.
Cook County Jail is the US #1 Hotspot with over 401 infections among the 4,500 predominately African American and Latinix prisoners.
Illinois Governor Jay Pritzker, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot have all done “too little, too late with too few at the expense of the many.”
All three, particularly Pritzker, refuse to use constitutionally guaranteed Civil Protection Rules, known as “Public Health State Emergency Powers” to take control of every business, hospital, jail, public agency, including transit, to protect All workers, patients, customers and prisoners from COVID19.
We call on these leaders to enact these, including emergency funding to immediately give money to all working class families, rebuild public health, and force all employers, private and public, to follow the safest and strictest rules enforced by onsite health department staff at every open business, hospital, clinic, public agency, especially transit, and prison.
Health department staff would screen every employee for mandatory PPE, COVID19 signs & symptoms before each work shift, sending those home who were sick to receive full pay not taken from their sick or vacation pay.
Inside each open business, hospital, health facility, public agency they would enforce PPE, including masks for every customer, social distancing, sanitizing and barriers to protect both workers and the public.
Stop ALL pre-trial detentions, Release all prisoners that are awaiting trial and who were convicted of non-violent crimes who test negative for COVID19. Hospitalize all prisoners who test positive with moderate to severe symptoms. Isolate under direct medical supervision all prisoners who test positive with mild symptoms. Provide housing and support services for these persons.
In order to fund these public health solutions –
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and the City Council must reinstate the head tax on all businesses with more than 50 employees and use the $100 Million to fund these solutions.
The Mayor and City Council must Abolish All Tax Increment Financing (TIF’s) now, including the TIFs for the Lincoln Yards and Project 78 developments, and use the $1.2 Billion public dollars remaining in TIF accounts for these solutions.
Use $1.5 Billion Federal Stimulus Package that is coming to Chicago to give $ to workers, families, schools, CTA and rebuild Chicago’s Public Health Department.
Chicago’s Black and Brown communities are being hit hardest by this crisis.
1. All workers (regardless of immigration status) are guaranteed four weeks full salary if they are sick with COVID19 or staying at home to care for sick family members, not to be taken from sick time, vacation or any other benefits.
2. All families whose income is 350% of poverty or less must receive $6,000/month and their full salary if they are not working until one month after the stay at home order is lifted.
3. No rent, no evictions, no mortgage payments, credit card late fees, no student loans payments or interest, no foreclosures, insurance payments, or property taxes until six months after the stay at home order is lifted. There should be automatic lease extensions and no increases in monthly rent. The state rent control ban must be lifted as an emergency order by Governor Pritzker.
4. No shut off or late fees of any utility-electricity, gas, water, Internet/WiFi, until six months after the end of the stay at home order. Guarantee the right to structured repayment of past utility bills.
5. Free public transit including only boarding the back of all buses.
6. All houseless people and people on the street must be placed immediately in safe, warm, clean, buildings, by immediately filling All 1,887 VACANT Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) Apartments, and hotels, with adequate bathrooms, and square footage so everyone, all the time, can be at least six feet apart.
7. No 5pm curfews or any other police harassment of people of color.
8. Free COVID19 testing, treatment and follow-up for all.
9. Free laptops and free Internet WiFi for all Chicago students for the entire school year, not just during the COVID19 pandemic.
10. Hire 1,000 Chicago Department of Health (CDPH) public health workers-Public Health Nurses (PHN’s), Community Based Health Workers, Communicable Disease Investigators (CDI), epidemiologists, health educators who are from & to work in Chicago community areas who have the greatest health and economic inequality. All of these public health workers are critical to greatly expand testing, tracing of all positive COVID19 contacts, and treatment of all who need it.
11. Re-open and fully staff all 12 CDPH mental health clinics (six were closed by Mayor Emanuel).
12. Immediately provide the highest level of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) to health and all other workers, expand staffing, hours, walk-up triage and COVID19 testing in all publicly funded health facilities, including University of Illinois Chicago (UIC), Mile Square, Cook County Health and Hospitals System and all federally qualified health centers (FQHC’s). Begin door to door screening, testing, tracing and treatment starting in those Chicago Community Areas with the greatest racial economic and health inequities and most vulnerable to COVID19 infections and deaths.
13. Place a full-time registered nurse in every Chicago Public School as soon they re-open.
14. All hospitals and other health care facilities must provide, maximum PPE, optimal nurse and other staffing ratios for all patients who have or are under investigation for COVID19. Safe staffing will reduce the need for mandatory overtime, an enumerated right by the state. All healthcare, transit and essential workers must receive hazard pay throughout the pandemic.
15. The state, county, and city must distribute all PPE, medication, and equipment to hospitals and health clinics equitably based on Black and Brown communities being at highest risk.
16. Train, certify, supervise and deputize the thousands of retired health worker volunteers and health science students to become health department workers to be deployed in the hardest hit communities. Governor Pritzker and Mayor Lightfoot must immediately issue strict, detailed, enforceable orders, and place health department personnel in all open businesses, hospitals, and public agencies, including the CTA, Metra and PACE, that includes PPE, other equipment, isolation rooms, barrier and social distance requirements to protect all workers, patients and customers.
Health department workers will immediately be placed inside and outside Every Open Business, grocery stores, pharmacies, restaurants, warehouses, factories, hospitals, health and transit agencies to enforce these rules until at least two weeks After the Stay at Home Order is lifted
All health department workers in every business, hospital, other health facilities, public transit and all other open government agencies will screen all workers before beginning their shift and entering their workplace-temperatures & symptom checks, social distancing, PPE, availability of soap and water and sanitizing gel and decide if any workers should begin working their shift or be sent home, for which they will be paid their regular salary without reducing their sick time, vacation time or any other benefits
Illinois Governor Pritzker, using the constitutionally guaranteed powers of all states, must immediately order all Illinois health departments to unconditionally reject all CDC guidance, which is not legally binding, that waters down & diminishes the safety of health workers, patients, all workers and the general public.
This includes CDC guidance that states health workers do not have to wear N95 masks when taking care of most COVID19 test positive, hospitalized patients, that not all hospitalized, test positive COVID19 patients need to be in negative pressure, reverse pressured isolation rooms, and that it is safe to decontaminate and reuse masks Immediately place health department Workers in All prisons, jails, and juvenile facilities to test all prison guards, workers and prisoners for COVID19, regardless if they have symptoms or not, enforce temperatures/symptom checks on each shift, social distancing, PPE, availability of soap and water and sanitizing gel.
All health workers must be offered free, safe housing in hotels in between shifts to protect their families.
Endorsed by: