City of Chicago Covid-19 Policies

The City of Chicago has ordered the following policies due to Covid-19:

• Delay referral of parking, red light, speed camera tickets to collection firms until June 1, 2020.
• No defaults of payment plans for until after June 1, 2020 and no new interest accumulated on current compliance plans including city tickets, utility bills, parking and red-light citations, booting and other non-public safety related violations.
• Delay driver’s license suspensions until after April 30, 2020.
• Through at least June 1, the city will suspend booting, late fees and defaults on payment plans for all city debts, and is suspending city debt checks for ride-share and taxi drivers. 
• Through at least June 1, the city will be limiting ticketing, towing and impounding solely to what are public safety-related issues.
• Extend utility bill due dates and referral to collection firms until June 1, 2020. #covid-19, #coronavirus, 
  

Covid-19 Evictions

On April 23, 2020, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker signed Executive Order 2020-30 (“Order”), which, among other things, extended relief previously provided by Executive Order 2020-10 prohibiting law enforcement from enforcing eviction orders for residential properties, and broadened this relief to non-residential evictions. Specifically, the Order provides that all law enforcement officers must cease enforcing any eviction orders for non-residential premises, unless the non-residential tenant has been found to “pose a direct threat to the health and safety of other tenants, an immediate and sever risk to property, or a violation of any applicable building code, health ordinance, or similar regulation.”[1] However, tenants of non-residential premises still are required to pay rent pursuant to any lease agreement. The Order further provides relief to residential tenants by barring any landlord or property manager from filing an eviction action pursuant to 735 ILCS 5/9-101, et seq., “unless a tenant poses a direct threat to the health and safety of other tenants, an immediate and severe risk to property, or a violation of any applicable building code, health ordinance, or similar regulation”.[2] Like non-residential tenants, residential tenants still are required to pay rent. #evictions, #covid-19,

Decline in Car Crashes

Total car crashes have dropped as more people are staying off the roads during the coronavirus pandemic, but state and local officials say some drivers are using the wide-open spaces as an excuse to speed.

In Illinois, crash rates dropped by more than half statewide April 1 through April 26 compared with the same period last year — to 1,608 statewide and to 688 on Cook County non-Tollway roads, according to the Illinois State Police.

This can be explained by fewer cars on the road, with schools and businesses closed. A national study conducted by INRIX, a provider of travel time information for travelers and shipping companies, found that vehicle miles traveled in Illinois dropped as much as 52% because of the pandemic, with lower travel times on ordinarily jammed expressways like the Eisenhower and Kennedy.

But Chicago has also seen a 14% increase in speeding tickets generated by automated cameras, while Illinois State Police figures show a modest increase in the rate of personal injury crashes in Cook County, which could indicate more reckless driving. #covid-19, #carcrashes, #coronavirus,