Is Brandon Johnson ignoring the next crisis here?
The mayor should follow Lori Lightfoot's lead
After his meeting with the U.S. Ambassador to Japan, Rahm Emanuel, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson quipped his takeaway from the meeting was”I learned how to curse” Few who know Emanuel, and have gotten on his wrong side will attest the former mayor’s affinity for coarse language. It’s likely that Emanuel shared and possibly elaborated on his trademark mantra “don’t let a good crisis go to waste”
It is agreed the migrant issue here is a crisis; however there is an additional crisis looming which the mayor has yet to address. That crisis is the return of COVID19. State and city health outlets are reporting that COVID19 is on the rise locally; yet few people are “masking” compared to a year ago.
Then, it was regular television appearances and public service announcements by the head of the Chicago Department of Public Health, that kept the virus from spreading faster because residents were repeatedly informed of the problem and subsequent consequences If the Johnson Administration has such a strategy in place, it hasn’t tipped its hand. This administration has been one prone to react instead of preventing.
Some readers might recall Johnson’s flippant response “winter isn’t here yet” to Failed attempt at sheltering migrants a reporter asked him about getting migrants out of police stations and off the streets and into shelters as he had promised. It is evident the crisis has to arrive before Team Johnson puts any solutions in place.
Johnson, who rarely is seen as camera shy, has been surprisingly absent about the topic that would bring him additional notoriety. It also could be that because COVID 19 explanations are rooted in science something Johnson can’t so glibly explain as he done with other issues. The other reason the mayor might be mum on this looming crisis is he is still indoctrinating what the new head of the Chicago Health Department is supposed to say. Ige replaced Dr. Allyson Arwady who ran afoul of the Chicago Teachers Union, Johnson’s largest campaign backers.
Dr. Allyson Arwady became the face of Chicago’s battle with COVID19. Arwady was commended for conducting daily news conferences on the status of the disease, the number of Chicagoans hospitalized-sometimes on an hour-by-hourly bases. Even though it has only been seven weeks since Ige’s appointment, Johnson is making a mistake to keep her under wraps.
Arwady’s candor and consistency, as well as an ability to simplify complex medical jargon, made her a go-to person on all things COVID19. The Johnson Administration doesn’t have such a person. If a wave of the COVID19 virus swept over the city in the next week or two, who would be there to explain it? Certainly not Johnson. He lacks the requisite healthcare background, questions from the news media would require. Dr. Ige may be able to handle the media’s questions with aplomb; however, we will never know if Johnson keeps her under wraps.
It is better to give her her first news conference with something simple before she has to face the flurry of questions from reporters during a crisis. We know also reporters are always looking for the chink in the armor. If they find any with Ige; it will reflect more on the mayor than his new appointment. There are thousands of people who recommended Arwady should have never been fired.