Alderman to try again to pass earlier curfew for downtown Chicago after shootings at teen takeovers
An alderman representing part of downtown Chicago plans to call for a City Council vote on Wednesday on a controversial curfew plan to keep teens from causing trouble at night.
Ald. Brian Hopkins (2nd), who chairs the City Council Public Safety Committee and whose ward includes much of downtown, has been pushing to change the curfew for unaccompanied minors downtown from 10 p.m. to 8 p.m. since last summer.
That proposal has been bottled up without a vote amid opposition from the mayor, but Hopkins has said he plans to push for a City Council vote on his proposal at Wednesday's City Council meeting, after two people were shot during a pair of teen takeovers within weeks of each other last month in Streeterville.
But a fellow downtown alderman said an earlier curfew won't make a difference.
"Clearly we have a problem, but a curfew is just not the solution to that problem. My concern is that it would take resources away to enforce it, and then also would just simply not be effective," said Ald. Bill Conway (34th), a former Cook County prosecutor.
Last month, two teen takeover events in Streeterville ended in shootings – a 46-year-old woman was shot in the arm near the AMC River East movie theater on March 9 while visiting Chicago with her son, and a 15-year-old boy was shot in the leg on March 28 near the intersection of Columbus Drive and Illinois Street.
"If we allow this to continue, it's just a matter of time before the bullets kill someone instead of wounding them," Hopkins argued.
Hopkins said police responded quickly after the March 28 shooting and took several teens into custody for curfew violations.
"There were six immediate pickups for curfew after that time, and when the kids see that happening, they know it's time to get out of here," he said.
Mayor Brandon Johnson, however, has said he does not support an earlier curfew downtown, arguing it would simply push the problem of teen takeovers to other neighborhoods.
"I don't believe creating policies for a very narrow space in the City of Chicago is the right approach, because that's not really dealing with the actual issue, and the issue is that we do have to hold people accountable, but we also have to make sure that there are opportunities for folks. So diverting the problem somewhere else, that's doesn't reflect my values, and I believe most Chicagoans don't want to see that," he said Tuesday.
The mayor also questioned the constitutionality of Hopkins' proposal.
"I'm not a constitutional law professor, but if you're only targeting a particular area, I believe and I see a scenario in which that just simply pushes the challenge elsewhere," he said.
CBS News Chicago has learned the Johnson administration has a new strategy to try to curb teen takeovers, having rideshare companies like Uber agree not pick up or drop off passengers in affected areas when takeovers are expected.
The mayor's office said when it learns such teen takeovers are being planned, it works with the Chicago Police Department, the Office of Emergency Management and Communications (OEMC), and a number of community groups and violence interrupters to try to make sure such gatherings don't turn violent. Johnson's office said those tactics were used after learning of plans for three such gatherings this past weekend.
"To prevent the publicized gatherings from escalating, the City deployed the City's Crisis Prevention Response Unit (CRPU) to the anticipated location of a 'teen trend' and worked with community organizations to conduct outreach to youth and parents. The City also employed highly-targeted geofencing to prevent large crowds from gathering during the publicized time of the event. As a result, the City was able to prevent the large gathering from taking place at two of the three anticipated locations," the mayor's office said in a statement. "As Mayor Johnson has made clear, we want young people to explore every part of our city. That is their right as Chicagoans. However, the Johnson administration is deploying every tool at our disposal to ensure that large gatherings do not become violent. "
Last Friday, after Chicago police learned of plans for a teen takeover at Millennium Park – which never materialized – one Uber rider saw that much of downtown appeared to be blocked from service.
In a statement, Uber said, "As requested by OEMC we implemented pick up and drop off restrictions."
Conway said there's a traffic benefit to that strategy, but it could be counterproductive.
"It's important that we keep traffic moving downtown, at all hours of the day, especially on weekend evenings when it tends to get brutal; but to the extent that it means that there's not going to be drop-offs downtown, I don't think that makes any sense for the businesses," he said.
Conway says he's not sure if Hopkins' proposal for an earlier downtown curfew will move forward on Wednesday, as it needs two-thirds of the City Council to approve it, or 34 votes.
"It's not clear if it will move forward, but I do think it sends the wrong message to young people that they are not allowed downtown, and that's not the message that we want to be sending, since downtown is really for everyone," he said.
