Impatience with Mayor Lightfoot — and from her — grows as violence rages

1. Days earlier, Foxx had called out Brown and Lightfoot for “dishonest blame games,” after they implied Foxx’s lenient release policies were setting would-be looters loose on the streets.
2. Pretty as Chicago can appear, it’s still a balkanized and sometimes bitterly divided city that is rendering Brown and Lightfoot ineffective, so far, in bringing order to this summer of unrest.
3. Lightfoot even invited Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx to stand within shouting distance of her new police superintendent, David Brown.
4. In the ongoing effort to get control of the city’s streets, Mayor Lori Lightfoot staged a news conference last Friday that was meant to make a statement.
5. Bitter experience has taught Lightfoot to tune the public accountability down a notch, and to give Brown and his command staff the time and resources to implement programs that will have long-term impact.
6. One sure tell is that Lightfoot declined to set measurable goals for the CPD’s progress in managing the downtown demonstrations while solving the twin problems of violent agitators and looters — not to mention the more entrenched concern over handgun violence in the neighborhoods.
7. The mini-revolt in City Council may be a minor irritant for now, but there are legions of people across the city who expected more from Lightfoot and Brown — and will insist on seeing results sooner rather than later.
8. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot speaks during a news conference at Olive Park in Chicago on Aug.
9. Brown set out his Chicago career on the wrong foot, with what Lightfoot termed an “epic fail” over the Memorial Day weekend.

 

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