It is the second time in six months that alderpeople have called an emergency meeting of the City Council to publicly push back against Lightfoot’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate. The alderpeople demanded the session one day after the deadline for Chicago Police Department members to get at least the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Fraternal Order of Police
Employees who are not vaccinated will not be paid and may face additional “disciplinary action, up to and including termination,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s office said in a statement Friday evening.
Chicago Police officers must be vaccinated against COVID-19, an arbitrator ruled Wednesday, handing Mayor Lori Lightfoot a significant victory.
The ruling gives the unions’ employees until Dec. 31 to get their first shot of one of the three approved COVID-19 vaccines, and until Jan. 31 to get the second dose of the Moderna or Pfizer BioNtech vaccines.
“Everyone is always welcome downtown, everyone is welcome to enjoy all our city has to offer,” Police Superintendent David Brown said. “Chicago belongs to all of us, but if you come downtown or anywhere else, you engage in disorderly conduct or other crimes, you will be arrested.”
Mayor Lori Lightfoot issued a statement Wednesday night saying the city had dropped its lawsuit at her discretion following an increase in compliance among Chicago police officers with the city’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate.
A day after he announced his intention to leave the department, John Catanzara — the first-term president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7 — posted a picture of his personnel action request on his Facebook page, which shows that he has indeed retired from the CPD.
The stunning announcement comes after John Catanzara, the head of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7, spent hours testifying at his own termination hearing Monday.
“It is not surprising to me that he did not want to face accountability for his own conduct,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said.
More than 4,900 members of the Chicago Police Department are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or have refused to disclose their vaccination status to city officials, one month after the deadline set by Mayor Lori Lightfoot, according to data released Monday by city officials.
The Chicago Police Board on Monday will hold the first in a series of hearings that could lead to the termination of police officer and union head John Catanzara for defying the department’s brass and ignoring its rules.
A Cook County judge won’t throw out Chicago’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate entirely, but in a ruling Monday he has put a hold on a Dec. 31 deadline for members of the Chicago Police Department to get fully vaccinated.
Approximately 130 employees — most of whom are members of the Chicago Fire Department and the Department of Water Management — were not likely to succeed on any of their claims, the judge ruled.
The Chicago City Council voted 13-30 Friday to reject a push to reverse Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s order that all city employees disclose whether they have been vaccinated against COVID-19 — and get fully vaccinated by Dec. 31.
Thirteen alderpeople invoked state law to call a special meeting of the Chicago City Council for 11 a.m. Friday in an attempt to force a vote on a measure that would reverse Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s order that all city employees disclose their vaccination status.
Cook County Judge Cecilia Horan on Monday evening denied a request seeking to extend a temporary restraining order against John Catanzara, who had repeatedly urged Fraternal Order of Police members not to give their vaccination status to Chicago officials.
