North Cook News

Cook County Board Commissioner Sean Morrison worries what could be next for the state’s crumbling economy.

“Without tenants paying their landlord/building owner and those building owners are holding mortgages how do they cover the lost revenue to pay their mortgage,” Morrison told the North Cook News. "This has the real potential to create a cascading effect that could be devastating. We could potentially face another real estate market collapse if mortgage companies foreclose on these properties.”

Morrison’s radar has been raised by a new survey by small business referral network Alignable that finds during the month of December 56% of all the state’s bar and restaurant owners were unable to pay full rent for their establishments as the governor’s ban on indoor dining took greater hold amid the changing seasons.

Nationally, that figure stands at 61%, up 19% from just a month earlier with the harshest part of the winter season still yet to come. In Illinois, the number of restaurants now unable to make full rent payments has already more than doubled since September.

Morrison fears things could get worse before they get better given what he sees as the governor’s disconnect with many of the people he’s supposed to represent.

“He has shown a mental disconnect that will have long term consequences on small business owners in Illinois,” he said. “The data has consistently shown that restaurants are very low when it comes to COVID transmittal yet his dysfunctional and at times illogical lockdown policies are destroying the restaurant industry beyond repair.”

Morrison fumes the governor’s actions have left the state in a class all by itself in terms of putting the state back on the right track.

“Our governor has shown that he is not up to the task in his failure to balance public health precautions and economic considerations,” he said. “We’ve seen other states across the country be able to strike this delicate yet vital balance but not here in Illinois.”