Hosey: Out there just dying to reopen Illinois

A couple dozen, maybe a few more than that, stood in the rain outside a Crest Hill shopping center and shouted at the passing traffic that they were tired of being told to stay home.

They carried signs and flags saying essentially the same thing, or else to vote for Donald Trump, or not to tread on them, or something about vaccinations. They definitely had a message. It was just a bit mixed.

Mixed or not, the general theme seemed to be that it was time to lift Gov. JB Pritzker’s stay-at-home order, to let people get back to work and revive the economy. Or as the event’s lead organizer, Brandon Harris, told Herald-News senior reporter Bob Okon, “We’re showing that we can wear safety protection gear, get out and gather.”

They did get out and gather, often standing in close proximity to one another. And many even wore masks, conscientiously keeping their faces covered except to smoke.

Despite all that, the protesters were fine. At least while they were protesting and maybe even now. But it can take up to two weeks for COVID-19 symptoms to emerge, so they still have a ways to go before they find out if they’re in the clear.

They may have caught the coronavirus while they were calling for the reopening of Illinois, but they’re not alone in fighting for their cause. They even have a member of the Illinois legislature on their side, one that beat the governor in court and can now leave his home in the Downstate town of Xenia any time he wants. Not that there seems to be much in the town of Xenia besides the home of state Rep. Darren Bailey, but it looks like the governor’s powerless to stop him from leaving it all the same.

And Rep. Bailey wasn’t the only one besides the protesters who was tired of staying home. In fact, just the day before and a few blocks away on Plainfield Road, William Spruell of Joliet was outside the Taco Bell, where he was fatally wounded by a gunman who also was presumably out and about, possibly engaged in an essential business, but probably not.

Spruell was the first person shot to death in the county since a murder-suicide nearly a month ago the police said was provoked by fears of coronavirus infection. And it was only the beginning.

Hours later, two more men were shot in an apartment on Parkwood Drive. And two days after that, another two men were gunned down in separate incidents on the city’s East Side.

There had not been a murder in Joliet since the end of February. Then there were four in as many days and would have been five in five days if Spruell was standing a half mile or so to the south instead of by the Taco Bell.

The number of shooting deaths in less than a week was shocking. It was so bad you would think somebody might form a mayoral commission to analyze and address the issue, to take a good, hard look at the violence plaguing the city and get to the bottom of things.

But for all that, over those same five days, 24 men and women in Will County died from the coronavirus, nearly five times the number shot to death.

Which won’t be enough to stop the protesters from coming back out this weekend to call for the reopening of Illinois, to stand shoulder to shoulder again and shout at the passing cars, just in case they didn’t infect each other the last time.

• Joe Hosey is the editor of The Herald-News. You can reach him at 815-280-4094, at jhosey@shawmedia.com or on Twitter @JoeHosey.