Fifteen months after dozens of Illinois Walgreens stores were damaged during the looting and violence that unfolded across the city last summer, three South Side stores are fully reopening to customers. Customers are still waiting on a fourth store, in the West Elsdon neighborhood.
The Deerfield-based pharmacy chain said it maintained pharmacy services at the stores while they were closed, but some community members were frustrated by the lengthy timeline to have full access.
“It really is a respected place that people rely upon, and now it’s closed,” said Jennipher Adkins, interim executive director of the Chatham Business Association. “It’s been long enough.”
More than 2,100 businesses throughout Chicago were damaged or looted during the civil unrest that erupted in the aftermath of George Floyd’s killing at the hands of Minneapolis police. In Illinois, 80 Walgreens sustained at least moderate damage. The company said it spent $35 million on reopening Chicago stores, and most opened relatively quickly.
Four stores took longer because they sustained more extensive structural damage, said Walgreens spokeswoman Kris Lathan.
One store, in the Roseland neighborhood, opened Friday. Stores in Chatham and Gresham are opening this week.
The West Elsdon store had to be entirely rebuilt and the company has not set a reopening date, she said. Earlier this summer, a Cicero man was charged with allegedly setting fire to the building.
“I am happy Walgreens is going to build a new store at 59th Street and Pulaski as a good number of 13th ward constituents rely on that particular location for the pharmacy,” said Ald. Marty Quinn.
Walgreens has four stores roughly a mile and a half from that location, and there is a CVS half a mile away.
The three other stores’ coolers were damaged, and the pandemic delayed delivery of the custom parts required to fix them.
Walgreens wasn’t the only major chain that had several Chicago stores damaged last summer, and some were closed for months, including Walmart’s Chatham and Austin stores. Walmart, Target, CVS and Jewel-Osco said all of their Chicago stores have reopened.
Walgreens maintained pharmacy services while the stores were closed. The Chatham store had a trailer in the parking lot providing vaccinations, prescriptions and items like allergy and cold medications, vitamins and first aid materials. The Gresham and Roseland stores reopened their pharmacies but kept the rest of the store closed.
At the West Elsdon store, customers can get prescriptions through free same-day delivery or pick them up at a nearby Walgreens pharmacy, Lathan said.
Walgreens said customers were more likely to stick to their prescription regimen while the stores were closed because pharmacies did outreach to make sure people knew how to get services while stores were repaired.
Still, Sebrina Robinson, 54, who stopped at the Chatham Walgreens to pick up medication for her brother, said she missed having access to the rest of the store, where she often stopped to get a sandwich or other items on her way to work.
The closest chain pharmacy is at a Jewel-Osco two miles away, though there are closer independent pharmacies.
Hattie Smith, on the other hand, who lives near the Gresham store, said she didn’t mind the limited access because she could still pick up her prescriptions and knew the store would reopen.
“It’s not a big deal,” said Smith, 54. “They’re working on it.”
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“but some community members were frustrated by the lengthy timeline to have full access.” Too bad, oh soo sad. When your friends, neighbors and quite possibly yourselves were looting and destroying these businesses apparently you didn’t think that it might well come back and bite you on the arse. If you weren’t trying to prevent the destruction and mayhem, you are just as guilty as those that did.
AND If they “WERE REALLY so well respected”, why then WERE THEY BURNED DOWN, looted and destroyed!!!
“It really is a respected place that people rely upon, and now it’s closed,” said Jennipher Adkins, interim executive director of the Chatham Business Association. “It’s been long enough.”
“Long enough” is the amount of time that has passed for prosecutors to build cases against BLM and Anti-First Amendment operatives.
So you riot, trash the “respected place”, then complain that you lack “access” and presume to dictate how long the damaged business may stay closed? This is victim think in a nutshell.
I wouldn’t risk another dime in your “hood”!
Me neither. If i owned walgreens, i’d tell ALL OF THOSE HOODS “YOU had your chance for our stores to be there and thrive. BUT YOU BLEW IT WITH a year+ long riot and anarchy. Proving you are incapable of ever being civilized enough to have our stores in your hoods”
Walgreens is either really stupid or it’s one h**l of a tax right-off for them.
And the cycle of allowing & even rewarding criminal violence under Dem Party & Corp profiteers continues.
Would like to know if insurance covered any damages from the rioting.
If so, then that means insurance premiums go up for everyone & innocent citizens are actually being forced to pay for criminal violence that by rights the Dem city & state govt officials should be held personally liable for due to their deliberate refusal to do their job to uphold law & order.
Corps like Walgreens that want to operate in areas where Dem city govt permits criminals to dominate should be required operate without insurance or taxpayer funded govt subsidies.
Businesses in govt permitted crime ridden areas should be required to build structures only with fire proof cinder blocks & with steel pull down covers for doors / windows.
Also, they should be required to have private armed security during operating hours to at least force wannabe thieves out the door at gunpoint even if city won’t allow police to arrest them.
Law abiding working class citizens are fed up with govt & Corps figuratively saying what me worry & forcing us to submit to & bear the financial & emotional brunt of violence & lawlessness.
HELL, the entire DNC should be financially liable, FOR ALL THAT INSURANCE!
Anybody unfamiliar with why down towns and malls (especially the one that was used in the “Blues Brothers” chase scene) are abandoned and forced to close, one need look no further than the coincidental patronage by people who now comprise the BLM terrorist group.
Exactly. TIME AFTER TIME i’ve seen stores open up new branches in “BLACK areas”, only to shut shop a few years later, DUE TO ALL THE BLOODY CRIME.
That’s not being ‘racist’. THAT IS JUST BEING LOGICAL, especially when the FACTS AND STATS back that all up.