Are they newspaper vending machines? One stands alongside a Trib and a Sun-Times box, but its tiny storage space is bereft of newspapers, filled instead with candy wrappers and empty juice bottles.
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Are they billboards, maybe? Some of them invite us to try WXEZ and a Big Mac, but that can’t be their only purpose–surely it’s against the law to place a simple billboard on a public sidewalk.
Despite the controversy Durkin has generated, his efforts have left at least one Chicagoan very impressed. Ernie Jackson, who, though homeless, is able to raise a few dollars from time to time working as a sandwich-board man in the Loop, moved into a shelter at Clark and Randolph streets a few days ago and feels right at home there. “It’s a little tight around the shoulders,” says Ernie, pictured above, “but it sure beats sleepin’ under a mess of newspapers.” Amen to that.
