Chicago's next mayor faces a changed city

Tuesday is election day in Chicago and up for grabs is the nomination of the next mayor, along with most of the 50 ward aldermen; powerful people in a city, not only of strong shoulders, but big money, made nearly from the beginning, when men of means came to the prairies to build-up or make fortunes. The metropolis that was created, has now, evolved into a city of deep contrast between races, and income with inequality rampant, and, ironically, against the glittering backdrop of Lake Michigan and the commercial spires of trade.

After the announcement, last fall, that incumbent Rahm Emanuel was not going to seek reelection, after creating a campaign chest of millions, the field of candidates was filled to the brim, and now has fourteen men and women of varying races and gender, and all committed to tackling major problems for the city: an unfunded pension liability of $113.5 billion, a public school system mired in debt, struggling to meet new per pupil financing, and a crime problem, that despite technological advances, sees near daily shootings, even while overall homicides were reduced.

With a painful legacy of segregation, and the consequent shunting of African Americans onto one side of town, and an equally painful history of police brutality, race relations came to a head with the shooting of teenager Laquan McDonald, by a white police officer, Jason Van Dyke, and the suppression of the body cam tape by the then states attorney, there were calls for Emanuel’s resignation.

Another added criticism is that much of the monies being spent from the city budget, are in the Loop, the city’s business area, and other parts of downtown, and not in the neighborhoods, and not entering the deeply impoverished areas of the city’s South and West sides; home to much of the black population, and whose level of disinvestment is high.

The mayoral election will be of critical importance to see if the city can rise, from even the mercurial ashes of distrust, disbelief and satisfaction.

Polls are showing that the two leading contenders are Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle and former US Commerce Chief William “Bill” Daley, the son of the legendary Richard J. Daley and the brother of the controversial Richard M. Daley, but there are cries of ‘No more Daleys” after a parking meter deal that gave away millions, say critics, to New York bankers, in this case J.P. Morgan.

Political king maker, David Axelrod told The Chicago Sun-Times that “The differences between the top rung of candidates — Preckwinkle, Daley, Chico, Wilson, Mendoza, Lightfoot are marginal enough that nothing would be totally surprising,” he said.

In another nod, he also said something that might not bode well for anyone but Daley: “All of this suggests a modest turnout and an older and perhaps, whiter electorate — which, in theory, should help Daley sneak into the runoff."

“He (Daley) has a familiar name, which has cache with older voters and has by far the best funded campaign and the most robust TV.”

Most Preckwinkle backers are looking elsewhere after denying that she knew Alderman Ed Burke, subject of a federal raid, of racketeering and trying to shakedown a local Burger King franchise to steer money to his law firm.

The fact that she not only took the campaign donation, and a massive fundraiser at his home, which she conveniently forgot, and hired his son, are making her less of a social crusader and more of what rival Susana Mendoza called “Boss Preckwinkle.”

“Toni starts out in a good place with a sizable base. But it’s not enough to avoid a runoff or make this an inevitable outcome for her,” said one Democratic operative, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of alienating Preckwinkle.”

“She raised the sales tax after saying she wouldn’t and tried to impose a soda tax, only to have it repealed. It’s gonna be hard to convince that same group of voters you’re the person to elect as mayor after two of the most regressive tax increases in history,” the source said.

Meanwhile coming on strong is Lori Lightfoot, and former head to the Chicago Police Board who has given answers to questions that others might want to avoid, but, self-identifies as not being part of machine politics -- and may prove to be a stronger candidate than previously thought.

Charter schools, erroneously thought to have greater test scores than neighborhood schools face opposition from the Chicago Teachers Union, and some feel that an elected school board can remedy this, and other issues, like an aging physical plant, and lack of social workers and special education teachers, yet others are not so sure.

One of the more bizarre ideas, for the schools came from Daley, who suggested an unwieldy combination of the city’s community colleges with Chicago Public Schools, and the reduction or near elimination of local school councils, an idea that the union rejected.

In a statement from December of 2018, CTU President Jesse Sharkey said, ”Shortly after we release poll results that show Chicagoans want a mayor who prioritizes education and is willing to support new methods to increase revenue for our schools, Bill Daley suggests one of the more ridiculous ideas we’ve heard in recent memory. His plan to combine Chicago Public Schools and the City College of Chicago is the kind of tone deaf proposal you hear at thousand-dollar-a-plate dinners frequented by the donors supporting his campaign, and would add multiple layers of bureaucracy to two systems already struggling under their own weight.”

No one candidate has shown great economic ideas, and with the pension liability it seems that the Emanuel legacy, which became infamous for a raft of new taxes, some of them regressive, and “the district has used money from new taxes and state aid to manage a still-woefully underfunded pension system but faces ongoing fiscal stress and a lack of public details on how lawmakers will pump billions of new dollars into an overhauled state education funding formula.”

The the idea of an elected school board has merit, and some candidates notably Preckwinkle Lightfoot, Aymara Enyia and Willie Wilson are supporting an elected board and the rest Daley, Paul Vallas, Gery Chico and former police superintendent Garry McCarthy are favoring a hybrid.

It does bear repeating the words of former alderman, and now professor of political science at the University of Illinois at Chicago: “First, if we held school board elections citywide rather than by district, we could end up with racial imbalance. Ninety percent of the students in the system are black and Hispanic but most of the elected board could be white. Second, with more than 600 schools to supervise, it is unclear how much any school board -- appointed or elected -- can do to really govern the system. Third, when we had elections of other local agencies like Model Cities, the political machine controlled the outcome in order to control the patronage jobs. The Democratic Party could control the outcome of school board elections as well.”

Whoever takes the top job, has to contend with long history of police abuse, stemming from the early days of the 1968 Democratic Convention, to the brutality, and torture of black men, by the late Cmdr. Jon Burge, and the multiple shots fired at McDonald.

Trying to deal with the perception that all Chicago police are bad, when the reality is that only some of them are, is like wrestling with an alligator that has been greased before the fight begins.

Last but never least are the economic woes, the financial analysis shows that the Chicago, in 2023, will need more than $2.1 billion to make its required contributions to the city’s four worker pension funds, up from about $1.2 billion in 2019.

“All in all, the city of Chicago is in a better structural position than prior years,” said Laurence Msall, president of the Civic Federation, which monitors state and local finances, “but it will continue to face revenue and expenditure pressures resulting in projected growth in future deficits.”

That too has changed with the recent stock market free for all, as Crain’s Chicago reported “With his time in office down to just a few months and the credit markets moving the wrong way, Mayor Rahm Emanuel and his financial team have decided to at least temporarily shelve plans to borrow up to $10 billion to refinance a part of the city’s yawning pension debt.

It will also need a mayor that needs to take in more than the proverbial wind from backroom meetings, and to bring in the needed “shock” economic troops to prevent, such mistaken efforts, like regressive taxes, to help fill empty coffers.