City on the hill it ain’t
Tuesday, Nov 13, 2007 - Posted by Rich Miller
* How the insiders are treated in Chicago…
Six years ago, Allison S. Davis, an ally of Mayor Daley, got two city blocks of free land to build homes in the Woodlawn neighborhood. And the biggest, most expensive house went to Davis’ son.
* How everyone else is treated…
Chicago could generate $2.7 million a year — and maybe nearly twice that much — by cracking down on what has become a “widespread black market” in counterfeit city stickers, Inspector General David Hoffman has concluded.
After a yearlong investigation that identified 388 counterfeit stickers — 94 percent of them found at city auto pounds and at least one on a car that belonged to a city employee — Hoffman is recommending stiff new penalties for those who sell and manufacture bogus stickers and against motorists who purchase and display them.
I’m not condoning counterfeiting in any way, but the city conducts a year-long investigation of city stickers and finds less than 400 of them and that’s a huge problem? Priorities, people.
* The treatment of the upper echelon…
The city of Chicago is under-reporting hundreds of millions of dollars in property taxes it pulls in every year. That’s according to a new study by the Civic Federation, a fiscal watchdog group. It says there needs to be more transparency.
* Everyone else…
Barring last-minute changes, the Chicago City Council is poised to hike taxes, fees and fines by more than $275 million when it votes Tuesday on Mayor Richard Daley’s proposed 2008 budget.
The chief concern for aldermen and homeowners is Daley’s plan to raise property taxes by $86 million, by far the largest hike since he took office in 1989.
* The few…
As a young lawyer, Allison S. Davis was a City Hall outsider.
He criticized Mayor Richard J. Daley over the 1968 riots. He worked to integrate Chicago neighborhoods. And he fought to elect judges based on legal ability, not political connections.
Today, Davis is a consummate City Hall insider.
He’s a loyal ally of Mayor Richard M. Daley, who appointed Davis to Chicago’s prestigious Plan Commission. Davis has gotten deal after deal from the mayor, helping to make Davis one of the city’s top developers. And Davis has forged strong ties to the Daley family, doing deals with one of the mayor’s nephews and giving legal business to Daley & George, mayoral brother Michael Daley’s law firm.
* The many…
This year, according to the Law Department, as of Sept. 30, Chicago had paid out more than $27 million in police misconduct judgments and settlements on claims ranging from sexual harassment to excessive force and illegal search.
* Meanwhile, grand plans from Mayor Daley…
Wind turbines on Sears Tower and a “green” roof on the Merchandise Mart are two high-profile concepts on the drawing board as part of a wide-ranging, environmentally friendly development plan under consideration by the city.
* But basic stuff like a decent city recycling program is still out of reach…
But the fact is, we’ll never be able to claim we’re green giants until we have an effective, citywide recycling program. And we still have a long way to go.
Recycling, after all, is the most basic of environmental programs. It’s probably the first thing someone does when they start to think green, because of the variety of benefits, from saving natural resources to saving energy to saving landfill space. “What’s good about recycling is that it’s something everyone can do and actually make an impact,” said Julie Dick, a board member at the Chicago Recycling Coalition. But people who move to Chicago from the suburbs or other big cities, nearly all of which have better recycling programs than Chicago’s, are often surprised at how hard it is here.
Thoughts?
- Truthful James - Tuesday, Nov 13, 07 @ 10:15 am:
All municipalities are required by State law to file annual reports with ILLDeptRev within 180 days after the end of each fiscal year on each TIF District they control.
The tables include each source of revenue and every expense with a specific table for each expenditure over 10 grand. Any reports filed by the financial advisors is attached, any audit must be attached.
Reporters, the data is is there or is delinquent. Go to work.
In addition, if bonds were sold to finance TIFs annual eports of required financial information are filed with the National Munipal Repositories as required by the SEC,
So the information is out there. Somebody show Mr. Msall the way, as well.
Go to it, gang
- Cassandra - Tuesday, Nov 13, 07 @ 10:50 am:
I don’t feel too sorry for Chicagoans getting their taxes raised, although I certainly don’t want my non-Chicago taxes raised to pay for their CTA and I don’t want a tax swap which will give
them any more money to waste on their really bad schools.
Daley’s shenanigans with favored political pals are well known to Chicagoans. So are those TIF’s.
This is not an electorate which doesn’t have access to a lot of negative information about its leaders. Yet they continue to vote Daley in and to
effectively enrich his business pals, to tolerate endless, widespread corruption and patronage in city government, and to accept subpar service on the CTA and in the schools, among other government
services.
This is not an uninformed electorate and they seem to have what they want. It’s democracy.
- irishpirate - Tuesday, Nov 13, 07 @ 12:33 pm:
The City of Chicago and various other units of local government are run as Quasi-criminal conspiracies for the benefit of Mayor Daley, his family and his friends. Of course he knows nothing about this. He hadn’t even read the Tribune story on the federal investigation into Bridgeport land dealings. He was too busy focusing on the big picture.
As for recycling one of his “friends” had various contracts involving blue bags. The recycling situation could be improved dramatically by placing bins for recyclables in nearly every block of alleys. Chicago ain’t Oak Park, but we can do better. Daley just needs to figure out how his friends can make money doing it. Perhaps someone named Daley, Thompson or Vanecko can be brought in as a partner. All without any knowledge of “da mare” of course.
This “painting” of “da mare” says all you need to know.
- Up North - Tuesday, Nov 13, 07 @ 12:44 pm:
It’s been years since Daley paid attention to the basics of governing–garbage and recycling, potholes, park programs–all the stuff he built his early “Mayor as Manager” reputation on.
That reputation is now gone of course, evaporated in scandal, taxes, cronyism, transit meltdowns and general incompetence.
But the Millenium Parks and the other high visibility projects–and a very good national economy–have insulated him up to now.
But I do believe people are beginning to notice the failure of the basics, particularly because they’re being priced out of the city.
- Bill - Tuesday, Nov 13, 07 @ 12:53 pm:
Cassie,
No offense but if you take “their” CTA and Metra away, Oak Park becomes Bellwood. Don’t expect your taxes to go down, however.
- Patrick McDonough - Tuesday, Nov 13, 07 @ 1:17 pm:
Wind Turbines on the Sears Tower? Why does all this talk get press? None of this will ever happen. Green roofs and other “Press Projects” will never help like a proper garbage recycling like in the suburbs. Is Daley waiting for Tadin or Barbara to give him permission to start a recycling program? Make it legal for junkers to pick up cans and scrap, something, anything. Chicago’s recycling and green policy is a farce.
- Rod's Brush - Tuesday, Nov 13, 07 @ 3:34 pm:
With each passing day Daley is reminding me of the monorail salesman from The Simpsons.
- Independent - Tuesday, Nov 13, 07 @ 6:24 pm:
Up North is fundamentally right, though I don’t recall Daley ever caring about recycling. Now it’s time for national rags like Time and Business Weekly to stop perpetuating the Daley-as-brilliant-manager myth. If they did a thorough examination and looked past the flower planters they would see a man who is out of ideas, save for his grand Olympic charade.