* Democratic candidates always know when they’ve touched a raw nerve when the Tribune publishes an indignant editorial…
Chris Kennedy’s divisive fantasy
We know it’s early, but we hope the 2018 governor’s race doesn’t get any uglier than it did this week, when Democratic hopeful Chris Kennedy hallucinated aloud about Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s secret plan to drive minorities out of Chicago.
Kennedy’s Wednesday news conference was supposed to be about violence, but veered off into irresponsible and baseless conjecture about the exodus of black families from the city’s South and West sides.
“I believe that black people are being pushed out of Chicago intentionally by a strategy that involves disinvestment in communities being implemented by the city administration,” Kennedy said.
That population loss is real. The “strategic gentrification plan” is imaginary. It’s a cynical and divisive pitch for votes, and it conveniently commits the candidate to nothing.
I’m not defending Kennedy’s claims. To say that there’s a deliberate plan with a name and everything is pretty darned weird. But I do recognize that Tribune editorial board positions generally don’t win Democratic primaries.
Also, how many angry Tribune editorials did we see published over the past three years while a sitting governor repeatedly bashed Chicago in order to gin up his Downstate base?
…Adding… Wordslinger in comments below…
I don’t get it. The troncs have long contended that Chicago Democrats are driving citizens out of the state.
Last I checked, black Chicagoans were Illinois citizens and they’ve been leaving the city and state in droves. In 1980, the black population of Chicago was 1.2M. Today, it is 850K.
What actually is the tronc position? Chicago Democrats are driving people out, but they’re not doing it on purpose?
* Meanwhile…
Cook County Commissioner Jesus “Chuy” Garcia endorsed Chris Kennedy for governor back in September — and he has a well-known history with Mayor Rahm Emanuel, whom he forced into a 2015 runoff election.
So it was more a resumption of old hostilities than it was a shock to hear Garcia on Thursday back Kennedy’s incendiary claim that Emanuel is overseeing a “strategic gentrification plan” to force poor black and minority residents out of Chicago to make the city “whiter” and wealthier.
“The statement is correct,” Garcia said of Kennedy’s headline-making comments. Speaking at an event to promote a slate of young Latino Southwest Side progressives he is endorsing alongside his own run for retiring U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez’s congressional seat, Garcia added, “The mayor has had seven years to fulfill many of the promises that he made when he first ran for mayor.
“The lack of investment in Chicago’s poorest communities obviously drives people to leave the city seeking communities that are safer, that are more affordable, that have more opportunities.”
* Champaign News-Gazette…
Kennedy’s criticism of city and county power brokers is on target, even if not for the reasons he suggests.
The property tax assessment system is, for all practical purposes, a continuing criminal enterprise that represents a bonanza for political insiders. The city, for all its fine qualities, fails in many respects to serve its citizens well.
Pointing out these problems may not get Kennedy the Democratic gubernatorial nomination. But it raises subjects that the city’s scandal-weary taxpayers need to hear.
Of course, when Kennedy is talking about exclusively Cook County and Chicago issues, he’s not talking about the serious problems that plague Illinois. But Cook County is where the votes are, particularly in the primary.
So look for Kennedy and his fellow candidates to keep leveling fire at the bosses in the hope they will diminish Pritzker, the bosses’ favored candidate in the race for governor.
- Arsenal - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:09 am:
He’s maybe wrong that there’s a deliberate plan to destroy African American neighborhoods, but African American neighborhoods are being destroyed all the same. So I’ll give him a pass. Granted, he needs to talk about a solution beyond “Rahm Emmanuel and Joe Berrios are bad.”
- low level - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:12 am:
Agree w Tribune. Thats a first.
As for the claim: that certainly is welcome news to certain city voters still upset and angry about President Obama’s Chief of Staff being sent to run Chicago.
- Levois - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:15 am:
I know this was said earlier in the week, the idea of “strategic gentrification” isn’t new. I remember it being forward by a fringe candidate for mayor in 2003 though without using that name. Regardless the idea has quickly spiced up the Democrat gubernatorial primary.
- low level - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:18 am:
for years now Ive been debating far right types who feel Rahm is waaaaay too liberal and is doing too much for said communitiies. Utterly crazy. Shame on Chuy as well.
- Chris Widger - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:18 am:
I’m surprised how Kennedy and his defenders haven’t mentioned that we have a well established legal standard where, under the Civil Rights Act, Fair Housing Act, and such, there’s a cause of action for discrimination that causes a disparate impact to a protected class even if there’s no showing of intent. Talking about Rahm’s insidious plan is a bit much, but disparate impact is the backbone of this area of law. You’ll never find the committee notes from Kenilworth Board of Trustees gleefully announcing their plans to exclude black people, but Kenilworth is still discriminating against minorities based on the results. That’s what is worth focusing on re: Rahm and Kennedy.
- wordslinger - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:28 am:
I don’t get it. The troncs have long contended that Chicago Democrats are driving citizens out of the state.
Last I checked, black Chicagoans were Illinois citizens and they’ve been leaving the city and state in droves. In 1980, the black population of Chicago was 1.2M. Today, it is 850K.
What actually is the tronc position? Chicago Democrats are driving people out, but they’re not doing it on purpose?
- lake county democrat - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:34 am:
There’s a line.
It’s one thing to say Bruce Rauner’s policies are going to be the cause of many needy people dying. It’s another to say that this is his intent. It’s yet another to analogize him to ISIS. Those saying the latter (Karen Lewis) should be condemned full-stop.
It’s one thing to say Rahm pushes gentrification at the expense of the needy and that it has a disproportional impact on African-Americans. It’s another to accuse him of pushing gentrification as part of an ethnic cleansing plot. Again, should be condemned full stop.
I’m supporting Kennedy because he’s the only serious hope in this race for progressives who want clean government and structural reform. But this makes me less happy and enthusiastic about it.
- NeverPoliticallyCorrect - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:43 am:
Sad that in 2017 we are still talking about neighborhoods by ethnicity. What does it matter where people live? I have lived through so much of the civil rights movement that I find the very concept of trying to maintain “Black” or “Hispanic” neighborhoods discouraging.
- Cheryl44 - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:46 am:
I still don’t think it’s black people Rahm wants out of the city. It’s poor people he would prefer to go away.
- Arsenal - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:56 am:
== What does it matter where people live?==
Chicago is still a heavily segregated city. When we talk about a failure to maintain a Black or hispanic neighborhood, we’re not saying those guys are moving into Lakeview.
- lake county democrat - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 10:57 am:
Word, Kennedy charged Rahm with ethnic cleansing: driving African-Americans (or alternatively “people of color”) out to replace them with white people. The subject is not “driving people out” but “driving -those- people out.” I posted a link the other day that “Black Flight” is going on in a lot of cities. Indeed, Oak Park lost nearly 6% of its African-American population in the last census and that’s with a soupcon of the crime Chicago experiences. According to the city’s website, it’s public housing assistance waiting list has been closed since 2004, and Oak Park is one of the most integrated suburbs in Chicagoland.
- Lucky Pierre - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 11:10 am:
Kennedy is saying African Americans are leaving Chicago because of “gentrification”
I don’t think he has ever been to Englewood or the other areas in the city losing population if he considers those neighborhoods “gentrified”
This a a failure to maintain public safety and create an environment for private sector job creation in these poor neighborhoods.
These neighborhoods were declining for decades before Rahm was elected,
Maybe someone could ask our community organizer former President how to help these people, he was strangely silent about it during his time in office.
- DeseDemDose - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 11:15 am:
Did Rahm push the Polish out of Bucktown? The Irish out of Bridgeport? the Italians out of Taylor St? The Mexicans out of Pilsen? The Puerto Ricans out of Humboldt park?
- Rod - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 11:16 am:
I agree with Cheryl44, it’s removal of poor populations that are primarily the Mayor’s concern. We saw this happen in Uptown where I live with lower income southeast asians and even earlier with poor whites from the coal mining areas of our country. Pittsburgh for example effectively forced out many families of steelworkers who were largely white.
The truth is Kennedy can’t argue about social economics of gentrification when he comes from such massive money himself, JB prefers not to go there at all with the gentrification discussion, as does the Tribune. U
- Actual Red - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 11:17 am:
@lake
I think there is a reason to take intent into account, and that is usually best not to hyberbolize. That said, “intentionally driving out black people” and “intentionally driving out people, who are mostly black” is to me an overly fine distinction.
- Jerry - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 11:30 am:
I do not say this in jest:
Maybe Kennedy should drop out of the gubernatorial race and run for Mayor.
- Natty_B - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 11:31 am:
To follow-up on Wordslinger the tronc clows literally have a nonsense editoral up TODAY about Dems driving people out of Illinois
- Molly Maguire - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 11:48 am:
I have asked many of the Afram staff in our office why they left the city. They haven’t gone that far. Many have moved to far south and west suburbs for better schools, less crime, and to buy a house in something other than a dying neighborhood. They are willing to commute further for those things. Those things are all fixable in Chicago over the long term–let’s get to work.
- Jane A. - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 12:10 pm:
Interestingly, I’ve been having this discussion off and on for several months with a friend who lives in the Austin neighborhood: she says Rahm is trying to drive minorities out of the West Side through “gentrification,” and I’ve been saying some of what folks are saying here–not much evidence of gentrification going on there; maybe it’s poor folks in general; a (very real, horrible, unconscionable) lack of services and jobs does not necessarily a deliberate minority-cleansing policy make.
Nevertheless, it seems to be an understood thing among the folks she hangs with that this is what’s going on. They see the school closings and property tax disparities as part of the strategy.
It is surprising to hear that Kennedy brought it up. It makes me more willing to believe what my friend is saying.
It would be interesting to look at the real estate market. Which entities have been quietly buying building stock in “targeted” areas? What other kinds of information would provide clear evidence?
Anecdotally, I know other folks who moved out of Austin because they want what everyone wants for their kids, a safe neighborhood and decent schools, and they fortunately had the wherewithal to do so.
- wordslinger - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 12:11 pm:
–Word, Kennedy charged Rahm with ethnic cleansing:–
He did? Show me where Kennedy used that loaded term. You’ve used it twice now. If you can’t show a Kennedy quote, you’re being profoundly dishonest.
“Ethnic cleansing” is not synonymous with planned gentrification.
From Merriam-Webster:
Ethnic cleansing
: the expulsion, imprisonment, or killing of an ethnic minority by a dominant majority in order to achieve ethnic homogeneity
- Sputnik - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 12:22 pm:
Enough with the harsh words about gentrification and being planned. Simply, when wealthier people move in, lots of private sector amenities follow. Better places to eat, nicer bars, Yoga studios, etc..
The lower income neighborhoods certainly have lots of expenses including more policing. The fact is that once a neighborhood gets dangerous, people of means prefer to leave. So the African American population is drifting away from the bottom tier neighborhoods like Engelwood. Everyone wants safe neighborhoods and good schools.
Rahm was present at the year anniversary of the new Whole Foods shopping center in Engelwood at 63rd and Halsted. There are community initiatives that are successful. But government alone can’t change the trajectory of this challenged neighborhood.
- Sputnik - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 12:25 pm:
And no, Kennedy was not hallucinating, but it was a very disappointing statement. Earlier on, he was my chosen candidate because he was addressing some reforms. JB is so silent about the problems facing Illinois.
- Soothsayer - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 12:48 pm:
If you build it, he (they) will come. A Whole Foods in Englewood might just attract evolved Millennials looking for an affordable neighborhood. Neil Steinberg referenced the Kusanya Cafe coffee shop in Englewood a few weeks back that would surely also appeal to Millennials. Reports of crime decreasing in the neighborhood also contribute to making the area more attractive to those who are openminded and financially challenged. And so the gentrification begins… Is this all a part of some massive government conspiracy? I think not but no doubt it is a real phenomenon.
- DeseDemDose - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 12:58 pm:
Gentrification is all over Chicago and the World. It’s all about the Benjamins. Did Rahm push the Italians out of Cicero? The Bohemians out of Berwyn?
- wordslinger - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 1:00 pm:
–Enough with the harsh words about gentrification and being planned. –
Where are you from, Sesame Street? Try not to faint over “harsh” words like “gentrification.” Civil discussion can get even “harsher” than that.
- Rasselas - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 1:16 pm:
When public housing projects were in fixed locations, they created a penumbra of affordable housing, because more affluent people didn’t want to live nearby. When public housing was torn down, the marketplace determined where people live and poor people had to move. The more affordable locations are in the near west and southern suburbs. Hence, the exodus. May or may not have been intent of Daley and the Rahm, but certainly the effect.
- NorthsideNoMore - Friday, Jan 5, 18 @ 3:04 pm:
The closing of 10s of thousands of housing units started under RMD and Rahm has not made much of an attempt to help keep the fabric of many neighborhoods’ together. On reason we left couldn’t afford the new rents was cheaper to buy in the burbs. The effect is real regardless of the intention or design. Exporting problems rather than dealing with them and keeping community in tact is the result.