David Sirota, who has become one of our nation’s top investigative reporters, here tells the story about how Chicago’s Mayor Rahm Emanuel says there is no money, that public pensions have emptied the city’s coffers, and that he has to close schools because of a huge deficit. But Sirota says that the Mayor has found plenty of money for favored projects, funded by his “Tax Increment Financing districts.” This is a shocking story though not many who live in Chicago are likely to be surprised. During the teachers’ strike in 2012, when the city claimed it could not afford smaller classes or libraries or anything that the schools needed, there were many complaints about the use of TIF funding for an unnecessary stadium. Read on.
Sirota writes:
This same story, portraying public employees as the primary cause of budget crises, is being told across the country. Yet, in many cases, we’re only being told half the tale. We aren’t told that the pension shortfalls in many US states and cities were created because those same states and cities did not make their required pension contributions over many years. And perhaps even more shockingly, we aren’t being told that, while states and cities pretend they have no money to deal with public sector pensions, many are paying giant taxpayer subsidies to corporations — often far larger than the pension shortfalls.
Chicago is the iconic example of all of these trends. A new report being released this morning shows that the supposedly budget-strapped Windy City – which for years has not made its full pension payments – actually has mountains of cash sitting in a slush fund controlled by Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Indeed, as the report documents, the slush fund now receives more money each year than it would cost to adequately finance Chicago’s pension funds. Yet, Emanuel is refusing to use the cash from that slush fund to shore up the pensions. Instead, his new pension “reform” proposal cuts pension benefits, requires higher contributions from public employees and raises property taxes in the name of fiscal responsibility. Yet, the same “reform” proposal will actually quietly increase his already bloated slush fund.
But it gets worse: an investigation by Pando has discovered that Emanuel has been using that same slush fund to enrich some of his biggest campaign contributors.
How a “shadow budget” is bankrupting Chicago
The new report, from the taxpayer watchdog group Good Jobs First, shows how Chicago’s roughly 150 “tax increment financing” (TIF) districts divert property taxes out of schools and public services and into what is now known as Chicago’s “shadow budget.” That’s a slightly nicer term for what is, in practice, Emanuel’s very own sovereign wealth fund.
Living up to his billing as “Mayor 1%,” Emanuel has used the fund to (among other things) offer up $7 million of taxpayer cash for a new grocery store, $7.5 million for a proposed data center, $29 million for an office high rise and $55 million for a huge new hotel (and that latter project is on top of $75 million more in tax money Emanuel has offered up to build a private university a new basketball stadium). And these are just a few of the corporate subsidy proposals in a $300 million spending spree Emanuel has championed at the very moment he has pled poverty to justify pension cuts, property tax increases and the largest school closure in his city’s history.
Diane – do you understand the difference between cash flow and accrual accounting?
LOL.
Jim –do you understand what the opposite of Robin Hood means?
Excellent! A great, succinct rebuttal. This debate coach is impressed!
Thanks, LP!
If intelligence is related to genetics as you seem to believe, I guess we know a lot about your genetics.
I don’t, please explain.
Thanks in advance!
Is this racist Jim?
Is this an ALEC thing or what?
In NJ, Governor Christie, while crying about pension payments, pass a bill that increased public employees payments while reducing benefits and agreed to fund the pension at 1/7th of the States liability per year.
Now that NJ is at 4/7th of the required State payment, Christie is claiming the increased employee payment in order to reduce the States actual required payment, yet he has given 2.1 BILLION in tax breaks to corporations. He also set up a slush fund at the PA to use for his “pet projects” after increasing tolls.
Is it something in the Kool-aid they are drinking or do they just think alike?
To answer your last question(s):
No, they don’t necessarily think alike, it’s just that they’re all bought off with the same green stuff.
The Gov of Michigan has pulled this same type of bs with a speech about “shared sacrifice” that made retirees, teachers, and public employees sacrifice while businesses got money funneled to them. It is all the same playbook. Obama, Rahm, Arne, Cuomo, have all proven that the Dem Party is rotten and useless.
The NJ pension fund has been underfunded since Christie Whitman was governor. Republicans don’t like teachers.
NJ Republicans, that is, and I recognize that Rahm is a Dem, and just as bad.
I think it might be an ALEC thing, because it’s happening in Utah, too. The last three years, the legislature has increased the Weighted Pupil Unit (WPU) about 2 percent a year. Then, the legislators crow about how much they’re “supporting” public education. However, they have not funded the money districts must pay to state retirement and Social Security, essentially rendering the increase in the WPU meaningless. The last five years, I have gained about 20 students per school year on my rolls, going from just under 200 students in 2008 to 256 this year. And yesterday, I learned that our class sizes are going up AGAIN. I will probably have about 270 students next year. I teach 8th and 9th grade social studies. I will probably have about 35 students per class, including (this is generally the situation) 5 or 6 students per class that are either students in special education and/or English Language Learners. Also, our paid teacher workdays have been cut to ribbons. We used to have eight days scattered throughout the year. We now have four. So every year for the last five years, I get paid less for teaching more students.
Howard Stephenson is an ALEC mouthpiece.
Yep. And a scumbag. All you need to get a group of teachers groaning in Utah is to mention his name, even if most are not politically active. Next time he’s up for reelection, I think the whole state needs to band together to let people know what this guy REALLY stands for.
This reminds me of a debt collector’s rebuttal when a borrower says he can’t afford to repay his debt. “Oh, you have no money to pay off the $20,000 you put on your credit card, but you somehow have enough money to eat lunch in a restaurant and buy pants at the mall?”
On Wall Street – where Emanuel made millions working for hedge fund Magnetar in between his White House stints – we have “Dark Pools,” huge constellations of hidden capital and financial positions that exist outside of any regulatory structure.
In neoliberal government, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Finance, we have “shadow budgets,” hidden taxpayer funds, with no public oversight, managed by politicians who’ve demonstrated their reliability to the Overclass.
In both cases, the public interest has been usurped in favor of hidden, unregulated, anti-democratic agglomerations of capital, intended to further the interests of those feeding and controlling these secret pipelines of power and wealth.
Class warfare in this country is nothing new, but its synergy with private government and digital surveillance – with ever-more militarized policing to keep everyone in line – is creating a landscape of wealth extraction, privateering and repression that is totalitarian in the literal sense of the word.
If we’re going to continue to think of ourselves as a constitutional republic, then it’s time to have a conversation about how that is undermined by behavior such as this, and how all of it is fundamentally seditious.
Michael, forget the time for conversation, it’s time for revolution!
Thanks, but I’ll pass.
Putting aside how premature it is to call for revolution when most people have no idea what is happening to them, in both my personal experience and readings of history, those insisting on revolution are often just as disfigured by the will to power as the Overclass. They’re just operating in a smaller sandbox.
History shows us that bloody revolutions—-in any name for any reason—almost always lead to a worse tyranny. All one has to do is look at Stalin and Mao as examples. Someone who has good intentions may start the bloody rebellion but along the way someone more ruthless usually grabs the power and gets rid of the person who started it making that person into a martyr who ends up as a statue in town squares with airports, bridges and schools named after them.
Reblogged this on onewomansjournal and commented:
Rahm, Duncan, and Obama…WOW! On the road again… Going fishing for $$$$$.
worthless crooks.
They are are!
The wheels of blind justice in the United States are often slow sometimes taking decades to right a wrong. We can only hope that it will not take that long and will not be swept under the rug by the neo-liberal political machine that Emmanuel (and Obama) are part of.
After all the neo-conservative and neo-liberal political movements started as one out of the University of Chicago that later split to infected both major political parties.
Maybe this video will help us learn more about the enemy, neo-liberalism. The video talks about the three schools of neo-liberalism:
1. Neo-Marxist: Focus on upward redistribution of economic resources from the poor and working classless to elites.
2. Neo-Foucaultian: Focus on neoliberalism as a cultural project in which market rationalities become embodied by self-regulated, self-responsiblized subjects.
3. State Transformation: Focus on neoliberalism as a new mode of statecraft entailing a shift from the welfare state to the carceral state.
Once we understand these three schools of neoliberalism, then we understand the reason for Obama’s Race to the Top and the Common Core standardized testing. These programs are not intended to improve education. They are intended to destroy public education as the neoliberals restructure American society, culture and laws to fit their political thinking and agendas.
In conclusion, we are at war with neo-liberalism/neo-conservatism (different sides of the same coin), and it took them several decades to infiltrate both political parties and move into leadership positions.
Therefore, stop trying to figure out why this is happening and admit we are at war and fight back accordingly through the power of the pen.
Who knows, the end of this war may lead to America’s second bloody Civil War. If we can’t win in the political sphere, eventually it will move to bullets and blood because once most Americans are aware of what’s going on many will not go alone with the neo-liberal agenda and they will resist. We are already seeing this happening through verbal protests with the Tea Party people.
What I don’t understand is why the Koch brothers are supporting what Obama and Emmanuel are doing because the Koch brothers are supposed to be libertarians. Maybe they are just stupid libertarians isolated behind their wealth and out of touch with what’s going on beyond their private security shield. In fact, the Koch brothers were behind funding and foundation of the Tea Party movement. I’m scratching my head on confusion over wast they are doing. What they say they believe often doesn’t match their political contributions to candidates.
“Therefore, stop trying to figure out why this is happening and admit we are at war and fight back accordingly through the power of the pen.”
Lloyd, the pen doesn’t affect the likes of the Koch brothers and the other capitalist exploiters.
“Political power grows out of the barrel of the gun”
-Mao
Don’t forget what Gandhi accomplished without bullets.
He didn’t bother to change the minds of the Imperialists of the British Empire who ruled over India. He went to the people and mobilized the support of a nation. It worked even if Gandhi was assassinated for other reasons after India was free of the UK and was governing itself.
Therefore, the pen should be our first weapon of choice and we should use that pen to spread word of what’s happening and educate enough people to create a movement that will be heard around the world.
I read once that it only takes 5% of the people to bring about change. In America that means about 16 million people who know what’s going on and who are protesting—making their voices heard in the streets and via the Internet.
With most election victories in the United States being razor thin, that 16 million voting as a block could make a huge difference. Look what the Tea Party has accomplished with its 5%.
This year we hold a national Congressional election. Voter turnout in the last Congressional election was 90.6 million, and 6 million could decide many elections across the country if informed voters knew who to vote for to defeat the neo-liberals at the voting booth or any candidate who doesn’t support the public schools. That’s why lists like the one in Texas are vital.
It’s too bad we don’t have a list for every state and every election.
Is it just me, or do most of your comments make some call for violence?
FLERP:
People who haven’t been to war are quick to call for bullets to solve problems. I would be surprised if “Communist Teacher” ever wore a military uniform and was a combat vet.
Granted, the further from home that violence occurs, the less people feel threatened by it. However, one needn’t have worn “a military uniform” or have been “a combat vet” to know the horrors of violence and war, as a lot of us who’ve just lived in a country under military attack and/or terrorism also know very well.
Additionally, I think that many of us have learned from history that Communist regimes are vulnerable to corruption and spawn elitism, as well as totalitarian rule. Why anyone today would think Communism is a viable alternative to our current nightmare is way beyond my comprehension.
If revolution were at hand, the primary aim for many would be a more equitable society, so with its dismal track record, Communism would be the last thing most of us would be fighting to achieve. A lot of us believe very strongly in equity and think it can be best attained through Democratic Socialism, as exemplified in the Nordic countries.
This is happening throughout the nation — not sure how it’s even constitutional.
State and local govts compete to attract employers/businesses by offering the employers/businesses $ — usually reduced property tax rates but sometimes outright govt grants — if the employer/business relocates or opens a facility in the jurisdiction.
Of course, once Govt A makes this kind of offer, then Govts B through Z come under intense pressure to make similar offers and they usually succumb to this pressure in order to attract the employers/businesses.
The effect of this practice is that, at the end of the day, employers/businesses have more $ and state/local govts (and/or state/local taxpayers) have less $ than they would have had if this practice did not exist.
It is obviously bad public policy to allow state/local govts to bid for employers/businesses. Not only does this result in a transfer of $ from taxpayers to employers/businesses, but this transfer occurs largely outside the knowledge of the tax-paying public + it encourages employers/businesses to make business decisions re location/relocation based on tax considerations rather than on market factors — something that even conservative/free-market types should strongly oppose.
Perhaps, as an attorney, I should know the answer to this, but — why don’t these special deals for particular employers/businesses violate the equal-protection requirements in the federal/state constitutions? If Business A and Business B are each operating in the state or county and the state or county is taxing Business A at a higher rate than it is taxing Business B, the state/county is violating Business A’s right to equal protection under the law. Seems like Business A should be able to go to court and obtain a judgment ordering the state/county to tax the two businesses at the same rate.
One would assume that the rates are the same but some businesses have “credits” to pay them off or sell to another business.
The thing that bothers me most in NJ is that some of the “big” businesses are given tax money to relocate in different regions in NJ!
It is human nature that if one business is given “credits” that any other business will use the same threatening tactic to get “credits” or move. Also, what is to keep these companies from doing the same thing when their “credits” run out? I guess the politicians just consider that their incumbents problem.
Lawyer,I think you’ve hit on a great point – has anyone ever challenged these tax breaks because they violate the equal protection clause?
In Illinois, corporate welfare has run amok. Illinois offers businesses the EDGE tax credit, which allows businesses to keep for themselves the state income tax withheld from their employees’
paychecks. The state income taxes employees pay which should go for public services is instead funneled into the pockets of for-profit corporations.
This is so absurd, so wrong; taking hard-earned money out of working people’s pockets to pay their bosses! When I explained this to a very conservative teacher at our school, he couldn’t believe it. He continues to believe corporations are overtaxed and supports Bruce Rauner for Governor, although since our conversation my fellow colleague has asked me a few times for the name of the tax credit. Perhaps there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
BTW, Mayor Rhambo Snake Skin also is supporting Rauner. Rauner is the billionaire Republican candidate who admires RW governors Scott Walker, Rick Scott and Mitch Daniels.
I have to wonder how long the American people will tolerate the abuse by the 1 percent ruling class. The sad thing is that just and peaceful solutions are waiting on the other side of the gilded curtain drawn by the hedge fund managers and their ilk, with their political puppets manning the curtain strings. History has shown that once a person becomes hungry enough and has nothing to lose, things get real ugly. The plutocrats seem to have forgotten the concept of enlightened self-interest. Perhaps the modern-day descendents of Madame Guillotine may need to offer them a refresher course.
David Sirota should follow the money. For example, John Rogers is founder and CEO of Ariel Investments and a long time best bud of Arne Duncan, as well as Obama supporter…
The former Emanuel-appointed school board member of the Chicago Public Schools and current Obama-appointed US Secretary of Commerce, Penny Pritzker, did not need money for her billionaire family’s Hyde Park Hyatt hotel. TIF funds are supposed to be earmarked for blighted communities, while due to the University of Chicago, Hyde Park is anything but blighted. It has long had a flourishing commercial district precisely in the area where the new Hyatt was erected, Harper Court. I spent a lot of time shopping there in years past, but I won’t shop there anymore, because the pubic parking lot is gone, displaced by this monstrous Hyatt complex. So other than limited street parking, my understanding is that the choice now is to park inside the Hyatt, but I refuse to hand out one cent of my hard earned working-poor income to Penny-Pinching-Pilfer-from-the-Paupers-Pritzker. (Someone really needs to investigate exactly how billionaires are permitted to take over a public parking lot on prime city real estate.)
This is truly stealing from the poor in order to engorge the wealthy. It’s thoroughly disgusting how similar the greedy, self-serving neo-liberal Democrats are to the GOP.
One more thing. Not long ago, when Chicago’s historic non-profit Hull House, which administered several Head Start programs in various low income neighborhoods, was drowning in debt, community members appealed to Penny Pritzker and her family for help in bailing them out. The Pritzkers ignored the pleas. Hull House and all of their Head Start programs were shut down, even though there have never been enough Head Start slots to meet the needs of children in poverty in this city.
That’s how committed Obama and his billionaire cronies are to Universal PreK for low income children when they don’t stand to make a profit off it.
I shudder to think of all the preschool aged children (ages 3 AND 4 in Illinois) who will receive services in unregulated military-style charters, such as KIPP, with its padded closet for disobedient young children. Sadly, it seems inevitable when politicians aim to funnel Universal PreK tax dollars to non-educator charter profiteers and non-profiteers, as indicated in NY.
In an attempt to cook the books before the teachers strike, Rahmpulstiltskin made a large advance payment to the Chicago police for work done in the schools. The rank and file didn’t ask for the payment. It depleted the funds in the account that would have been used to pay the teachers the contractually agreed upon (by Daly) raises so Rahmpulstiltskin could cry poor and void that part of the contract.
Ben Joravsky who writes for the Chicago Reader has been shining the sunlight on the TIF scam in Chicago for years now. Search the Bleader archive for all the articles. http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/mayor-emanuel-taps-shrinking-tif-funds/Content?oid=6984977 also http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/jean-claude-brizard-chicago-public-schools/Content?oid=3724688 just for starters.
Here’s a link to the story on the payments to Chicago POlice Dept. http://www.ctunet.com/blog/cps-lies-about-police-dept-payments-to-void-teachers-4-raises
Teachers are an easy target – they do not seem to mess with fire, police, prison guards. In Chicago – it is sexist – most teachers are women, it is ageist – it is against veteran teachers, and worse of all – it is racist – many are black teachers working with minority students.
Here is a story about firefighter’s pensions in California: http://www.npr.org/2012/12/26/168059128/firefighters-deal-with-community-backlash
And another story about fire and police pensions from the other side of the country in Rhode Island: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125061895
The mostly female teacher workforce is easy pickins, but other public service workers are next on the agenda of neo-liberals in both parties. Of course, the high salaries and pensions of politicians, who are legislating austerity for everyone else, are being spared from the hatchet. I think this underscores the importance of educating the masses and the critical role of democracy in voting these self-serving hypocrites out of office.
I think the major problem with public empolyee pensions has been that the folks making the promises have not been the folks responsible for making the payments. A defined contribution retirement system like the one Dr. Ravitch has could offer many benefits to teachers and to the taxpayers that pay the teachers as well.
Mayor Rahm and his allies have consistently derailed
efforts to have a school board elected by the public:
http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20130913/downtown/ald-arenas-call-for-elected-school-board-derailed-by-city-council
In Chicago, the appointed school board is made up entirely
of businessman with ZERO background in education. They
actually have voted to divert ed money—that could have
gone for lower class size, libraries, full curriculum including
the arts, P.E., music, etc.— into TIF funding for
subsidize hotel building and a stadium for a private
Catholic university (De Paul).
And of course, they voted a year
ago to close 50 schools. An internal document from
TFA later leaked a plan to open 50 charter schools—staffed
by TFA, in place of unionized teachers, as had been
the case formerly—in their place.
Like New York City’s PEP, Chicago’s “school board”
operates like Saddam Hussein’s
parliament, rubber stamping the wishes of the Mayor
and his stooge “CEO” of schools.
Well, the voters weighed in in a non-binding referendum
that they voted overwhelmingly that their desire was
to have an elected school board like they
have in Los Angeles.
Well, even though 14 members of Chicago’s City Council
have signed a petition to have an elected board, Rahm’s
allies have, for the umpteenth time, blocked the efforts to
have an elected board, where citizen-taxpayers control
public school via an elected school board.
In my original hometown of Chicago, there is a
fiasco known as “Safe Passages”, or walking
routes that had to be created after the massive
closing of over 50 schools—in spite of
massive community protests to keep them open.
One of the big reasons for the protests,
but not the only one…the biggest being the
opposition to overall privatization of schools…
was the threat to the safety of children who
would now be walking new, longer, and more
dangerous routes to school.
As with prior mass closings, the unelected
Chicago School Board was warned about how
children from closed schools would have to
cross gang borders, and walk through unsafe
areas to get to the schools to which they
were assigned, with these schools now
no longer within their neighborhood.
The CPS officials pooh-poohed such
concerns (as did Michelle Rhee when
she did something similar in D.C.
that led to similar, but less-well-known
results.)
Well, we all know what happened in Chicago
to Fenger high school student Derrion Albert in
2009—again after the same warnings
against school closings (executed by then
CEO, and current Sec. of Ed, Arne Duncan)—
as Albert walked to school on his new and
longer route:
http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=914
This video of Albert being beaten to death
by teens swinging 2″-by-4″ wooden clubs.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=fb1_1254077314
was and still is on-line for all to see…
the murder directly attributed to school closings
and his being forced to walk longer distances,
crossing gang border, and walking through
dangerous areas.
Well, after the 50 (or 51) schools that were closed
last summer, the Chicago Public Schools announced
that they would have “Safe Passages” routes manned
by unarmed, barely-trained “security personnel” making
minimum wage. It was too expensive to hire actual
trained, armed security guards, or off-duty police.
I kid you not.
Predictably, this has been a disaster, with masses of “security
personnel” either walking off the job mid-shift, or being
totally useless in preventing problems.
The corporate reform’s defense of this reached its nadir when Alexander Russo blogged that a shooting that occurred on one of the “Safe Passages” routes didn’t “count” because it occurred after the time frame recommended for walking to and from school. Never mind that kids often stay late, or come early to get tutored or to participate in sports or other extra-curricular activities.
For this gem from corporate reform shill Russo, go to the top COMMENT of this article:
http://chicagoist.com/2013/09/04/workers_hired_for_cps_safe_passage.php
ALEXANDER RUSSO: “a ‘Safe Passages’ shooting really only counts if it happens while kids are going to and from school, not on the weekends or overnight or even during the day.”
which prompted this reply two comments later:
KEVIN_ROBINSON: “Only in Chicago do we have a set of conditions to determine when a ‘shooting really only counts.’ ”
Well, this was all a long set-up a later incident. A 15 year-old high school girl walking along one of the “Safe Passages” routes was just pulled into an alley and gang-raped: (from George Schmidt’s SUBSTANCE)
(This occurred at 6:00 am, 30 minutes before any minimim wage “security personell” were on duty. She has to get there this early to make a long bus ride to her new school)
http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=4690§ion=Article
Thanks Rahm! And also thanks to Chicago Public Schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennet, cheerleader-from-afar Arne Duncan, and all the sell-out aldermen/alderwomen who backed this schools’ closings and “Safe Passages” fiasco…
… and also thanks to the Chicago Public Schools Security Chief, Jadine Chou , who has no police or security experience, but was still appointed by Rahm Emanuel & his puppet School Board in 2011, and who refuses to comment on the recent gang-rape (at the end of the article BELOW).
There’s blood on all of their hands.
Here’s the entirety of the text:
————————–
Rape of high school student along ‘Safe Passage’ route enflames anger on Northwest Side
Jean Schwab – December 21, 2013
“Chicago Public Schools officials haven’t found the dollars to relieve overcrowding on the city’s vast and growing Northwest Side, and they continue to promote the expansion of charter schools in communities that have decisively rejected them, but they continue to claim that closing schools and shuffling kids around is OK as long as CPS has a policy in place called ‘Safe Passage.’
“Well, it didn’t work that way for one 15-year-old high school girl the same week the Board of Education met. She was raped on the way to school during the dark early morning hours, a danger that parents and others had warned the Board against when tens of thousands protested against the massive school closings pushed by schools ‘Chief Executive Office’ Barbara Byrd-Bennett a year ago.
“Part of the crowd at the community meeting demanding answers about the “Belmont Cragin Morning Rape”. Substance photo by Jean Schwab.The girl was dragged into a yard, beaten and raped on her way to school.
“And a community meeting showed another outrage for a part of the city’s that has been almost unanimous in its opposition to several policies of the Emanuel administration and its school board over the past year or two.
“Residents of the Belmont – Cragin community say they are fed up with the violence in their neighborhood, and they are demanding action. The residents say they are traumatized by the brutal, sexual assault of a teen girl Tuesday, December 17, 2013, the day before the meeting of the Chicago Board of Education.
“Police say the attack was at 6:00 am, about 30 minutes before the Safe Passage Route workers began patrolling Fullerton Avenue near Long Street. The girl was on her way to catch a bus to go to high school, which officials have failed to identify. The identity of the victim has also been kept a secret.
“One of the most powerful and consistent voices for the city’s real public schools comes from Alderman Nick Sposato, above. Speaking to the community meeting, he told the audience that the police, like the teachers, had seen their ranks cut by Mayor Rahm Emanuel. (Substance photo by Jean Schwab.)”
“James Rudyk, director of the Northwest Side Housing Center, in the 5300 block of West Diversey, stated, “There were 20 violent crimes reported in the community between November 7 and December 7, including three sexual assaults between Cicero and Austin. We need extra police around neighboring schools and Hanson Park.” The area includes several public schools, including Prosser High School (currently under attack by a new charter school proposed for a block from Prosser) and the massive Hanson Park Stadium.
“A major meeting meeting, organized by the Northwest Side Housing Center, and others, drew around 200 members of the community, elected officials, and representatives of the Chicago Public Schools. As usual, CPS Chief Executive Officer Barbara Byrd Bennett refused to attend the meeting.
“Chicago Police Supt. Gerry McCarthy assured the community that the police are actively involved in solving this crime. McCarthy, along with other police officials, urged people to speak up if they have information, “no matter how small,” that might help solve this crime. Also present were 25th District Police Commander Navarro, State Representative Luis Arroyo, State Representative Toni Berrios, Alderman Ariel Reboyras (30th ward), Alderman Ray Suarez (31) who is also the Vice Mayor, and Alderman Nicholas Sposato (Ward 36).
“Alderman Reboyras encouraged the community to ‘get up if they hear a noise,’ find out what is happening, and call the police. ‘Get involved, pick up the phone and call the police. Talk to the neighbors and get involved,’ he said.
“Alderman Nicholas Sposato said he does not blame the police and has attended CAP meetings. Like McCarthy, he said he urges everyone to get involved. Sposato, who has also criticized CPS for stripping schools of resources, said he feels that the local police commander doesn’t have the resources he needs.
“ ‘We need to tell people that we need more police officers,’ Sposato stated.
“Community residents offered a variety of comments about why the problems have been growing. One of the reasons came from people stating that some people are “illegal” and afraid of the police. Others said they are afraid of speaking out for fear of the gangs. Gang activity in the area has been growing, many residents have been noting.
“Others stated concerns about the ‘Safe Passage’ route and police.
“In rapid fire, residents talks about what they saw and experienced.
” ‘I’m tired of this shit. I didn’t find out about this from the media, I looked out the window. I live around the corner from the police. I call and they spend a half hour to get there. Why do we need cameras to give tickets? We need cameras around the schools to protect our children. Safe Passage Routes don’t come until 6:45 am. High school students leave home at 5:30…’
“The powerful statements poured out. Either the residents did not say their names, or I did not hear them.
PHOTO:
“Jadine Chou, above, is the “Chief Officer for Security and Safety” for Chicago Public Schools. Like other appointees since the beginning of the administration of Rahm Emaneul, Chou has been slowly decimating the ranks of veteran security staff at CPS and replacing them with privatized underpaid volunteers, like the “Safe Passage” people. Chou spoke to the community meeting, promised to be back for another meeting on January 24, and refused to return phone calls from Substance reporter Jean Schwab. Substance photo by Jean Schwab. One resident said she has been victimized four times but there was no police follow-up.
“Commander Navarro stated that the case load for policemen is heavy and the resident should call area north with report number and the name of the detective assigned to a case. Navarro stated that there are “a lot of burglaries” in this city right now.
“Another resident stated that there are a lot of police around the high schools, but no officers at Hanson Park. There is gang activity at Hanson Park, she said at the meeting, and she would like to be able to take children to the park.
“A resident stated that the police are not the problem.
” ‘It’s our mayor’s problem. He needs to get more police on the streets,’ was a common refrain. During the same week, Rahm Emanuel was using taxpayer money to host media events and send out press releases about how many new ‘educational’ programs he was setting up in the parks. Residents laugh at those claims when most of the afternoons and evenings the parks are taken over by the gangs and there are not enough police to stop their activity.
“Liz Kirk has lived in the neighborhood for ten years and is against the proposal for a charter school on Grand Ave. across from Prosser High School. The Chicago Board of Education is planning to approve another ‘campus’ of the Noble Network of Charter Schools, which routinely kicks out the students who have ‘failed’ so it can continue to promote itself as a successful school. Where do the students kicked out by Noble Street wind up? In the city’s real high schools.
” ‘That would put 900 kids on that corner,’ she said. ‘The traffic on that corner is already tied up,’ She said C.K. Johnson sends her son to Lane Tech and used to live in the Belmont Cragin neighborhood.
“ ‘There are no lights in the parking lot at Lane Tech at 6:00 am in the morning. The students come home from Lane Tech at 6:00 pm. It is dark. Our children need to be protected. Our children need to be safe. I don’t blame the police, I blame CPS — Safe Passage is a joke.’
“But CPS officials won’t answer specific questions about ‘Safe Passage.’ Jadine Chou (the CPS Security Chief, who has no police experience, but was give the job by Rahm’s Board when it took office in 2011) promised to come back to the community on Jan. 25, 2014, at 10:00 am, when the community will meet again. She refused to talk with Substance on the night of the meeting and did not return phone calls from this reporter.”
Chicago has played with pension funds for years. When I resigned as a CPS teacher in 1980, there were already rumors that the Chicago Teachers Pension Fund was not that solid. So I took my pension and went elsewhere. We also never, to my knowledge, had an elected School Board. The members are chosen by the Mayor and serve at his command. I attended a City Council Meeting where TIFF was discussed. It was easy to see which Aldermen were serving his/her constituents and which were serving the Mayor. I attended the Education Committee of the City Council. Parents came to talk about an Elected School Board but they were not allowed to bring the subject up. Somehow the Friday before this meeting, they turned in their request only ten minutes too late to get on the upcoming Education Committee agenda. The Chair of this committee, Alderman Joe Moore, would not be flexible and allow a discussion on such an important issue. The bureaucracy of CPS has been a problem for years. It just seems to be getting worse. At least finally more and more is being exposed and parents, teachers and others who care about public education are fighting back.
Of course, Look into his EYES…shifty, shifty. Rahm-bo is part of the unholy trio….fill in the blanks…