Last week I sat down with Alderman Ricardo Muñoz of the 22nd Ward. Muñoz has long been considered one of the most independent aldermen on the City Council. The 22nd ward has a long tradition of independent politics, beginning with Jesus Garcia's election to the city council as part of the Harold Washington coalition. The 22nd Ward IPO (independent political organization) is the last one standing after years of pushback from the Regular Democratic Organization, Mayor Daley and his allies. The interview was fairly wide ranging, covering Muñoz's political history, ward politics, and Obama's outreach to Latino voters. Most interesting is his response to my question about his support for the Ogden/Pulaski TIF, given the current suspicion over TIFs and Ben Jovarsky's piece in the Reader on the Ogden/Pulaski TIF March 6th.

Lesniewski: What has contributed to your ability to remain independent?

Muñoz: When I first got involved here in the 22nd ward it was specifically because I liked the politics of the group here. When I graduated from college in '87 and moved back into the city, I lived in the 22nd ward and I got involved with the candidacies and campaigns of Jesus Garcia. I liked what I saw because they had founded a group that called itself the 22nd Ward Independent Political Organization, who's not necessarily an obstructionist, not necessarily anti-everything, but we tended to be independent of what's commonly known as the Machine. The Regular Democratic Machine doesn't have a great history with the Latino community and Latino elected officials, because they like to get folks elected and they don't let them speak their minds, whether it's an issue of access to education, a safe and affordable neighborhood. The politics were just right for me when I came out of college and started working for Alderman Garcia, and since becoming an alderman, I'm very fond of saying I vote with the mayor 96 percent of the time. And you know, 4 percent, that makes me a radical! A crazy lefty, but it's that 4 percent that matters, 'cause that's where we're creating accountability at the budget level for the city. That's where we demand that Latinos and African American women get their fair share of contracts. That's when we and our friends in labor demand that if a company's gonna get subsidies from the city of Chicago. If they're gonna get breaks, if they're gonna come into the city to make their profits, they should be paying a living wage. I end up voting with the mayor 96 percent of the time anyway, it's that 4 percent that makes me that crazy liberal.

Lesniewski: Is there a range of issues on which you can act independently before the mayor says stop?

Muñoz: I've never operated on the basis that you have to be careful of the mayor's reaction to your actions. I've always operated under the assumption that if it's good for the neighborhood, that's what you do. Clear example was the story of the construction of the new high school at 31st and Kostner. In 1979 when I was in 8th grade, my 8th grade math class was in the hallway. When I became alderman in January of '93, that math class was still in a hallway, so we made it our mission — not my mission, collectively as a neighborhood — to advocate for new schools. Between 1993-1997, we built five new grammar schools, all in little village, all within two miles of each other, all preK-8, all brand new. The most new schools of any other neighborhood in the state.

In 1997, we set our sights on building a new high school. Late that year, the property commonly known as Edible Oils — because that's the name of the company on 31st and Kostner — went up for sale. So I immediately called up then-president Gary Chico and said, "Hey, we have a site for a school." That was November of '97. By January of '98, the board passed the resolution authorizing the construction of three new schools: North Side Prep, Walter Payton, and Little Village. By April of '98, the property was purchased, which means we were well on our way, and I had talked to the mayor, and this meant this was a good thing. And then, Paul Vallas began to drag his feet, because in '98, Jesus Garcia had just been defeated for state senate by a machine candidate that had no name recognition or electoral history. They came very close in '98 to beating my state rep, in 2000 they beat us. What used to be here an office of three elected officials — alderman, state rep and state senator — was now just me, the alderman. The political side of Paul Vallas began to say if we do the high school we'd never be able to defeat alderman Muñoz. They slowed it down until 2000 and 2001 we got extremely upset, and some of our supporters did the hunger strike, and then forced the board after a 19-day strike to agree that the school could get built. Never in my mind did I think, "If we do a hunger strike, what's the mayor gonna think?" I always said, "We need the high school, they're slowing it up. Who's our target: Paul Vallas and the Mayor." If that upsets them, so be it, but at the end of the day, we got a 300,000 square foot $68 million building that's beautiful.

So being independent means sometimes you incur the wrath of Daley. Every election — I've been here since '93. So in '95 I had a Daley-backed opponent, in '99 I had two Daley-backed opponents. In '03, I had two Daley-backed opponents who, because they made mistakes with petitions, we were able to kick off the ballot. I was unopposed — that was a happy year. In '07 there were two Daley-backed opponents. They get pictures with the mayor, the mayor does appearances with them, the mayor's friends give them money, and that's the price we pay.

Lesniewski: What are the consequences for you for your politically independent stands? Is that the main price you pay — strong opponents running against you?

Muñoz: If it wasn't for them, I'd just be running against riff raff, it would just be neighborhood riff raff. Just wannabes, but every time except for '03 where they got sloppy with their petitions, we've had Daley-backed opponents. And it's sad, because I think at the end of the day the mayor loves this city as much as I love this city, it's just the fact that he and his operation want 100 percent support, which I can't give them. I can only give them 96 percent.

Lesniewski: With the HDO seemingly on the ropes, do you see other organizations bubbling to surface to challenge independent Latino politicians?

Muñoz: The mayor's operation is gonna continue to be strong whether you call it HDO, whether you call it the Southwest Side Democrats, whether you call it the 22nd Ward Real Democrats. Call it whatever you want, the mayor's operation will always be strong. Now, they're a weakened organization specifically because of the hiring scandals and the fundraising scandals, but at the end of the day, they still control the city, and the mayor continues to be the most powerful democrat in the state — in this region! I mean, when folks are even considering running for president, there's four or five people you call in the country; Rich Daley's one of them. That's before you even talk to your wife about it!

Lesniewski: Moving nationally, there's been a lot of talk about Obama and Latinos. Why do you see the disconnect between Obama and Latinos?

Muñoz: I think it has more to do with a function of the campaign making an early mistake, which they learned from real quick, starting in Nevada, January 19th. What the Obama operation didn't anticipate was the fact that the Clinton name is a brand. It's kind of like McDonald's. The reason you walk into a McDonald's in the middle of nowhere is because you know that quarter-pounder will taste the same as the one across from your house. It's branding, so the Clinton brand has some significance in the Latino community, because folks remember that. The Obama campaign didn't pay much attention to it. They thought because Barack had friends in the Latino community in Chicago and because Barack was good on the original state of Illinois DREAM Act before it was popular in the mid-'90s, because Barack was a sponsor of the driver's license bill in 1996-97, back before it was an issue like it is nowadays, that once you tell people that everybody would be cool. But that wasn't the case. Latinos outside Illinois remember one and only one thing — Senator Obama voted for the Wall, when he had promised he wouldn't. So, that left a bad taste in everybody's mouth. The campaign didn't realize that until — I was in Nevada that election, January 19th with the staffers who said "hey, we've got a problem here." That is when they shifted gears, they started spending money, they started doing Latino media. In the Arizona primary, they spent almost a million bucks on TV, not to mention all the radio they did.

Lesniewski: There's that video with the mariachi song, right?

Muñoz: There's about five different mariachi songs now. That's independently created though, I'm talking about the things they paid for and looked to do. I mean, they've been asking me to be a surrogate all over the country. I was in Ohio, I was in Nevada, New Hampshire, I went down to Texas for a couple days, and not just me but there's a bunch of us going around telling our stories about who Barack is. So, I think that was just a misstep by the campaign that they've corrected since.

Lesniewski: It's interesting how the media frames the issue in terms of race.

Muñoz: Race is an issue, you have old school Latinos who grew up in a segregated society, who to this day, like the older woman in Texas who said, "well Latinos ain't voting for a Black man." She thought that was perfectly cool to say, when in fact it isn't, because she's still living in the Fifties. It's generational. There's a friend of mine who's a representative in Texas who is for Barack, and his dad is his state senator, and is for Hillary. He's 60-something, he's 30-something — it's generational.

Lesniewski: Getting back to the local scene, given the potential for reduced immigration and gentrification, what do you see as the future of Little Village?

Muñoz: Little Village has been and will continue to be a port of entry. Aqui es donde llegamos, where people arrive to. It's a challenge for us 'cause we're constantly educating, we're constantly teaching English. As soon as you teach somebody English they move out to Summit; as soon as someone becomes a citizen they move down to Midway. So it's difficult, it has been and will continue to be. I'm proud of our housing policy, where we basically tell folks if you own a property, if you own a lot, you won't be able to build a five-unit condo, because five units means five families, 14 kids, seven cars, and it's already the most densely populated ward in the city. I mean, we've got more bodies per square acre than even downtown, simply because it's a working class neighborhood with a lot of two-flats and three-flats, where people are doubling up. The affordability issue is key to making sure this neighborhood continues to become affordable, and I do that by simply putting a limit on development. When my developer friends come to me and say, "Hey alderman, I've got three lots in your ward, can I build 14 units?" I say, "No, you get two per lot." They say, "I'm not gonna make any money!" And I say, "That's not my fault," 'cause you build 14 units that's 14 families, that's 24 kids, that's 19 cars, where are people gonna park? My schools are crowded already. Even though we built five new grammar schools, we're still at 110, 112 percent capacity, so it just doesn't make sense to be overbuilding. That's why I don't understand why some of my colleagues, specifically on the far North and South Sides, allow these monstrosities to be built. You have neighborhoods like Belmont-Cragin where the schools are crowded, and the alderman are allowing on two lots, nine units to go up. Like where these kids gonna go to school? You go to Lincoln Park and everybody's crying about parking, and you see a sign "coming soon 16 units." Where are those 16 units gonna park? It's just common sense. I'm accused of being anti-development, I say, "I'm not anti-development, I'm pro-neighborhood."

Lesniewski: We have similar debates in Hyde Park about density and development.

Muñoz: Yeah, I mean, I have a friend who's on the board of a school down in Hyde Park, and they own a lot, I believe it's like 300x300, and they wanna build a 14-15 story condo unit, and they say they just want the best and highest use. And I say, "Yeah, but that's for your profit line." You know, if you build 14 floors and there's three units per floor, do the math! That's 45 units, where those kids gonna go to school, where those drivers gonna park? And granted, not everybody drives, let's say 70 percent of them drive, you're still talking about 35-36 cars in a neighborhood you're already driving five blocks to find parking. Folks always say me, me, me, me, me, but it's my job as an alderman to say, "Hey look, you might make more money if you put nine units on two lots, but you're only getting two units." That means that instead of 22 extra kids, we have seven off this property.

Lesniewski: Why did you support the Ogden/Pulaski TIF?

Muñoz: I supported that TIF because TIFs were originally... let me back off... A TIF is like a hammer and a chisel. It can be used to sculpt a beautiful piece of art, or it could be used to break a lot of windows. I'm of the opinion that some TIF's in Chicago are breaking a lot of windows, because they're being over-utilized for the wrong reasons. If you drive around on the Ogden/Pulaski TIF, you'll see that 30 percent of the land is vacant, you'll see that 40 percent of the commercial space is unrented, you'll see that of the existing housing stock in that TIF, 90 percent of it is over 80 years old, and 50 percent of it needs help, whether it's a new porch, a new window, or a new roof. So that TIF qualifies as blighted, because it needs help, that area.

The part that's in the 22nd ward includes a site known as the CTA bus-barn, which is now vacant at Cermak and Springfield, we'd like to do something public there. The only way you pay for a public project is with tax money, so if there's a way we can take some of the TIF money or future proceeds from the TIF, and finance either a senior center or a park... We still don't know what it's going to be, but I want it to stay public. I've gotten visits from a number of developers with offers, one a month in the last three years, who come to me and say as alderman, we're gonna go talk to the CTA and we're gonna buy the bus-barn, because we wanna put a commercial center here. Because this neighborhood is so densely populated, there's very little public property, so as the alderman, I say no, I won't sell it. And if they do sell it, I won't grant the zoning, so don't even try it, because that's my responsibility. The more we sell off public land, the less public benefit we have, so we won't have the senior center, we won't have the park, we won't have a running track. Something public, something that the public can benefit from. Because there's an industrial corridor between Pulaski and the city limits on Ogden, I'd like to see if the TIF can help create some jobs there. So, for me, I'm very focused on what I want, I want public benefit, and creating some jobs. Now I know there's some political and community dialogue going on in the 24th ward as to what intent is, because the TIF is huge, and personally I don't like big TIF's. TIF's should be project-driven, in this case, I have projects. The bus-barn in one of them, I wanna use TIF money to fix the bus-barn, make it a public benefit.

[As for] what Alderman Dixon's doing in her ward...

Lesniewski:Was Alderman Dixon's house listed on the TIF property list?

Muñoz: No, it gets kinda tricky because in 1996 when all Pilsen was gonna be TIFed, then senator Garcia introduced TIF legislation that required any new TIFs to do a housing impact study. The housing impact study is not an acquisition list. It's a study that's looks at the TIF and says if the intent of the TIF is to create commercial space, and we have a little commercial space here and a bunch of houses next door, there's the possibility that those houses could be displaced by a larger commercial development. The possibility. Not that it's gonna happen, that's why it's called an impact study. It might happen. If the TIF is an industrial TIF, well, we have an industrial tenant over on 31st and Millard, and he needs parking, so the homes next door to it might be impacted if he applies for TIF money to get a parking lot for his employees or whatever.

So Senator Garcia did that back then to make sure it was public record, and what could happen if it goes in that direction. So in the housing impact study was a number of lists — and this is where it gets real tricky 'cause this was in the transition of the '07 election, when Alderman Dixon was challenging incumbent Alderman Chandler. If I were a betting man, I'd bet that her address got on there as political harassment to her candidacy by the Chandler forces. I can't prove it, but I'd bet that that happened. She becomes the alderman, and then it becomes her problem, so she corrected it by immediately taking it off the list. That was political gamesmanship because I was not the incumbent; I'm the incumbent now so we're doing it this way.

And some political forces were misinforming people and saying "look — out of the 8300 housing units in the TIF, almost 20 percent of them are gonna be taken from us 'cause they're on this list." I went to several community meetings in the 24th ward and in the 22nd ward and said, "Look, this is a housing impact study, this just says that if this is the vision, if this happens, this could happen. If you really wanna know, there is an acquisition list, these are properties that we really wanna buy." Of these 45 or 50, there might be 5 percent vacant, one of them was owner occupied, but the owner wanted to sell. He came to the city and to the alderman's office and said, "Hey, I wanna put mine, 'cause I'm outta here, I'm 85 years old, I'm not gonna stick around. Instead of putting it on the market and waiting 6 months, if you guys wanna just buy it from me because you're buying these four lots anyway." You know, but there were political forces who are anti-alderman Dixon who are using documents to scare people. I mean, I had people come in my office who were saying, "If you approve this TIF, the city's taking my house," I said look, I only take people's homes if I'm building a park, a library or a school. They say "Oh, I live across the street from a school," so then they got nothing to worry about, you know? I don't know what Alderman Dixon's policy is, but that's my policy. They go "they're gonna take there homes" but nobody's going to take their homes. And, you know, let's say we do need your home, the city pays very well. When we took some homes for the expansion of (Toman Branch?) Library, we took 5 homes. Those property owners did very well, because you get paid your fair-market value. If it has to be done by a judge, he does three appraisals, and takes the average, and then you get paid moving costs, and you get paid relocation costs, so it's pretty generous.

Lesniewski: You see this TIF more like the 53rd Street TIF, with a strongly, organized community and vigilant alderman?

Muñoz: Yeah, I do.

Lesniewski: Thanks, Alderman Muñoz for your time and your candor.