Nor should they. I'm not convinced Mark Kirk's letter to the Palin people constituted a request for an endorsement, but his campaign certainly made a pitch to Palin about his suitability. And for what? A "Palin bump" over his barely-existent primary challenges? Stupid move.
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (0)
Understanding that the period for petition signatures and filing has passed as of this past Monday I wanted to show two videos of candidates making their filings in Springfield running for state offices.
This video from the Quinn campaign is a bit more "glamorous." The production values are very nice, although it doesn't seem to convey how long that they've stood in line to turn in the petitions. Found this via Capitol Fax in discussing an asset the Quinn campaign doesn't utilize or even publicize enough.
This video may not score as much as far a production values, but it sure does convey somewhat how serious the petition filing process is at the state level! This video was by Syron Smith running for state representative in the 32nd District. I posted another video featuring him earlier.
Well hopefully the candidate of your choice has put in all the hard work to file their petitions, whether on the federal, state, or even county levels. Hopefully the candidate of your choice will have solid petitions to remain on the ballot in 2010. I think we'll have some interesting elections to watch next year!
— Levois / Comments (0)
Austin-area alderman Isaac "Ike" Carothers was wearing a wire for a year or so after being nabbed in a zoning-for-cash bribery scheme. His wire has netted an arrest, of Wafeek Aiyash, a Naperville businessman.
The Chicago Sun-Times has learned that the cooperator is Ald. Isaac "Ike" Carothers -- who was charged earlier this year with corruption. Carothers is one of 14 members of the City Council's Aviation Committee.
Ike & the G.
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (0)
Exactly one year ago this evening--on November 4, 2008--Barack Obama was elected the 44th President of the United States of America. Just prior to his victory, thousands of supporters spent the day on the outskirts of Grant Park, and lucky ones with a ticket were able to get inside the park and listen to his victory speech, creating a serenity not always seen in Chicago. Police and security surrounded every single corner around Grant Park while crowds aligned in excitement in anticipation of the evening.
— Sheila Burt / Comments (0)
Chicago Union News is reporting:
The SK Hand Tool strike is over, as Teamsters members voted Tuesday to end the job action and accept a contract -- with health care but lower wages -- from the company.
"They voted to both end the strike and sign the contract, and the contract included [a health care provision and] a return-to-work agreement," a spokeswoman for Teamsters Local 743 said Wednesday. The company is "going to call all the people back to work today and fire all the . . . scabs."
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (0)
Andy Kroll reports on how Arne Duncan forged the most militarized school district in the country.
Yet a closer investigation of Duncan's record in Chicago casts doubt on that label. As he packs up for Washington, Duncan leaves behind a Windy City legacy that's hardly cause for optimism, emphasizing as it does a business-minded, market-driven model for education. If he is a "reformer," his style of management is distinctly top-down, corporate, and privatizing. It views teachers as expendable, unions as unnecessary, and students as customers.
Disturbing as well is the prominence of Duncan's belief in offering a key role in public education to the military. Chicago's school system is currently the most militarized in the country, boasting five military academies, nearly three dozen smaller Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps programs within existing high schools, and numerous middle school Junior ROTC programs. More troubling yet, the military academies he's started are nearly all located in low-income, minority neighborhoods. This merging of military training and education naturally raises concerns about whether such academies will be not just education centers, but recruitment centers as well.
Rather than handing Duncan a free pass on his way into office, as lawmakers did during Duncan's breezy confirmation hearings last week, a closer examination of the Chicago native's record is in order. Only then can we begin to imagine where public education might be heading under Arne Duncan, and whether his vision represents the kind of "change" that will bring our students meaningfully in line with the rest of the world.
Yes, I added double emphasis, because it says middle school. Twelve- and thirteen-year-olds. Thanks, Arne.
So, President Obama, why did you make this man our chief educator? For his track record of militarization?
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (1)
Via Carol Marin and the Sun-Times:
NBC5 and the Chicago Sun-Times have learned the city Inspector General's Office is taking the Daley administration to court after issuing a subpoena last month.
The IGO is demanding the city Law Department and its boss, Mara Georges, turn over documents and records concerning an unspecified no-bid contract awarded in 2006.
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (1)
Some updates on union contract negotiations around town:
[CTA Tattler]: CTA bus drivers union weighs strike to protest layoffs
The union president, Darrell Jefferson, goes on to insist the CTA's budget deficit is actually $500 million, not the $300 million cited by the CTA. But the union will continue to resist any givebacks, including furlough days.
[Chicago Tribune]: Hotel workers authorize strike at downtown Starwood hotels
Chicago hotel workers voted Wednesday evening to authorize a strike at five downtown Starwood hotels.
A union spokesman said if contract negotiations drag on, similar votes could occur at downtown Hyatt and Hilton hotels. Union contracts covering 6,000 workers at 31 hotels in downtown Chicago expired Aug. 31, and the union has said a settlement is far from sight.
[AFSCME Local 3486]: Contract Negotiations Update: Running in Place
With a federal mediator in place at the end of the table, the Union and Management traded barbs as the contract stalemate continues. AFSCME continues to demand that management provide us with an updated wages proposal, which the county will not as the tax issue continues to drag on before the county board.
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (1)
I came across this bit on a blog about transport project finance:
In separate news reports, Daley indicated that his administration is prepared to fast-track the Chicago Midway long-term lease without another auction process. The mayor would, instead, negotiation [sic] directly with the pool of potential bidders attracted to the airport in the previous process. Since the first quarter, traffic at Chicago Midway has rebounded with sequential gains in each month since March and positive year-over-year results from July. The improving passenger volume and newfound cargo flows bode well for the bidding process.
We own Midway Airport. The process should be open, with citizen review and real deliberation. After the parking meter debacle, that this type of "fast-tracking" could be discussed among these finance professionals in regards to Chicago's municipal assets is appalling.
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (1)
The Parking Ticket Geek makes an excellent case for ending residential permit parking in Chicago. I tend to agree--this falls into the general area of "commonly owned infrastructure" that I'm very fond of.
The creation of residential permit parking districts ends up exacerbating parking problems because the more of them you have, the more competition you get for the fewer and fewer free parking spots--making convenient targets for the city to squeeze more money out of people. While permit parking makes sense immediately around certain institutions--particularly big schools and hospitals--just creating permit parking because developers are over-building on density is silly and counter-productive. If your street parking can't handle it, there's no gun to your head saying you have to up-zone a piece of property to allow those extra five condo units.
I don't know if this means repealing all the districts (goodbye, every incumbent alderman) or restricting them to distances from certain classes of land use (hospitals, schools, stadiums).
There's one thing for certain, though: with better buses and trains, you wouldn't need them at all.
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (3)
The city's Chief Environment Officer, Sadhu Johnston, was interviewed by the American Society of Landscape Architects. Some interesting stuff that reminds you of just how hard it is to get anything done in a democracy:
Chicago is now famous for installing millions of square feet of green roof across the city. How critical are these green roofs to the city's program for a sustainable stormwater management?
They play an important role. However, we couldn't give credit to a new development for installing a green roof until we passed our storm water ordinance a couple of years ago. Now, every new development is required to calculate stormwater runoff and figure out how they can keep at least a half-inch of that first rain onsite for utilization and bioswales, green roofs, or other green infrastructure, like permeable pavements. Green roofs can play a significant role in stormwater plans for each site.
You hear that, hippies? You wanna save the earth, you better start brushing up on those 200-page stormwater ordinances.
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (0)
As the issue of tax increment financing (TIF) districts and the non-appropriated "shadow budget" they generate moves into mainstream media coverage, it's important to remember a couple two tree things about TIF funds, the main one being that the money in TIF accounts is not interchangeable with the money that is missing (the deficit) in the city budget.
First, TIFs are ultimately regulated by state statute. [PDF]
Second, TIF funds are property tax funds, and they can't just be spent however. The state statute limits what the money can be spent on. So although the Mayor controls some $1 billion in TIF funds, that money can't just be spent the same as the corporation funds the City spends on most of its budget; by state law it has to be spent inside the TIF district (or an adjacent district) and on statute-defined things.
Third, and related to that, is that the money in TIF funds is not the city's money per se. So if the TIF districts had not existed, the subsequent money raised would not be "freed up" for the city to use; it would return to the following taxing bodies (via the now-defunct NCBG):
— Ramsin Canon / Comments (8)
EDITOR'S NOTE: This story was submitted by journalist Christopher Gray.
The roof leaks and large, brown circles mar the ceiling where the panels aren't missing entirely. People for Community Recovery is used to shabby quarters in the Altgeld Gardens housing project at the southern end of Chicago.
The environmental justice group's small office is crammed with desks and cluttered with papers. People for Community Recovery shares a mostly vacant commercial strip with a liquor store and a fried chicken outlet, set in the middle of a labyrinth of the identical barracks-style row houses of the Chicago Housing Authority project.
But lately, the office has a new feature: electric space heaters — after People's Gas turned off the organization's heat for non-payment.
People for Community Recovery, along with other South Side non-profit organizations, is fighting for its survival as the recession continues to bear down.
— Andrew Huff / Comments (0)
Virginia voters on the cusp of a gubernatorial election recently received an automated call from the femme fatale from everyone's political porn fantasies: Sarah Palin. During this robocall, Palin's nasal voice encouraged voters to "vote [their] values" and "vote to share our principles." I don't want to put words in Palin's mouth, but I'm going to go ahead and assume that she's alluding to the moral principles upon which Republicans have campaigned recently.
This campaign strategy highlights the irrelevancy of the Republican party to the group that I affectionately refer to as the "New Conservatives." Believe it or not, there are young people out there that are conservative. Not every recent college grad subscribes to John Stewart's school of economic liberalism. Unfortunately, however, the Republican party seems largely disconnected from this growing group, continuously barking out stupid, uneducated and uninformed crap like this. The increasingly urban population either doesn't or can't afford to care about the hot button moral issues of yester-year. Gay marriage? That seems pretty unimportant when you're unemployed and wondering where your rent is coming from. Abortion? That's sad, but without health insurance a lot of young people (a fat chunk of the nation's uninsured) are wondering if they themselves will survive amidst life's daily hazards and the media's "OMG" epidemic of H1N1.
— Conor McCarthy / Comments (3)
We got an email from Jonathan Goldman about his candidacy for state rep in the Democratic primary for the 10th district.
I suspect when the email was sent they didn't figure it would be the suburban Republican who would do the item on it. But he makes some points I would like to take a closer look at. You can find what was in the email here.
Work to put Illinois' fiscal house in order. "We need to get serious once and for all about fixing the State budget, rather than lurching from one fiscal crisis to another. We need to restructure our tax policies based on ability to pay and address our structural deficit so that we can pay our bills on time and fully fund our pension obligations," said Goldman.
So bottom line, who is going to pay more? Who is going to pay less? As for the pension system, do you think the current state pension system should be available to folks who go to work for the state three years from now?
— OneMan / Comments (1)
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