Note to commentators: a good followup question might have been, "Are you going to 'destroy' ISIS the same way the US destroyed Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and the Viet Cong?" Oh, wait.... Put another way, if we seemingly lack the ability to destroy violent organized crime or criminal gangs within our own borders, how can we eradicate a more well-armed threat halfway around the globe? But I digress.
To any American with even a smattering of moral education, it shouldn't be necessary to reiterate why war is so often stupid and horrible that it should always be a tool of last resort, and that "whether" and "why" should always precede discussion of "how" and "how much." Sadly, we currently seem to inhabit a Matrix-like false reality of delusional denial, complacent to let a long, massive, and often brutally tragic and destructive war be waged in our name, and with our money - so long as it's far away and largely outsourced to missiles and drones, with U.S. casualties far less than in comparable conflicts.
So, as a refresher, here are some reasons, as a goodbye to 2015, why the pursuit of just peace needs to be a principal plank in candidates' platforms, and why candidates for president and Congress should be held accountable on peace and war to the same degree that they are vetted on issues like transgender rights or religious freedom.
1. War kills and maims people, including lots of innocent people.
It almost makes me cry to have to type the previous sentence, but we've seemingly forgotten, or have taken so much media and iNarcissism tranquilizer that we are unable to consciously process the destructive human violence of the wars we are waging. Estimates vary but, by any account, the undeclared wars the United States has been waging in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and the other countries where we've bombed without any declaration of war have led to, at minimum, the loss of not only thousands of American soldiers but also the death of hundreds of thousands of others: opposition forces, vaguely-defined "militants," and of course civilians, including children, with many times more than that injured and/or displaced. Physicians for Social Responsibility this year estimated that direct and indirect consequences of the U.S. "war on terrorism" in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan include the deaths of at least 1.3 million human beings.
A recent Brown University study estimated nearly 27,000 civilian deaths in Afghanistan alone since the US invasion in 2001. While most of these are due to "anti-government forces," that doesn't negate that it's now considered a "success" that there were just over 100 civilian deaths from US and allied air operations in 2014. Let that sink in: in just one year, and a "good" year at that, coalition bombs in Afghanistan killed more civilians than the Newtown, Charlotte, Aurora, and San Bernardino shooters, put together, did. And we've been doing this now for over a decade.
That's just Afghanistan. In Iraq, there have been a minimum of 150,000 documented civilian deaths since a 2003 US invasion based on a pack of lies. While air bombings were at a lull between 2009 and 2013, the total number of civilians killed just by US and allied air operations easily exceeds the number of Americans who died on Sept. 11, 2001.
Iraq, remember, had nothing to do with 9/11.
This October, a US gun plane - in a country where we claim combat operations have ended - attacked a hospital run by the Nobel-winning Doctors Without Borders organization, killing dozens of civilians and injuring many others. Whether or not the attack was a war crime, the carnage was somewhere between that of San Bernardino and Paris, yet the story in the US was mainly relegated to small reports on inner pages, as opposed to the days-on-end front-page screams with respect to the other bloody massacres.
2. War destabilizes countries and regions
It's now beyond debate -- acknowledged even by President Obama -- that the Afghan-Iraq-Pakistan war and subsequent interventions, such as support for overthrow of the Gaddafi regime in Libya, destabilized the entire region, creating the vacuum that allowed radical groups such as Islamic State to arise. But this should not have come as surprise. Experts from the Brookings Institution to the Pentagon (Google "Desert Crossing") warned of this long ago. Former Assistant Secretary of Defense Morton Halperin, for example, warned in 2002 that "American military conquest of Iraq will lead many more people in the Arab and Muslim world to choose the path of terror." Former Rep. and presidential candidate Ron Paul's 2002 prediction as to unintended consequences is worth a re-read. While the admission by the President falls under "better late than never," too few, including too few of those running for president or federal office, seem able to connect the dots and question that doubling down on something that horribly backfired makes sense.
3. War helps terrorists
Sec. Clinton has been forced to engage in a now-familiar walk-back of her seeming assertion in debate, akin to Carly Fiorina's claim of viewing nonexistent Planned Parenthood videos, that ISIS was using videos of Donald Trump to recruit jihadists. Regardless of whether Clinton succeeds in parsing away the plain meaning of her words, her undeniable assertion, that Trump is becoming "ISIS's best recruiting tool," has to be challenged as ridiculous.
Again: the 13 years of constant US war in the region have directly killed hundreds of thousands of people, mainly Muslims, and displaced and injured double that or more. The United States has dropped over 20,000 missiles and bombs just in Syria/Iraq v. Islamic State. The long sanctions against Libya caused a disputed but large number of child deaths. The extent of bombing and war and the sheer number of ordnance dropped and fired in the last 13 years of war is such that if even a small percentage result in "collateral damage," that loss is huge; just the air attacks by the US and allies have killed more innocent people than were killed on 9/11. In a related issue generally conceded to be a major source of discontent and radicalism in the Muslim world, the Netanyahu administration forges ahead with new settlements in Palestine while the US fecklessly wags (but does not lift) a finger, and we head towards the half-century mark of Israeli military occupation. Yet Sec. Clinton suggests that Trump, a blowhard who has not won a single American vote let alone held public office, more than any of the foregoing, is what is driving the disaffected to join Islamic State? Not the thousands and thousands of deaths, the millions of displaced persons, the screaming children and burnt hospitals, the hours and hours of video of the consequences of US and allied bombs and missiles, the thousands of killings (targeted and otherwise) in occupied Palestine, torture at Abu Ghraib, kangaroo courts and hunger strikes at Guantanamo -- not those, but Trump? Is the former Secretary of State serious?
Our war efforts - including the type of "assistance to moderate rebels" Clinton thinks we should have done more of, and earlier, also supplied Islamic State with materiel necessary to its 2014 sweep across Iraq and Syria, in much the same way that arms left from the first Gulf War were used against American troops and Iraqi civilians by militias following the second Iraq invasion. Two years before the ISIS anschluss, the New York Times was reporting how arms to rebels were flowing into radical hands. Other of the many outlets reporting on this phenomenon include The Atlantic in multiple stories, the Wall Street Journal, NPR, NBC, and British press such as the Guardian and Daily Mail. These stories are worth a read to let the Syriana-like madness of the current situation sink in.
4. War is horribly expensive
I still shake my head thinking how Lawrence Lindsey in 2002 was cashiered by the Bush administration for suggesting that the cost of invading Iraq could be as high as 1% to 2% of GNP (about $100-$200 billion then), and how Defense Sec. Rumsfeld assured the nation that the costs would be under $50 billion. As 2015 ends, the only question is how many trillions this seemingly perpetual and growing war has cost and will cost. Six years ago, Noel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard's Linda Bilmes authored The Three Trillion Dollar War. Now that figure seems conservative. There are of course ancillary economic impacts such as the opportunity cost, the impacts on oil markets, the contribution to worldwide recession, and now the impact of the refugee crisis. Again, some of these were warned of in advance, such as by the Brookings Institute's George Perry, in 2002.
5. Perpetual war corrodes our morality and ideals
Thirteen years of war grounded largely in lies is sucking away what this country aspires to be. Once upon a time most Americans believed, whether or not true in execution, that the United States became engaged only when attacked, and did not initiate wars. Now we seem to have embraced a grotesque Bush doctrine of unilateral use of force that shreds notions of sovereignty, that says we can bomb any "militant" anywhere on the planet based on might makes right, and that concurrently seems to be shredding attitudes toward torture, toward observance of the Geneva convention, toward protection of noncombatants. An argument in particular that the disengaged nature of drone warfare has a corrupting effect is thought-provoking, enough so to fill a book. On a long term -- and this war is now long term -- the "anything to keep us safe" meme is shredding civil liberties, the sense of privacy essential to democracy, and creating a "new normal" that tilts toward totalitarianism. On the most base level, perpetual war is a major contributor toward our national culture of violence, because it implicitly or explicitly endorses violence and killing.
It is unclear why peace is not more central to the 2016 campaign so far. For sure, the GOP for decades has been hawkish, with only the libertarian wing led by the Pauls holding up the old Republican non-interventionist POV. But Democrats surged to congressional and then presidential victory in 2006 and 2008, respectively, largely on opposition to the Bush war. A double whammy then seemingly took effect - whereas the GOP used its activists to gain victories across the country, the Democrats, instead, having won first the Congress and the White House, told their activists, "Get lost," with WH chiefs of staff publicly chiding the left and, at local levels, the Party stifling activist movements if they questioned Obama. Michael Heaney has recently written specifically on this in Party in the Street: The Antiwar Movement and the Democratic Party after 9/11.
So what we see now is the GOP raising money based on fear itself, and Democrats churning up an unprecedented money-raising machine not by challenging that fear, but via fear of the GOP. The deluge of e-mails from each party to its donor base often has no substantive content at all other than "Boo!"
Aside from fundamental respect for a base constituency, telling the Left, "You have nowhere else to go" is risky. Activists will never vote for a candidate of opposite ideology from the other party, but can refrain from writing checks, knocking on doors, making calls, or even voting.
A not-insignificant percentage of the electorate agrees that, as sketched above, our current perpetual war is bloody, counterproductive, unaffordable, unsustainable, and corrosive to our national spirit. The Democrats have more to lose from jingoism than does the GOP. A choice between two perceived evils cut from the same cloth creates opportunity if not necessity for third party candidacies, which may resonate in an America disgusted with both major parties.
Possibly Islamic State will suffer enough military defeat that Iraq, Obama, the Democrats, and for that matter Putin can all claim "victory" even though a simmering, much smaller network of jihadists persists, and even if it continues to carry out sectarian bombings, or inspire or even direct terrifying but non-state-threatening atrocities elsewhere. But even if so, all the arguments against war remain.
War and peace - not just a particular war but our entire foreign policy - deserves more discussion, and real discussion. It is distant but real people are suffering and dying. It was refreshing to finally hear in a national debate the scary and too-accurate phrase perpetual war at least be voiced, but political leaders need to lead on dismantling the growing national numbness toward that concept, with all its associated evils. Candidates for federal office, from president to Congress, need to demonstrate the degree to which their values truly oppose the evils of perpetual war, and have the courage to lay out meaningful steps and multilateral plans for building peace.
There have been many nice things said about Andrew and Gapers Block across Chicago media circles, including this from Mike Fourcher and this from Whet Moser. They provide a lot of context to why this is a big deal, and not just for the people immediately involved.
Now, I'm a Johnny-come-lately. I've been writing about politics here -- and, along the way, also about coffee shops, professional wrestling, and bowling balls -- for about two years. But I'm also here at the moment-before-hiatus, which means I get the chance to write about Gapers Block for Gapers Block. Sure, it's an exercise in the meta. But see: Gapers Block is all about Chicago, and Chicago is especially all about Chicago. It's all one huge ball of meta.
]]> It might also be fairly said that I'm a Johnny-come-lately to Chicago, too. I moved here nine years ago this month. Now, I've lived somewhere in Illinois almost my whole life, so Chicago wasn't exactly foreign growing up, but I only experienced so much. When I was young my dad and I would come into the city to visit his friends. We'd take the Eisenhower in and get off at Austin, or we'd take the Kennedy in and get off at... Austin. Yeah, the city was this vast thing, but if we always got off at the same street, how big could it really be? (Now when we come back home from visiting Rockford, we take the Kennedy... and get off at Austin. Funny how that works out.)As I got older I increasingly thought of Chicago as too fast-paced a place for me, and resisted repeated suggestions that I should just move to the big city. Finally, in 2005, my girlfriend (now wife!) and I visited Manhattan. She lived in Wicker Park then, so when we got back to O'Hare, we took the Blue Line back and got off at Division. It was that experience of emerging from the El at the Polish Triangle where I first really thought, yeah, I guess I really can live here. Spending a couple of days in Manhattan is all it took to make Chicago feel manageable... knowable.
Moving to Chicago doesn't make a person a real Chicagoan, though. There's no single benchmark to cross, either. Eventually, it happens, or it doesn't.
Pretty much immediately after moving to Logan Square nine years ago, I got involved in "Chicago politics." I was neck-deep in Green Party affairs at the time, and some of us got a new Green local off the ground in the neighborhood. The Greens had full statewide ballot status at that time, and in 2008 among other candidates we ran Jeremy Karpen for State Representative in our area. It was all very exhilarating, not just the kind of campaigns we were running, but to do so in the middle of Chicago.
One of the biggest differences in running a political campaign in Chicago as compared to downstate is the way local media responds. In Bloomington, as a Green candidate for State Representative in 2004 and 2006, I actually got newspaper, radio, even TV coverage. It was a lot harder to figure that out in Chicago, where the major media outlets pretty much ignore anything as small as legislative races. We were really excited, then, to see a piece all about Jeremy's campaign on Gapers Block. It was like we'd made it: an important and influential Chicago site was covering Jeremy's grassroots campaign. Forget the major media! We had won over the Internet!
As it turned out, Jeremy himself knew a little better. The writer of the piece, Brie Callahan, was a good friend of his (and now they're married!) See, that piece wasn't really an affirmation of anything specific we were doing. It was, unintentionally, more a lesson about how Chicago works: It's a good idea to know somebody.
It was a couple of years later that I finally found Nelson Algren (or, more precisely, I finally acceeded to the Reader incessantly name-dropping him.) The first thing I got my hands on was Chicago: City on the Make. Now, it wouldn't quite be true to say that suddenly everything made sense. It would be more accurate to say that I finally had the framework for understanding all of the things happening around me. Before, if a manager at work were to have made an off-handed comment about "The City That Works," it would have been kind of funny, but really just a thrown away line. Algren changed that for me.
Not long after discovering Algren, a bunch of things happened. The Green Party's fortunes in Illinois largely came crashing down in November 2010 when we lost our statewide ballot status. Jeremy's second campaign was a resounding success by Green standards, but he came up short, and a lot of our momentum fell away. A few months later, my wife and I bought a bungalow in Jefferson Park. (Or maybe it's Portage Park; it all depends on who you ask, like so many other "facts" in Chicago.)
By that point, I would seem to have been well on my way to being a real Chicagoan. I'd worked in River North for so long, it was like the Blue Line was my second home. Our favorite team was the Windy City Rollers All-Stars. And, I mean, we were now bungalow owners. Along the way, I was paying less attention to what was happening in Springfield (because, you know, snoozer) and more attention to what was happening at City Hall (because, you know, Rahm's an asshole and property taxes and all that.) But as familiar as the streets were, and as much of a foundation as we'd laid down, was it really enough? Could I have really said I was a real Chicagoan?
After settling in some after the move, I got a little more involved in the neighborhood, and I switched to a different job in the Loop. Along the way, I was reading more over time from Gapers Block, especially some of the excellent stuff from Jason Prechtel. (If you want to see how a site like Gapers Block can unearth deep crap on the part of our Powers That Be, read Jason's work on Ventra, like this piece.) Jason and I knew each other from a previous shared media conglomerate, and so I saw one day when he posted that Gapers Block was looking for people to write on politics. I figured that I was suitably qualified, and thankfully, Mechanics editor Monica Reida agreed.
My first piece was about how Bruce Rauner might eventually get elected governor. Now, dear reader, I should level with you: Bruce Rauner is one of the most despicable human beings I can think of. But writing a piece exploring such a subject was, for me, liberating. For so long I'd had to bury my fascination with the political process generally in favor of being the consummate hate-all-elites Green. My writing in that first piece was a little stiff, but my general argument has (unfortunately) largely been proven correct. I understood right away that I could bring a unique voice to political coverage, and Gapers Block could provide a rare forum for that.
Over the last couple of years, my thinking on a lot of political subjects has evolved. I've frequently explored the mechanics of the political process, and how those mechanics can be manipulated, mangled or, most often, simply misunderstood. I've also tried to dig deeper into the way that the political elite behaves -- especially the Democratic Machine, which somehow controls so much while being so reviled, and which is so effective at maintaining power and yet seemingly so incompetent at wielding it. And all of it, amazingly, seems to come back somehow to City on the Make, a theme I explored in my favorite piece. If you haven't read it, I hope you'll do so now. It's every bit as relevant as it was back in February.
At the same time that I've more deeply explored Chicago politics, I've also gained way more of an education about Chicago Public Schools than I could ever have imagined. Shortly after getting on board with Gapers Block, I ran for a seat on the Local School Council at Prussing Elementary. My decision to run was based on the idea that, as a new father, I should get involved in the local school before my son started going there. Pretty much immediately, I encountered some truly bizarre stuff, and it's only gotten more ridiculous over time. An early Gapers Block piece of mine was about the absurdity of having apparently gotten elected, but not knowing for sure. Since then I've experienced the bizarre-even-by-CPS-standards matter of the school principal being escorted out of the building for by CPS security (as Algren would say, for keeps and a day), and then two months ago, the unbelievable confusion of a carbon monoxide leak sending over 80 kids to the hospital and CPS thoroughly bungling the situation. I've learned that with CPS there's simply always more than meets the eye, and Gapers Block has provided not only the forum for sharing what I've seen, but also the impetus to dig deeper.
Generally speaking, Gapers Block is a site of, by, and for Chicago. It's not the first thing to be of, by, and for the city, but it's been the first of its kind, and it's held up remarkably well. In the Internet age, a time of broad societal dissociation and particularly difficult transformation for media, Gapers Block has been here to help usher the city into a digital realm, and yet to do so in a way which has stayed essentially Chicago. For as much as so many people feel disconnected today, our city's self-image has arguably grown even larger, as epitomized by arguably the most prevalent icon in Chicago today being the six-pointed star. Even in a time of mass gentrification, food deserts, a school system in broad collapse, and an era of unprecedented exposure of violence, it seems as though, somehow more than ever before, Chicago coheres.
Now, I am just some guy writing for a blog. And yet, doing so has allowed me, in a small way, to follow in the tradition of those luminaries whose singular names scream Chicago: Royko. Studs. Algren. Through Gapers Block, I have found not merely a forum, but also an obligation. Writing about the city -- and especially its politics -- demands something more than the knee-jerk and the superficial. As I have dug, I have learned, and I have grown, not just as a writer, but as a Chicagoan.
All of this is my very long, winding way of saying thank you to Gapers Block and especially to Andrew Huff for manning the wheel for all these years. Gapers and Andrew have provided not only the forum and the opportunity that comes with it, but even beyond that, the chance this year to play that most ridiculously Chicago of games, 16-inch softball. Not that he set out to do it, or that he would even expect me to have written something quite like this, but Andrew, you've helped me become -- dare I say it? -- a real Chicagoan after all.
]]>The leading contender for such a process is House Bill 4356, introduced by State Rep. La Shawn Ford (D-8). HB4356 provides for a mechanism of recalling the mayor by public election. HB4356 now has five co-sponsors -- perhaps fewer than might be expected, but perhaps more given that the legislature is out of session. While the Tribune took a look at HB4356 this week, publishing what was essentially a hatchet piece, even that article suggests the idea is at least going to stick around for a while.
My take is different from the Tribune. I think recall legislation, whether in the form of HB4356 or some other bill, has a decent shot of passage. It has already lined up some interesting co-sponsors, and prominent politicians such as Lisa Madigan and Pat Quinn have come out in favor of recall at least conceptually. I think it's extremely unlikely that Rahm Emanuel will ever be recalled, but that will not stop legislation from proceeding. The credible threat of recall is important enough that enough political operators will allow it to stay on the table.
HB4356 is of course subject to amendment, and competing bills could also be introduced that would offer different processes. Still, even though it is a largely speculative exercise to consider all of the permutations of how recall legislation might proceed, it is worth stepping back and regarding some of those possibilities. Key distinctions regarding different processes may lead to significantly different results in terms of who might replace Emanuel -- even if no recall ever takes place. The details of pending and prospective state legislation could therefore be of critical importance for the fate of not only Emanuel but the entire city.
]]> What Constitutes a Vacancy in Office?Conceptually, there are numerous different ways by which Emanuel may be out of office before 2019. Some of these are very similar in effect and can be grouped together. For the purposes here, I am ignoring possibilities which are not especially relevant, except insomuch as they help provide context to the intent of the law as written. (For reference, the mechanisms currently in effect can be found in Section 3.1-10-51 of the Illinois Municipal Code.)
Death or Disability. These are fairly straightforward. If you're no longer alive, you're no longer in office. (You can insert your own joke here about still being able to vote.)
Formal Resignation. This is also fairly straightforward. If you formally resign, you're no longer in office.
Disqualification. This covers multiple similar scenarios such as "abandonment" (one example of which would be moving outside of the city), which mostly aren't too interesting to us. But this also covers certain criminal situations, specifically pleading guilty to or being convicted of a felony.
Existing state law covers all of the above scenarios, and also includes provisions for how such a vacancy would be filled. First, the sitting vice-mayor would temporarily assume the role of mayor. Currently, the vice-mayor is 42nd Ward Alderman Brendan Reilly. Next, the City Council would select, from their own ranks, an individual to serve as acting mayor. Under current law, the acting mayor would remain in place until the next regularly scheduled municipal elections in 2019 (unless the acting mayor were also to vacate the seat for any of the aforementioned reasons.)
Other mechanisms by which a vacancy might be created are at this time either formally proposed or merely conceptual.
Legislative Removal. In effect, this would mean that the City Council would vote to remove the mayor from office for cause, where "for cause" would ostensibly mean a nefarious action that, at least for the time being, has not yet resulted in a conviction. This mechanism has not been widely discussed, and may not manifest itself, for the simple reason that Emanuel has not been charged with any crimes.
Recall Election. While there is no existing legal mechanism for this, State Representative La Shawn Ford (D-8) has introduced House Bill 4356, which would provide such a mechanism. As currently written, and using the numbers from the 2015 election, recall would require the submission of a petition with 88,610 valid signatures (effectively requiring at least 200,000 raw signatures), followed by an election to consider the question of whether the mayor should be recalled. Neither the petition nor the election ballot would specify any "cause"; ultimately, if things got all the way to a recall election, the matter would come down to whether or not voters simply wanted a new mayor, regardless of whatever their personal reasons might be.
The provisions currently in HB4356 are the ones most likely to eventually go to vote, for the simple reason that they constitute a starting point. The likelihood, though, is that if the bill does pass, it will be amended somehow. Such an amendment could be minor, or it could be very expansive. For our purposes, we will consider the provisions in the existing bill, and some of the more likely changes to those provisions, introduceable either through an amendment to the bill, or through the introduction of one or more completely new bills.
As currently written, HB4356 calls for tiered elections to be held in the event that an incumbent mayor is recalled. Similar to how the regular municipal elections currently work, there would first be an election, and if no candidate receives an outright majority, then there would be a runoff election. Until such time as a candidate receives an outright majority, the vice-mayor would assume the mayor's duties, and no separate acting mayor would be selected by the City Council. This last part is significant, because the existing legal process for filling a vacancy does not contain any provision for a new election. A very logical amendment to HB4356 would be one which provided for a replacement election in the event of any vacancy that might occur sufficiently in advance of the next regularly scheduled municipal election.
Such a change would be consistent with how most vacancies in Illinois are handled, and with how the last mayoral vacancy in Chicago was handled. In November 1987, Harold Washington passed away just a few months into his second term. Although no law on the books explicitly provided for a short-term election, the matter went to the courts, and the courts found that the combination of then-existing state municipal code and determinable legislative intent required that a special election be held. At that time, Chicago's mayoral election was still partisan, though since no Republican had been elected mayor of Chicago in decades, the election that really mattered was the Democratic primary. Richard M. Daley defeated the acting mayor, Eugene Sawyer, in the primary, thus beginning his 22 years on the fifth floor of City Hall.
The tiered approach called for in Ford's bill is also interesting and potentially subject to change. For one, three rounds of special elections would be very costly. One simple solution here -- and one which arguably should be applied for all Chicago municipal elections going forward -- is to replace the two-tiered election-and-runoff model with a single Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) election. IRV is a specific type of ranked choice election, where voters do not simply vote for one candidate, but instead assign preferential rankings to one or more candidates. FairVote has put together an excellent primer on ranked choice voting. In short, IRV largely solves the problem of "first-past-the-post" elections where a candidate can win with a tiny percentage because there are a large number of candidates, while also saving taxpayers the expense of paying for a second full election, which would cost millions of dollars. If ever there was a time for IRV to get its foot in the door in Illinois, this is it.
The most interesting aspect of the three-tiered process is that the recall vote itself would be separate and distinct from the subsequent election(s) to choose a replacement. This approach varies from that employed in the the two best-known recall votes held in the United States this century: the successful recall of California Governor Gray Davis in 2003, and the unsuccessful recall of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker in 2012. The circumstances of those recall votes are worth considering at some length as they may offer insight into what could happen in Chicago if things get that far.
The recall process in California involved two parallel votes on the same ballot: the first a Yes/No vote on whether to recall Davis, and the second a winner-take-all vote which would have effect only if an outright majority voted for recall. The California law had a particularly unusual provision, though, whereby would-be candidates could get on the ballot with very few petition signatures and/or a filing fee. The result was a circus, with 135 candidates on the ballot. Davis lost the recall vote, and the new governor was Arnold Schwarzenegger, even though he was a Republican in an overwhelmingly Democratic state. Davis had only won reelection in 2002 with 47.3% of the vote, so the 55.4% Yes vote to recall him was not especially out of step with the preceding election. The 47.3% Davis won is actually higher than the 45.6% Emanuel won in the February first round, suggesting that Davis could be a precarious example for Emanuel.
The process was different in Wisconsin. Instead of a two-vote ballot like in California, or a tiered process as provided for in Ford's bill, the Wisconsin recall election was essentially just a do-over election. The actual vote was simply a vote with only two prominent choices, Walker and Democratic opponent Tom Barrett. In 2010, Walker had defeated Barrett 52.3% to 46.5%. In the recall election, Walker won 53.1% to 46.3%. Ultimately, the recall vote wasn't explicitly a referendum on Walker, because there was no separate Yes/No vote, and Barrett was the same lackluster candidate the Democrats had just run. Emanuel ultimately feels much closer to Davis than to Walker.
Unlike those recent examples, the process in HB4356 calls for a single Yes/No vote to be held separately from a replacement election. This means that the vote would be a straight-up referendum on Emanuel, an opportunity for voters to come out en masse to eject a man very few of them actually like, and make history in the process. That would not bode well for Emanuel. It is possible that Ford's bill will be amended to create a process somewhat more similar to California's, whereby the recall vote would be simultaneous with the first-round replacement election. Then voters would be voting not just on Emanuel's fate but also simultaneously on who would replace him -- and if they didn't prefer the available options, such a process could work more in his favor. If the IRV option is not pursued, then the issue of funding three separate elections might well compel an amendment combining the recall vote and first-round replacement vote on the same ballot.
It should also be noted that HB4356, as currently written, pertains only to the office of mayor of Chicago. If the General Assembly sees fit to move on such a recall mechanism, then they would presumably also see fit to establish a mechanism for recalling a Chicago alderman, and, in turn, perhaps also statewide officers, and maybe also municipal and other local elected officials for cities other than Chicago. Whether such additional provisions are liable to be added to Ford's bill, or introduced as separate bills, may ultimately impact whether any recall mechanism at all passes. As we'll explore below, prospective amendments or new bills may emerge due less to any kind of democratic principles than to political considerations.
For those wondering if any legislation at all can be passed for the situation at hand, not only is it possible, but recent history demonstrates that Illinois will definitely do such things. While the U.S. Constitution specifically prohibits ex post facto laws, HB4356 would not establish a retroactive effect; it would instead provide for a recall process which could be employed in the future. This is admittedly a point of some contention -- the Tribune article cites House Republican leader Jim Durkin (R-82) as questioning the applicability of such a law -- but anyone who expects that the overall recall process might somehow avoid involving the courts clearly hasn't lived in Illinois very long.
As for recent precedent, in December 2014, State Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka died shortly after having been reelected. The law in effect as of that time gave the incoming governor the ability to appoint a replacement who would then serve out the entire four-year term. Because Topinka was a Republican, this meant that incoming Governor Bruce Rauner would have been able to appoint a Republican of his choosing to fill the entire four-year term. In light of this, the Democratic leadership in Springfield scrambled, introducing and quickly passing a bill which provided that in such an event, a state office would go up for reelection as a two-year unexpired term in the subsequent presidential election year. Elections to fill vacancies for partial terms are actually quite common in Illinois for numerous down-ticket offices, so the new law was not out of step with common practice. But if the situation would have been different -- a Democrat passing away, a Democratic governor coming in, with the Democrats in control of the General Assembly -- it's hard to imagine the same law would have been passed.
As of Dec. 16, a week after the bill's introduction, it has five co-sponsors. Ford and Mary Flowers (D-31) are both African-Americans representing West Side and South Side districts, respectively. Jaime Andrade (D-40) is Latino and represents an Albany Park-centered district. His inclusion is noteworthy, because having initially been appointed to his position through his connection to long-time Democratic boss Dick Mell, Andrade showing up here suggests that Democratic powerbrokers may be okay with recall, at least for mayor. (Andrade signing on may also just be taken as a sign that he is feeling pressure in his reelection campaign against progressive Harish Patel.)
The other co-sponsors are perhaps the most interesting ones. Jeanne Ives (R-42) represents a Wheaton-based district. Ron Sandack (R-81) represents a Downers Grove-based district, is the House Republican floor leader, and is closely allied with Governor Rauner. The discussion at Capitol Fax, referencing the Tribune article, emphasizes that Republican leaders are "not enthused," yet the same article itself clearly suggests that some Republicans would be on board.
In 2008, the General Assembly considered a pair of bills which would have sent to voters proposed constitutional amendments providing for recall of statewide officers and state legislators. While both died in the Senate, they both had majority support; putting constitutional amendments on the ballot requires a 3/5 super-majority, though. Still, if an outright majority of state senators was willing to advance legislation which would have provided for the ability for they themselves to be recalled, it is not hard to imagine a similar majority passing a bill dealing solely with the mayor of Chicago, or perhaps all municipal offices in Chicago. It should also be emphasized here that even if calls rose to include recall provisions for state offices, such provisions would require amending the state constitution, so that would have to be taken up in a separate bill anyway.
The main powerbrokers are the usual suspects here: Rauner, Speaker of the House Michael Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton. Rauner's office has declined comment, but if a bill makes it all the way to his desk, political calculation could very likely overcome his personal friendship with Emanuel. Madigan himself hasn't commented, but his daughter, Attorney General Lisa Madigan, has come out in favor of recall procedures for mayor and other positions, albeit without also saying that she thinks Emanuel should be recalled. Her comments can reasonably be considered a proxy for her father's, sufficient to suggest that the elder Madigan will be content to sit back and let the situation develop further, and may even be willing to let it pass as is. The Tribune reports that Cullerton, the closest political ally of the three, is firmly in opposition. But Cullerton is also the least important of the powerbrokers. If any legislation gains enough steam, Cullerton may simply step out of the way instead of trying to stop the train himself.
An unusual consideration is that, should HB4356 get to Rauner in substantially its current form, he would have the ability to use his amendatory veto to add additional offices which would be subject to recall. Rauner did run on a platform of "shaking up Springfield," and led with an aggressive effort to establish term limits for the General Assembly. It could be a simple, and potentially fruitful, political move for him to personally add Chicago aldermen alongside the mayor as potential subjects of recall. Rauner might even find it politically expedient to champion broader recall provisions, including ones that could ultimately make even himself subject to recall. While proponents of term limits and recall procedures don't always overlap, they often do, even if the reasons for supporting one reform or the other aren't always the same.
Of course, beyond high-level political implications, and notwithstanding new unexpected developments (such as Emanuel suddenly resigning), the ultimate success of Ford's bill may simply have most to do with the prevailing mood of the electorate. If new evidence emerges suggesting that Emanuel knew more about the Laquan McDonald video than he has claimed, while it might not ultimately qualify as any kind of criminal action, it might nevertheless push the public yet more strongly in the direction of wanting to see him gone. In turn, the pressure on legislators to give the public the recall option may overwhelm other considerations. If instead, a month from now, the holiday season has provided Emanuel with a cooling off period, the public retreats to a mentality of thinking there is little to be done, and the issue gains little traction in any of the March legislative primaries, the bill would likely just die on the vine in Springfield without ever being called to a vote.
The heat shows no signs of flagging, though. In an attempt to gain a much-needed photo-op, Emanuel went to Urban Prep in Englewood on Wednesday to talk about federal funding for a program which would create "My Brother's Keeper Cabinet." The occasion went awry when Urban Prep students chanted "16 Shots" -- a reference to the number of times Laquan McDonald was shot by Jason Van Dyke. The photo-op was such a failure that the lead Tribune article didn't even bother mentioning why Emanuel was at Urban Prep in the first place. And this was at a charter school. If that could happen there, and this is how the media is going to portray it, even the holiday season isn't going to bail the mayor out.
In short, Emanuel stands little chance of thoroughly rebuilding his reputation over the next few months. HB4356 will certainly pick up more sponsors when the new legislative year begins in January, and with several legislators facing primary challenges, recall will be a hot issue in the March elections -- possibly an even hotter issue than the ongoing budget disaster. Michael Madigan knows better than to block the bill under the circumstances. Ford deserves credit not just for introducing his legislation, but for how he's managed its PR to date. HB4356 will have legs, and if Ford continues to be shrewd -- perhaps adding in a well-crafted amendment fixing the resignation vacancy loophole, and also perhaps in expanding the bill to at least include Chicago aldermen -- the bill is headed for a full House vote at bare minimum relatively early in the legislative term.
If a recall bill does make it all the way out of Springfield, it would only happen if Emanuel remains under fire for months. In such a situation, his ability to run the city would be greatly compromised. With compounding factors such as the financial disaster at Chicago Public Schools, the real potential for another Chicago Teachers Union strike, and a Department of Justice investigation into the Chicago Police Department only just starting, even Emanuel would be likely to resign before a formal recall process could get going. But even here, pursuing the recall bill may ultimately have the real intended effect. If recall were to be off the table, that would relieve at least some pressure from Emanuel. Even in a weakened state, he still has his largely rubber-stamp City Council. He could simply ride things out until 2019. The mere threat of recall, though, helps to keep the pressure on him specifically. That threat is too potent for other politicians right now.
Expect HB4356 to persist, and expect to see some amendments at least proposed. Expect to see discussion about expanding recall to other offices, perhaps in the form of other bills. Don't expect this crisis to subside any time soon. Emanuel's nature will be to fight, and fight hard, to regain his standing, but he has more frenemies than friends. It is ultimately more expedient for those people to leave him twisting in the wind. That, after all, is precisely what Emanuel would be doing to them.
The odds would seem to be that Emanuel ultimately survives for the full term. But the odds were also very much against him being forced into a runoff in February. If the combination of a widening DOJ investigation, further deep investigative journalism, and stronger organizing in opposition to him should come to pass -- and all of these things are eminently possible -- then all bets are off. For now, people who want to organize to see Emanuel go are well-advised to get on board with the recall bill effort. It is the most direct pressure point, and one where people are most likely to get tacit support from other Powers That Be. HB4356 may well be amended, or usurped by some other bill, but the recall issue is alive and well, and should continue to be for months to come.
]]>If you haven't heard of Cedric Chatman, then you should know his name. Cedric is another tragic example of a black youth being killed by police and the city trying to cover up the murder. Cedric was killed nearly three years ago, almost two years before Laquan McDonald. To no surprise to anyone in Chicago, Rahm is currently trying to prevent the video from being released.
Black Americans being killed by police is not just a Chicago problem. This is an American problem.
]]> I can't sit back and witness the continued murder of black Americans, while far too many white Americans sit back and say nothing at all about it or even worse, blame the victims themselves.As a white person who grew up in a majority white area, I know how white people view the police. They help keep us safe. The only times a white person fears a cop is when we are going more than 15mph over the speed limit and spot them in our rearview or when they show up to peacefully break up our youthful parties. The general consensus among whites is that the police won't harm us, or our children; they will save us from the bad guys and give us due process if we mess up. If any interaction falls outside of this norm, it is ludicrous.
As we have sadly seen over the past few years, the world does not operate like this for black Americans. Whiteness lets us have that sacred, safe privilege.
I know if you don't experience something personally it's hard to really internalize it. But this is the very reason why the intense, disturbing, police videos are so important to see.
Of course, no one wants to see someone being killed on camera. But if you don't watch it, then it never happened.
If white America is as tired of hearing about race and racism as some media outlets claim, then there are ways to help.
Start by giving a damn. I could call this empathy, but we are past that point in this struggle.
White culture tends to blame the victim, not the police officer, with comments like, "If Eric Garner had just... " "If Laquan McDonald would've...", or "If Tamir Rice's parents would've...."
Or we try to deflect from the real conversation about racism and ask questions like, "What about black on black crime? Why don't black people care about that?." Firstly, black people do care. Secondly, they do protest it, which just doesn't get the press coverage that black conflict gets on mainstream media.
Even comments like "Most police are good" are harmful. Yes, I agree that most police are good, but we're focusing on the ones who aren't. It is clear that there is an issue with the police and/or police training that needs to be addressed in this country. This has been going on for decades and as an example, Chicago operates Homan Square, a secret police site used to illegally hold and torture primarily black Chicagoans.
Here is a list of all the black people killed by police across America from 1999-2014, if you still need more proof.
So what can white Americans do?
Listen to black people when they share experiences about race.
Some white Americans would rather go out of their way to find the most random black person saying how race isn't a problem anymore and that black America just needs to "get over it" than actually listen to the overwhelming amount of black narratives and stories that show how racism is still so prevalent in our country. Rule of thumb, if it is just a black person sitting in their car talking about how racism isn't real anymore you need a more credible source — and for that matter, if you only quote Ben Carson as your "black source," you again need find a more credible source.
Read articles, books, and narratives about race. The authors of these writings should be black.
There is a plethora of researched articles and books about race out there. It may not be comfortable to learn about how racism benefits us as white people and what white privilege is and does for us, but if you really want to consider yourself empathic or even Christian for that matter, then you need to spend the time educating yourself. Here are a few good places to start.
STOP listening to white people on the news tell you about black people.
This isn't specific to any news or TV station (although some are much worse than others). But, if you are getting your information about issues of race, including but not limited to police abuses, violence, protests, racism, etc. solely from white talking heads, you need to stop and refer back to the previous point #2.
Put yourself in the minority.
Go to areas of the city that aren't white. The first step with this point is realizing that yes, you are welcome and yes, it is safe. (No you won't be killed, robbed, raped or shot at---actually the odds are better that those things would happen in a white area, but that is a different article.) Try to take the images portrayed in movies out of your head. Try to limit your unnecessary fears. Use websites like Yelp & Trip Advisor to help you figure out where you want to go. There are great places to eat, shop, and see in black communities no matter what city you live in. When you go, plan to interact, not just observe "another culture."
Teach your children that black people aren't scary, by your words and actions.
The words you use around children are powerful; strike ghetto and thug from your language to describe places and people. Watch movies and shows with black leads or majority black actors. If possible, have your kids interact with kids who aren't white, in situations where they are equals. Also refer back to my previous point #4.
A former black student of mine wrote an article titled, "The Reason I Can't Have White Friends." The title is sad and justified and the words are powerful. But, we white people need to read his words and then start educating our children and ourselves.
I have grown tired of having to explain to people why mouthing off to police shouldn't get me killed. I am tired of having to try twice as hard to smile on the train so people aren't automatically afraid of me. I am tired of being afraid of police officers as they drive past my house or walk by me on the street. I am tired of being too afraid of police violence to go to the public pool, walk down the street, go to the movie theater walk with skittles or exist in my own skin. But I am unable to express this pain to people other than those of my own race. It is almost impossible to get other people to understand my pain. It is even harder to get people to acknowledge that the pain I and my people feel is even real. We live in a "post-racial" target="_blank">society but it seems that this "post-racial" target="_blank">attitude has tricked people into thinking that denying racism will completely destroy it.
~*~
David Stieber is a father, husband, CPS teacher of History. Dave is passionately committed to promoting and improving urban public education, while simultaneously improving the lives of his students. He earned his masters in Urban Education Policy Studies from the University of Illinois at Chicago. You can follow Dave on Twitter at D_Stieber.
]]>Overall it was as solid a showing of political strength and, perhaps more impressively, unity, as has been seen in some time in this highly-involved turf, where politics is sometimes blood sport but which, because of its high degree of involvement and awareness, can also be a barometer and influencer. Voters turn out in Evanston and the surrounding areas in higher-than-average numbers in even relatively uncontested primary years; if anything newsworthy or cause-like is in the mix, the effect for a candidate (such as for Barack Obama in 2008) can be large, even in down-ballot races. Unlike some regions where there is enormous drop-off from top to bottom of the ballot, if a voter in Evanston or Wilmette actually makes it out to vote in a primary, about 85% of the time he or she votes in races all the way down to judge and committeeman. The dynamics are similar for the lakefront city wards where turnout is lower but interest level of those who do vote is keen.
The combo of high registration, relatively high turnout, and high participation in lower-ballot races gave County Commissioner and Evanstonian Larry Suffredin healthy pluralities in these areas in his 2008 bid for State's Attorney. Evanston and New Trier gave Suffredin outright majorities and a combined 12,000-vote bump, with Edgewater and Rogers Park adding another 2500-vote plurality. While these margins were not enough to provide Suffredin a W -- he came in a close third in both the suburbs and the city -- they made the race tight.
In the 6-way melee of 2008, Alvarez was the field's sole female. 2016's is a more-digestible (for voters) three-way contest, between three women. It is unclear yet how the family money of the third candidate, Donna More, will impact the race, to say nothing of how Democratic voters at large will feel about her $2500 contribution to Bruce Rauner (assuming they ever hear of it) or that she voted in the 2014 GOP primary. But it is safe to say that, in the turf between uptown and Ravinia, voters will be informed about such matters.
Foxx is an impressive speaker with a compelling personal story, beginning with a childhood in Cabrini-Green. She evinces sincere passion about being driven to improve government and make the office of state's attorney work for the many who feel, especially of late, that the prosecutor's office is simply one more cog in the machinery tilted against average folks.
On top of her own considerable political pluses, Foxx will have the benefit of the emotion currently surging around Alvarez's handling of the Laquan McDonald shooting case, which, one must remember, is only the latest in a series of negative headlines for that office. Alvarez's treatment of the Northwestern University students who worked on wrongful-death cases remains a particular sore spot in Evanston. Foxx will be running in a presidential-year primary that, assuming Clinton, Sanders, and O'Malley are still on the ballot, will generate high interest and turnout tho likely short of the throngs that came out for Barack Obama. If anything, Sanders voters can be expected to be overwhelmingly anti-Alvarez.
It's no stretch to imagine that the wards and townships represented Sunday in Evanston could give Foxx a 25,000-or-more bump. If Suffredin had enjoyed such a plurality in 2008, he would have won the suburbs, in a race where a 17,000-vote swing would have changed the overall outcome.
It's a big county. Evanston, Wilmette, Rogers Park and their neighbors don't necessarily represent how an election will go down in Cicero, Pilsen, Norwood Park, or Englewood (tho Evanston is usually a pretty good predictor of how Oak Park and Hyde Park will go). Alvarez, in office for seven years, enjoys much higher name recognition than Foxx or More. Political calculus related more to who is friend or foe of Preckwinkle will play a part in many areas. But, on the north lakefront where "good government" still resonates, "Black Lives Matter" signs can be seen even in overwhelmingly-white neighborhoods, and many back up their beliefs by writing checks, the state's attorney race is taking on the nature of a Cause. Foxx is the beneficiary, able to run not just as the "anti-Anita" but with cred of her own. Sunday's launch signals an overwhelming "Cook County nor'easter" of plurality for Foxx, a hazardous wind for an Alvarez campaign that has already taken on a lot of water.
]]>Ford's bill is of course not submitted arbitrarily. With a recent poll suggesting an outright majority of Chicagoans want Rahm Emanuel to resign, Emanuel being steadfast that he will not do so, and no existing legal mechanism in place by which Emanuel might otherwise be removed from office, HB4356 could very well become a very hot topic in Springfield.
]]> Bearing in mind that the specifics are liable to change via amendment, Ford's bill contains the following provisions:Perhaps the most interesting aspect of Ford's legislation as currently written is that the election to remove the incumbent mayor would be separate from the election to replace that person. This is a different approach than has been used in high-profile recall elections over the last couple of decades, most notably the successful recall of California Governor Gray Davis in 2003 and the unsuccessful recall of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker in 2012. While the methods in those two gubernatorial elections were not identical, in both cases, there was only one election. In California, there were two separate votes on the same ballot: one as to whether to recall Davis or not, and the other as to who would replace him (which was famously won by Arnold Schwarzenegger). In Wisconsin, there was no separate recall vote at all; instead it was essentially just a new gubernatorial election, which Walker won outright.
Expect Ford's bill to change slightly, because bills like this rarely go through exactly as originally written.
Of course, just because the bill has been submitted does not mean it will even come to a vote. Perhaps the most intriguing question surrounding the introduction of this bill is whether House Speaker Michael Madigan will even allow it to come to the floor.
Give Ford credit for pushing the issue. Notably, he has done so three months before a primary election for state legislators, which should put pressure on many of them to get on board with his bill. When an apparent outright majority of voters express an opinion that an incumbent should resign, basic tenets of democracy compel that voters be given an opportunity to pursue that belief. Springfield has rarely been a place where basic tenets of democracy have won the day, but these are highly unusual circumstances.
One thing to bear in mind is that it is entirely feasible that even if Ford's bill makes it through the legislature, and even if over 100,000 valid signatures are collected on a recall petition, and even if popular and prominent candidates emerge as would-be replacements, Emanuel could very well survive a recall election. After all, Scott Walker survived his recall, and in the process, made an even more prominent national name for himself. It would take several months before a recall election could take place, between getting the legislation passed, collecting the recall signatures, and scheduling the election, and by the summer of 2016, everyone who voted for Emanuel may very well feel he's nevertheless better than any prospective alternatives.
Speculating on the eventual outcome, though, is getting ahead of ourselves. First Ford has to navigate his bill through the legislature. And he'll need a lot of help -- and probably also luck -- along the way.
]]>The suit may have been overlooked here due to more sensational events, or because lawsuits against the State over its fiscal mess are no longer news; half a dozen have been filed, and court orders are part of how Illinois keeps spending money despite no budget in place. However, unusual in this case is the judge's language used in granting a TRO. In his order, Judge LeChien wrote on Nov. 25 that the inability of "the Governor and the General Assembly to perform duties makes essential services and assistance headed for a chaotic bust." The court charged both the executive and legislative branches of Illinois government with adopting a "fiddling while Rome burns posture" that forces the courts to act.
Governor Rauner says that the legislature - where the Democrats hold large majorities theoretically able to override a veto -- never gave him a balanced budget. Democratic leaders counter that the governor is holding the budget hostage to unrelated issues that are part of his "turnaround agenda." Who's right? Actually, both, and both are presenting only part of the picture, and avoiding their own responsibility.
The governor has the duty under state law - specifically, Article VIII, Section 2 of the Illinois constitution - to prepare and propose a balanced budget to the legislature. Gov. Rauner never did that, submitting a budget that relied on pension reform savings that most observers (correctly) thought would not be realized.
The governor, however, only proposes. The legislature's role under the same constitutional section is to pass a balanced budget, implemented via an appropriations bill. The legislature never did its job, either, sending the governor spending bills admittedly billions out of balance. In other words, Gov. Rauner proposed a budget that depended on unicorns; the legislature responded by insisting that those unicorns be ridden by flying monkeys.
Normally, negotiation would lead to a more realistic menagerie, but unrelated issues have stalled the process. The governor has been insisting that Democrats yield on some issues that are part of his so-called "turnaround agenda," most prominently making Illinois workers compensation claims harder, capping lawsuit awards, and making labor law changes that would weaken unions' ability to collectively bargain. Characterizing these requests as "extreme," the Democrats have refused to put them on the table, and accuse the governor of wrongly holding the budget hostage to political agenda.
On this last point the Democrats are correct. Let's be clear: Illinois's fiscal problems are not primarily due to public sector labor organizing, private lawsuits, or workers compensation. I've represented businesses and worked with them for decades, and while there are many complaints against Illinois government, rarely if ever have I heard these issues highlighted in business's struggles or as reason to leave Illinois. Nor do they relate, except indirectly, to the Illinois budget.
Rather, the public and press need to realize that these are political volleys aimed at specific groups. Labor, especially public sector unions such as the plaintiffs in the health insurance lawsuit, is the largest organized Democratic-leaning constituency, at least in terms of campaign contributions. Although unions can and do back Republicans, overall they skew blue. Similarly, the "trial lawyers," by which is meant not all litigators, but those who mainly represent plaintiffs or workers, are consistent Democratic supporters in Illinois. Workers comp hurdles and so-called "tort reform" take money directly from the injured, and, because such suits are typically compensated on a contingent basis, from the pockets of the plaintiffs' bar.
Thus, Rauner's insistence on his "turnaround agenda" amounts to asking, as a precondition of negotiations, that the Democrats throw some key allies under the bus, and agree to weaken themselves as a party for the next election. Obviously, the Democrats will never do this, and Rauner knows it, and to continue to insist on it is pointless, naïve, phony, or all three. This refrain has legs only so long as mainstream media treat it as normal politics or a legitimate bargaining approach. Be clear: the "turnaround agenda" precondition is not a viable bargaining tactic. It is a non-starter deal-killer.
At the same time, it is hard to extend sympathy to the Democrats because the fiasco is also due to their putting politics first. Illinois in 2011 staved off fiscal shipwreck by a so-called "temporary" income tax increase from a puny flat 3% , one of the nation's lowest, to 5%. The additional revenue went almost entirely toward paying down pension shortfalls. Everyone who paid any attention to this issue knew that, and also knew that if the income tax increase was not extended and/or made permanent by 2015, Illinois either would once again fall further behind on its pension obligations, or would have to divert the equivalent of the tax increase to pensions, forcing large, unprecedented cuts in state spending that it could not responsibly do. Again: everyone knew this. So, most expected that the Democrats, in 2014 when they not only controlled the legislature but also the governor's office, would extend or make permanent the 5% rate, even though no one wants to have voted for a "tax increase" in an election year.
Instead, the Democrats, despite holding overwhelming legislative majorities that included a number of legislators not even running for re-election, first failed to do so during the 2014 session, and then, to the shock of many, also failed to do so after the election. The buzz in Springfield with respect to the latter failure was that the Democrats did not want to shoulder blame for the higher rate while giving the incoming governor enough funds to work with, and so would insist that the Republicans, who presumably also knew that the 5% income tax rate was necessary to balance the budget, contribute some initiative and votes for the necessary revenue.
How anyone could have imagined that the incoming governor, who for all of 2014 had used the spectre of a tax extension as a cudgel with which to pound Pat Quinn, would suddenly change his tune, is a mystery. Did the Democrats, who argued to the public for months that Bruce Rauner was the Illinois avatar of Scott Walker, secretly think that Rauner once sworn in would turn pragmatist and promote the very increase he railed against? Rauner himself called his victory a mandate for lower taxes. Given the chance to effectively defund government without the necessity of a vote such as California's Proposition 13, Rauner and some conservatives leapt at it. The Democratic gambit, if that was what it was, was unsound, and the current wreck is what one expects when two drivers play a game of chicken and no one flinches.
Any lawsuit between parties to a relationship - a contract, a marriage, a lease - is a statement that the relationship has broken down. Here, however, the suits by thousands of State employees symbolize that the wreckage extends beyond the parties involved. More like a plane crash landing on the Kennedy Expressway.
Governor Rauner for the good of the state needs to stand down. Adding ornaments to a Christmas tree violates fundamental principles of traditional conservative lawmaking. If ideas have enough merit on their own, let them be introduced, debated, and voted up or down by the legislature in session. To hold a budget hostage to non-budget issues is admission that such ideas can't pass on their own. While the tactic has become common in D.C., it's part of the reason Congress is detested, and it is wrong, immoral given the stakes, to use extortion putting the entire state in jeopardy, to try to ram through proposals that lack popular or legislative support.
The Democrats, in turn, have the obligation to pass a balanced budget and present it to the governor. Moreover, they must use their majorities. Not one Democratic seat was lost in 2014. What is the point of exhorting the rank-and-file to elect "veto-proof" majorities if they are not used? The state party does not hesitate to deploy political muscle, even in primaries where any winner would still be a dependable Democratic vote. Lawmakers every year jump on command to pass rules and shell bills that strengthen leadership's hand. What is the point of party if it does not enact legislation that reflects its brand? Extension of the income tax to preserve vital programs reflects overwhelming Democratic principles. Democrats, rather than running from fear of voter backlash, need to do what must be done, own it, and expend political capital and actual capital on explaining why they did the responsible thing.
Governor Rauner, stand down. Democratic Party, step up. Do what you need to do before other events and actors, beginning with more court orders, force you to step aside.
]]>Mayor Rahm Emanuel says he didn't watch the video of a Chicago police officer shooting a citizen in cold blood because he then couldn't be asked about it. Which is the perfect Chicago move. In fact, it crystallizes the city's longstanding attitude toward police abuses: if nobody has access to information, nobody can be expected to act.
The body that's supposed to be keeping police accountable, the Independent Police Review Authority, does almost nothing to track patterns of police misconduct and brutality. When reviewing a complaint, it does not make inquiries into any previous complaints against the same officer. Although the agency says it now has an early warning system for repeat offenders, that system identified only six percent of the officers with 11 or more complaints.
~*~
Susan Bandes is the Centennial Distinguished Professor of Law at DePaul University and a 2015 Public Voices Fellow of The Oped Project.
]]>The only Illinois congressman called out by Volsky was Rep. Peter Roskam (R, 6th), who received $2,000 from the NRA in 2014, $3,000 in 2012, $2,000 in 2010 and more going further back.
Please keep #SanBernardino in your thoughts and prayers this evening. Our hearts are heavy for the victims and their families.
— Peter Roskam (@PeterRoskam) December 2, 2015
Got $2,000 from NRA during the 2014 cycle to address gun violence by keeping victims in his "thoughts and prayers" https://t.co/WXgCYxFbbR
— igorvolsky (@igorvolsky) December 3, 2015
But according to OpenSecrets.org, several other congressmen and women from Illinois have benefited from NRA contributions -- six of whom are still serving in Washington. Here's a look at how they reacted to the San Bernardino shooting.
]]> Rep. Mike Bost (R, 12th) received $2,000 from the NRA in 2014. He said nothing about the San Bernardino shooting, instead posting about the US Capitol Christmas tree.The beautiful US Capitol Christmas tree is now fully illuminated. Breathtaking! #CapitolChristmasTree pic.twitter.com/zGymwivjPr
— Rep. Mike Bost (@RepBost) December 2, 2015
Rep. Rodney Davis (R, 13th) joined Bost in praising the tree, and boasted of passing a bill protecting coal-fired power plants while Obama was at the global climate summit in Paris.
As pres returned from Paris climate summit, we sent bills blocking EPA regs est to double # of coal plant closures https://t.co/6qjPbRCrai
— US Rep Rodney Davis (@RodneyDavis) December 2, 2015
Davis was the greatest NRA beneficiary in Illinois in the 2014 election cycle, receiving $7,450 in contributions.
Rep. Randy Hultgren, (R, 14th) spent Dec. 2 tweeting about a #SpaceChat with ISS astronauts. He received $2,000 from the NRA in 2014.
Among other ?s, I asked #ISS astronauts which continent they were orbiting above. Response: southern part of South America. #SpaceChat
— Rep. Randy Hultgren (@RepHultgren) December 2, 2015
Rep. John Shimkus (R, 15th) also received $2,000 from the NRA in 2014. He tweeted his prayers to the San Bernardino victims.
Praying for the victims and all those affected by today's senseless violence in San Bernardino.
— John Shimkus (@RepShimkus) December 2, 2015
Rep. Adam Kinzinger's (R, 16th) only activity Wednesday was to retweet a National Weather Service bulletin for his district. He received $2,000 from the NRA in 2014.
No Illinois Democrats in the House received campaign donations from the NRA in 2014 -- and neither did Senators Dick Durbin and Mark Kirk. Durbin was very active on Twitter after the shooting, noting that more than 350 mass shootings have occurred already this year, and urging fellow legislators to action. Kirk in fact has been very pro-gun control, and the NRA has given him an F rating the last several years. Still, Kirk's only Twitter activity yesterday was to call for Iran to release journalist Jason Rezaian.
After 500 unjust days in prison, #Iran must release Jason Rezaian. Freedom of press should be a universal right. https://t.co/d69iOFvttj
— Mark Kirk (@SenatorKirk) December 2, 2015
Want to do something beyond just scold a politician on Twitter? Find your representative and contact them directly.
]]>Mr. Mayor, the public can have no faith in you at this point, and you need to resign.
That felt great, didn't it?
Now, back to reality.
]]> First, Rahm is going to do everything he can to weather this storm. I'd be thrilled to see him go, but we can't expect that to happen. He's less than a year into a four-year term. He's going to try to rebuild his reputation somehow.Second, much in the same way that the firing of Superintendent Garry McCarthy does not magically solve the systemic problems within the Chicago Police Department, the mayor's departure would not be some kind of magic cure-all. We all know better than that.
The public is angry, though, and there is a possibility here to get focused on systemic change in a way that the city has perhaps never seen. To borrow from the mayor himself, Rahm is in serious crisis, and the public shouldn't let this serious crisis go to waste.
There are multiple pressure points available that, for many reasons, are not traditionally available. The Machine in Chicago and across Illinois generally does a thorough job of locking the public out. The systemic problems which Laquan McDonald's death are shining a light on go beyond the police department and the fifth floor of City Hall. All of these governmental institutions are interlocking, and bringing thorough change means focusing on more than just the figureheads at the top of the most visible hierarchies.
Conceptually, Chicago has a "weak mayor, strong council" system. I'll pause now so you can stop laughing.
From time to time people will talk about how the City Council should be more than just a rubber stamp. Chicago magazine weighed in a couple of years ago. NBC5's Ward Room threw a bit in at the beginning of Rahm's first term, referencing a Tribune article which on the one hand seems like a perverse joke, but which may actually portend the potential for changes to come. There's a wonderful quote from a Chicago alderman in the Tribune article which gets to the heart of the matter:
"The City Council is the only legislative body in the Western world that acts like the Soviet Politburo... He [Emanuel] doesn't have inherent power. We surrender it."
Now, that quote is from 49th Ward Alderman Joe Moore, who has honed the fine art of surrender over the last four-plus years. But let's simply regard what Moore said then as an acknowledgment that the City Council is well aware that they have latent power which could be brought to bear. And now, they have an opportunity to flex that power, with Rahm being very politically weak.
Committee Chairs. You might be forgiven for thinking that the mayor appoints the chairs of the various City Council committees, because that's how the story always tends to get reported. The reality is a little different. Look at the Council Rules yourself. [PDF] On page 10 you'll find that the Council itself, by resolution, appoints the officers and the members of the various committees. These assignments are often adopted en masse, having been worked out behind the scenes under the leadership of the mayor, but there's absolutely nothing stopping the Council from adopting a new resolution which would change out a given committee chair.
If you think this doesn't matter, you're wrong. Mayoral allies typically chair committees, and they're in place to ensure that legislation the mayor does not like will not even progress to a vote.
Here's a nice tidy list of chairs who should be sacked immediately:
Committee on Education and Child Development: Will Burns is an ardent charter proponent who has personally blocked a Council resolution in favor of a charter moratorium. That resolution has over 40 aldermen signing on. There's no excuse to allow Burns to continue in this role.
Committee on Finance: Ed Burke was one of the actual antagonists in the Council Wars during Harold Washington's years. He's an absolute system man and it would send a particularly strong message that times have changed to finally replace him with someone who actually cares what average Chicagoans think.
Committee on Health and Environmental Protection: George Cardenas is a quintessential yes man who long stood on the sidelines on the question of closing the Fisk and Crawford coal plants which were spewing largely into his ward. Almost anybody would be a better choice for this seat.
Committee on Public Safety: Gee, maybe Chicago has a problem with public safety these days. Ariel Reboyras has clearly done nothing with his chairmanship to provide any kind of oversight or investigation. This one should be a slam dunk replacement.
Beyond the committees, there are some obvious additional places for the City Council to get some work done.
The existing Independent Police Review Authority, which is widely understood to be an unmitigated disaster, has its composition and functions defined in city ordinance. That means it's on the City Council -- not the mayor -- to give it actual independent authority, and to give it some actual teeth. Dumping Reboyras as committee chair is probably a prerequisite to getting this to happen.
The City Council can also strengthen the Office of Inspector General. It might not bother with such things, given how it completely handcuffed the Legislative Inspector General (who serves as the watchdog over the Council itself), but if ever there was a time to give transparency a boost, this is it.
And that is of course but a short list of things the City Council could be formally doing. The key element here is for people to understand that this is the time for the Council to demonstrate whether, on the whole, it's actually on the mayor's side or not. There should be enough potential now for more votes to be brought to the floor, and for more aldermen to be forced to be accountable to their constituents.
First, let's be clear that no help is going to come from Governor Bruce Rauner. Everything here is suggested on the basis that not only do the Democrats have what is supposed to be a veto-proof majority, but also that more reasonable Republicans should be willing to cross over and defy Rauner on several of these points.
The main reason why it's such a joke to think of Chicago as having a "weak mayor" system is because the mayor's authority also extends beyond traditional mayoral roles into realms like education, parks and libraries.
It is high time that Chicago had an elected school board. Every other district in the state directly elects its school board. This is not just a matter of democracy, but also a matter of practicality. At a time like this, it should be abundantly obvious that the same person shouldn't be trying to manage both police policy and also school policy. Both of those things demand too much attention. State Representative Robert Martwick (D-19) is confident that his elected school board bill (HB4268) will be passed in 2016, and every single Democratic legislator who hasn't signed on yet should now be feeling pressure from their constituents to do so.
And let's not stop there. The mayor shouldn't be in charge of the Chicago City Colleges either. Much like school boards, community college boards are elected everywhere else in Illinois. A parallel bill for an elected City Colleges board should be rolled out and passed in 2016. The structure could be so similar that once Martwick's bill goes through its final amendments, someone should be able to mostly copy and paste over into a second bill.
The park board and library board should be elected as well. In most parts of the state, these are also elected offices. Again, any mayor would have his or her hands full with public safety, transportation, streets and sanitation, zoning and all of the other responsibilities which would remain untouched. The parks and libraries are already separate taxing entities, and they should no longer be controlled by the mayor's office.
The General Assembly can also address some of the more problematic aspects of Chicago elections. One problem -- actually caused by the General Assembly itself in recent years -- was the doubling of signature requirements for aldermanic races. As I've written about in the past, higher requirements have disproportionately difficult impacts on minority wards. That change should be rolled back.
Currently, if an alderman resigns or dies in office, the mayor is allowed to appoint a replacement, who can serve until the next Chicago municipal elections. This approach has allowed for such things as Dick Mell resigning as 33rd Ward Alderman and the appointment of his daughter Deb to replace him. Once aldermen become incumbents, even for short periods of time, it becomes much easier for them to win subsequent elections. The General Assembly can modify this, though, and make it so that in the event of an aldermanic vacancy, the office will be up at the next regular election, whatever that might be. The mayor could possibly still appoint an interim, but this way, if someone leaves office in April 2016, a permanent alderman could be elected in November 2016, instead of a mayoral appointee being allowed to serve for three full years. This would be a critical change in breaking down mayoral power and enhancing democracy.
The General Assembly can also legalize marijuana throughout Illinois, or at the very least, fully decriminalize it so that it is no more than a ticketable offense. Much research has gone into how the Chicago Police Department has approached marijuana and how an extremely disproportionate number of blacks and Latinos have been arrested -- perhaps most notably by former Reader and current Sun-Times writer Mick Dumke. It is not an effective policing strategy, it has bogged down the Cook County courts system, and it contributes greatly to the distrust minority communities feel toward the police. Here is an opportunity for the General Assembly to take a strong, common sense step in addressing policing culture -- and let's not pretend the problem is limited only to Chicago -- and to do so in a way that will save money and help free up currently misapplied police resources.
One reason why the General Assembly is a particularly important pressure point right now is because those primaries are a little over three months away, and in particular numerous House members look to be facing strong challengers. In a district like the 15th, where a Machine Democrat in John D'Amico is facing a progressive in Jac Charlier, the general public connecting the systemic problems in Chicago with the systemic problems in Springfield can be essential in sending new blood to the capital -- new blood that can in turn help enact some of the aforementioned needed legislation.
Assuming that the State's Attorney's race plays out as it currently looks, Kim Foxx will likely trounce Anita Alvarez. But Emanuel and Alvarez have never really been associated with one another politically. Alvarez is not really a proxy for the Mayor. The US Senate race won't work as a proxy race either, because even though Tammy Duckworth owes her career to Rahm, Andrea Zopp is best known for being one of Rahm's appointed school board members.
At the very top of the ticket, though, there is a very real proxy available: Hillary Clinton.
Rahm Emanuel first came to prominence as a staffer in Bill Clinton's White House. Hillary remains a strong ally of the mayor. They're too politically connected as is for them to be able to create any real separation. What activists need to do now is hammer home those connections, and turn them into political issues for Hillary.
The reality is that Rahm is not just under fire at home. The Washington Post and New York Times among others have gone after him. Laquan McDonald, like Mike Brown and Eric Garner, is not local. He is, in death, a national figure, and potentially the most powerful of all because of the video footage. So long as McDonald's death remains a major national story, Emanuel will be the center of that firestorm. And it is eminently appropriate to hammer home the Emanuel-Clinton connection, because it's not simply a personal or strictly political connection. Rahm, Bill and Hillary all represent the neo-liberal bloc of the Democratic Party that has been systematically burying progressive movements for years. This can be seen even now with Hillary's attempted attacks against Bernie Sanders' call for single-payer universal health care.
He would of course need to be tactful and cautious, but if I were advising Sanders today, I'd tell him to do everything he can to keep Laquan McDonald and Rahm Emanuel in the national consciousness. This is not simply a matter of playing politics. McDonald's death reflects an out-of-control police culture, the worst excesses of which might be associated with Chicago, but which is clearly national in scope. In fact, Hillary herself has now called for a federal probe of the CPD. Her camp has already been thinking about precisely what I'm writing here, and they're clearly trying to establish distance from the mayor.
Any further pressure that can be brought to bear nationally will only help with applying pressure locally. Particularly in Chicago, if Sanders and his allies can effectively turn Clinton into an Emanuel proxy, then it will also help boost the chances of non-Machine Democrats downticket. It's important to emphasize here that with an extremely confusing and hotly contested Republican primary underway, no Republicans are likely to cross over. A strong showing of progressives can produce much more prominent results than usual this year.
Is it cynical to suggest that the brutal, horrific killing of a young black man on the streets of Chicago should be regarded as a means of advancing a progressive political agenda? It would be understandable for people to regard it as such.
I would argue that for the most part, it should not be regarded in such cynical terms. When you step back and realize that the political agenda advocated here involves attacking the deep systemic problems which helped cause Laquan McDonald's death, this makes it quite a bit different from what Rahm meant when he made the original "wasted crisis" comment.
But we must also not be so naive as to believe that the cynicism argument doesn't at all apply here. We must be realistic that when we are confronted with horror, while we may be moved to combat it, we are also, in the process, tacitly acknowledging the presence of that horror. We can, and we must, do better as a society. But to do so sometimes frankly requires political opportunism, as much as we wish it weren't the case. It's simply not good enough to hope for change. We have a very complicated political system, and tackling the deep flaws within that system necessitates utilizing systematic approaches which will at times feel similar to approaches used by nominal political rivals.
If Laquan McDonald's death is ultimately going to mean something, and can ultimately be a catalyst for great change in our city and nation and beyond, it will not be because we all joined in a chorus calling for one man to resign his office, or because we felt good in doing so. It will take immense effort on the part of innumerable people, but not just effort. We must not just work harder; we must also work smarter. As much as we might dislike thinking about it in such terms, we must see the current political climate for the opportunity it is.
We can't afford to waste this crisis.
]]>If the footage was so blatant that no less than Rahm Emanuel called it "hideous" (albeit without actually seeing it), then how on earth did it take 400 days for charges to be filed?
I asked that question online. Within an hour, I saw three other variations on that question asked by other people.
Unbelievably, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez gave the answer that she "moved up" filing the charges, saying her original intention was to wait until the concurrent federal investigation had concluded. You can read that article for more of Alvarez's explanation. I'm not going to rehash it here, because there are limits to how much bullshit I can quote.
]]> I've already said it elsewhere and I'll repeat it here: Alvarez should resign over this. But the more I think about it, the more I realize how minor that resignation would be overall.Months ago, NBC5 reported that surveillance video from a nearby Burger King had allegedly been deleted. Then they reported that the dashcam video somehow has no audio.
But the point remains that the facts were clear enough to the City that a settlement has long since been reached with McDonald's family.
We can only hope that the federal investigation which is underway is not merely an investigation into McDonald's death. If justice delayed is justice denied, then the excessive delays smack of Obstruction of Justice. The issues with the videos similarly call into question what has happened in the last 400 days.
The Sun-Times writes about "the process" and how Van Dyke couldn't be summarily fired. While it is understandable that there be some kind of due process in a situation like this, 400 days is not due process. Charges could very well have been filed before the completion of the investigation.
Yes, Alvarez needs to be resign. But that's not all.
If Alvarez doesn't resign, then her remaining supporters among elected officials should publicly withdraw that support. If they don't, then they themselves should be held accountable at the polls.
The Fraternal Order of Police needs to come out and say that they will not, as a matter of course, support an officer in a situation like this. At an absolute minimum, Van Dyke should have been suspended shortly after the shooting, and the evidence should have been substantially overwhelming within the first couple of months for that suspension to be without pay. The FOP has an obligation to the general public and their own officers to accede to a more intelligent process.
Rahm Emanuel needs to not only speak out on McDonald's killing, but publicly say that the police need to accede to greater accountability. And he should give teeth to a true Citizens Review Board, not the existing Independent Police Review Authority. Now, I don't expect the Mayor to do anything like that, of course. But the City Council has a voice here as well, and they should be exercising it.
Eventually, when the feds are done, there better be additional charges against somebody. There must be some accountability for the excessive delay in filing charges and for the circumstances thereof. The feds should closely scrutinize all of the internal communications from the CPD and the office of the State's Attorney and any other governmental entity which inserted itself.
Also in the Sun-Times article is a reference to Van Dyke having been subject to 18 complaints over 14 years, eight involving excessive force, and two involving the use of a firearm. Whatever "process" has allowed someone with such a lengthy record of complaints to stay on the streets is not a process that respects the notion of serving and protecting.
To that end, Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy needs to be fired. The man has clearly not made the police force accountable, and the relationship between the police department and general public is far too poor because of the perception that officers can usually get away with anything. It is not enough to blame the union contract for this. The fundamental relationship between police and the general public needs to change, and McCarthy is clearly incapable of being part of such a change.
I don't usually write about things like this. It's not that I haven't been moved before by other examples of police violence. What strikes the chord here is that I don't see Van Dyke as some random out-of-control cop. I see him as a manifestation of a thorough systemic problem within Chicago, where major law enforcement decisions appear to be routinely made based not on what's best for the general public, but rather on what's best for managing the immediate news cycles.
Speaking out on an issue like this is very difficult. It's kind of like trying to condemn Israel for actions vis-a-vis the Palestinians, while still taking pains to emphasize the condemnation is directed toward the Israeli government. There's an easy knee-jerk reaction when calling out Israeli behavior to simply blow someone off as an anti-Semite, and then the conversation is over. Similarly, there's an easy knee-jerk reaction when law enforcement is called out to blow someone off as a cop-hater, and then the conversation is over. In neither case are most people willing to speak out, because they often feel like they can't relay any kind of nuance, since battle lines are too fixed. (I guarantee that some people will read this and think, oh, that's such a poor analogy to use. But that would just prove the point I'm making.)
The fact is that we need that nuance. We need a more serious conversation about the relationship between police, the State's Attorney's office, and the general public. We need to be able to be critical of CPD without it translating as hating on cops. We need elected officials who will help signal that such a conversation can take place. We need CPD and the FOP to send similar signals.
Most immediately, though, beyond the charges against Van Dyke, what Chicago needs right now is a new State's Attorney. If Alvarez won't go of her own accord, her patrons need to show her the door.
]]>Silver, though, also argues against the disarray argument, by making a fairly simple point: excluding the presidency, Republicans are winning a lot more than they're losing. Even here in Illinois, with Democratic supermajorities in both houses of the General Assembly, the reality is that the Republicans hold the governorship, one U.S. Senate seat, and eight of 18 U.S. House seats. The voting profile of the state would suggest that the Republicans should be doing far worse here.
So are the Republicans in disarray? I think the answer has to be yes. But does it matter very much? Maybe not. As bad as things may seem for the Republicans, they're nevertheless the majority party in the country, based on control of both houses of Congress, a large majority of governorships, and most state legislatures.
The party with the worst problems right now is the Democratic Party, and we can even see this playing out in Illinois.
]]> Much of what I considered writing here, it turned out, had already been written about a month ago by Vox's Matthew Yglesias. In his piece "Democrats are in denial. Their party is actually in real trouble." Yglesias hits on several points, including recent Republican electoral domination -- especially at state levels -- a point that Michael Barone at National Review hammered home after an awful result this month for the Democrats.Yglesias's point which deserves emphasis is this one: recent Republican success is largely predicated on "a reasonable degree of ideological flexibility." Aside from the editorial board of the Tribune, it's been very difficult lately to find anyone with anything nice to say about Bruce Rauner. But Rauner is a fine example of Yglesias's point: No matter what angry words we might use to describe Rauner today -- CTU President Karen Lewis used the word "sociopath" -- the reality is that Rauner didn't run as a Tea Party type of candidate. He ran as a "reformer" and as a self-styled common-sense businessman. Rank and file Republicans embraced Rauner not because he was a staunch social conservative, but because he was striking the right chords with them about fixing government -- and, most importantly, they thought he could win. Ultimately, the voters went along for the ride, though less because they were especially interested in Rauner's agenda and more because they saw Pat Quinn as incompetent and generally deplored state government. And on those two points, at least, who could really disagree?
There is a problem with the ideological flexibility argument, though. Consider a nominally moderate Republican like Mark Kirk. Then consider very right-wing Republicans like the "Freedom Caucus" in Congress. Plot them both on a functional spectrum -- where "functional" is sort of halfway between what they believe and what they actually do. The line on the spectrum between the "centrist" or "moderate" Republicans and the "extreme" Republicans is simply shorter than the comparable line for the Democrats.
Excluding President Obama, the most prominent Democrat from the middle of the country is Rahm Emanuel. Take the functional positions of Obama and Emanuel on numerous issues, from war to charter schools. Now contrast those against some of the local elected Democrats, like members of the Chicago City Council's Progressive Caucus. Mark Kirk is closer to Ted Cruz than Rahm Emanuel is to, say, Carlos Ramirez-Rosa.
As the Republican Party's center has moved further to the right, they've compressed their base ideologically. There might well be a lot of ideological flexibility, but it's flexibility across an increasingly narrow part of the spectrum. It's also flexibility defined more in terms of ideology than in terms of voting records, because at most levels, Republicans are engaging in more and more bloc voting. Someone might go off and rant about Mexicans, someone else might go off and claim to want to shut down the IRS, but both will reliably show up and vote as climate change deniers.
Meanwhile, as the Republicans move even further to the right, they find themselves reliant on their most extreme elements for success. Not only is the base being energized more by what's happening on the far right, but a lot of the money is coming out of that end as well.
For the Democrats, moving further to the right has had a different internal effect. On social issues, energy can be found across a broad swath of the spectrum. On a growing number of issues, though, Democratic energy comes strictly from its left, and that left has been consistently marginalized by party leaders. The Republicans might be in a state of disarray, but the Democrats have stretched themselves so thin on the functional spectrum that they are not set up for success, unless that success is very narrowly defined.
The Democrats hold all but one aldermanic seat in Chicago, and every state legislator serving the city is also a Democrat. But the city is in disarray financially, and the Democratic powers that be are the ones blocking things like the elected school board. Even though the Democrats have a veto-proof majority in both houses of the General Assembly, they somehow can't get anything done.
Mark Kirk should not be in good shape going into his reelection bid. He's made a couple of public blunders. He's voted as much more of a right-winger than he ran as. His health issues are considered a liability. And Illinois is, on paper, a staunchly Democratic state.
But the most likely Democratic challenger is Tammy Duckworth, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Democratic power structure. Her most viable primary opponent is Andrea Zopp, who was one of the Chicago Public Schools board members who authorized the closing of 50 schools. There is no palpable enthusiasm around either one. Duckworth should make it out of the primary, and still has the odds in her favor against Kirk, but her campaign will likely focus on only three themes: she's a woman, she's a disabled war veteran, and she's not a Republican. This isn't "disarray," but how is this any better a place for a political party to be in that wants to regain ascendancy across the country?
The establishment Republicans have come to regard the Tea Party and other "extreme" elements as necessary evils, mostly reliable voters who bring money and energy in. All of this leads to weird public squabbling from time to time, and may well result in some level of dissatisfaction with the eventual Republican nominee, but all of this "disarray" is simply a byproduct of what has proven to be a very successful approach of becoming the country's preeminent party while representing the true interests of only a tiny majority.
The establishment Democrats go out of their way to squash dissent most of the time. Their practice has been that they would rather have a Republican win than have too progressive a Democrat win, because the progressive is more of a viable threat to what they're doing than the Republican is. If progressives ascend within the Democratic Party, then all of the pro-Wall Street, pro-charter school, generally hawkish positions will get buried. These people would rather hold a higher percentage of control of a smaller share of the pie, because it means they personally will retain more control, which is really what they want.
The Republicans are less interested in control in and of itself. Control for them is a means to an end, whether that end be holding taxes down, or maintaining a bloated military, or whatever. For the Democrats, control is more of a pure desire in and of itself. Michael Madigan is the very best example of this today, because the man has no real ideology, and operates as strictly a political animal.
All of this has mostly worked pretty well for Madigan and Emanuel and a handful of other Democrats, because they can maintain so very much control of their immediate domains. But it destroys Democratic chances nationally, at least outside the presidential race.
Rauner, however, is straining this idea. Madigan is used to dealing with the likes of Jim Edgar or George Ryan, Republicans who were willing to play the political game according to more or less the same rules. Rauner isn't doing that. He has exposed the fallacy of Madigan "needing" a supermajority. Some people may point to Rauner's approval ratings hanging around in the 30s and say he's hurting himself. For the most part, I don't think he is. His three predecessors were Quinn, Blagojevich and Ryan. At, say, 35 percent approval, Rauner scores higher than just about any other politician in the state, doesn't he?
On top of all this comes the release of poll numbers which would seem to corroborate my argument. Natasha Korecki at Politico reports on a poll commissioned by the Illinois chapter of Americans for Prosperity which suggests that the legislature -- which really means the Democratic leadership -- is reviled more than the governor for the problem at hand. Now, Americans for Prosperity is a Koch brothers aligned entity, so any poll they commission should be taken with at least a couple of Acuras full of salt. The thing is, I think Rauner is a pragmatist as much as anything, and if his people determined he was losing the public relations battle, he'd have changed course. But it's mid-November, and there's still no budget.
Rauner, I think, has become a bellwether of sorts. The Democrats will go hard after him, but his attitude is that he doesn't care how much people might revile him, so long as the Democrats are at least as unpopular. And, it has to be admitted, this is pretty much exactly how Rod Blagojevich ran his reelection campaign in 2006. "Hey, maybe almost nobody likes me, but at least I'm not a batty old woman, right?"
Which brings us back to the presidential race. The fight for the Republican presidential nomination is legitimately fascinating, but I would put 90 percent odds that when it's done, the nominee is either Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio or John Kasich. The disarray is real, but it's just part of a crazy overall narrative.
It's the Democrats who are really in trouble. Several months ago I considered Hillary Clinton to be a strong favorite to win the presidency next November. If I were going to wager today, I'd put my money on the Republicans winning. I think their ultimate strategy looks a lot like what Rauner is pulling off right now. "We know we're not all that likable, but we don't think Hillary is likable either, so we're not even going to worry too much about being liked. We're just going to control the discourse, and the public is going to be unhappy, and that will work in our favor."
But then there is another element to it. As much as some Republicans may not like their more "conservative" elements, the reality is, the Republican establishment would be far happier to see President Ted Cruz than the Democratic establishment would be to see President Bernie Sanders. For that matter, I think even the Democratic establishment would rather see Cruz win than Sanders.
Rank and file Democrats need to wake up. Their party is less internally democratic than the Republicans are and their leaders -- people who they don't even agree with on so many issues -- are no more likable than the Republicans they think everyone should be despising. The Republicans are content to embrace disarray and enable the people they don't agree with, because they think it ultimately serves their interest anyway. But so long as Democrats keep enabling the very people who have marginalized them, the Republicans will ride that disarray straight to the White House.
]]>Last week, I focused on the inadequacy of safety protocols for incidents like this. That theme was picked up on by the Reader's Ben Joravsky, who still can't get over how the main school building had no detectors. Had there just been one properly functioning detector, installed in a manner such that it would have alerted school administrators, the worst of the incident never would have occurred.
With that said, the leak did occur. It is critical that all parents citywide should focus on safety protocols at their own schools, but some of the questions about what happened at Prussing, and what is happening in the aftermath, still need to be answered. Not only does the incident itself need to better understood, but so too does the waffling CPS response, and how parents are responding to what they're seeing.
]]> First, two disclaimers are in order. I'm an elected member of the Prussing Local School Council, and getting the boiler system at Prussing replaced, or substantially overhauled, is a top priority for me. Second, it's been over two decades since I had a chemistry class, so I needed a little help in making sure I knew what I was talking about, so here's a shout out to Mike Davis, professor at Truman College. (If I have any of the science here wrong, it's not Mike's fault. I just haven't had a chemistry class in over two decades. They let me take astronomy in college.)In simple terms, a boiler is a big water tank where the water is heated until converted to steam, most commonly by burning natural gas. The primary component of natural gas is methane. In a hypothetically ideal combustion environment, pure methane would combine with pure oxygen gas, and when reacted upon by flame, the burning of those gasses would result in the release of three byproducts: water vapor, carbon dioxide, and heat. This formula might bring you back:
CH4 + 4O2 -> CO2 + 2H2O
Natural gas is not pure methane, though, and ambient air is not pure oxygen, and there's no such thing as a 100 percent efficient combustion system. In short, there's no such thing as a "perfect" boiler.
The device which failed on Oct. 30 was a gas regulator. Gas regulators control the amount of natural gas that can enter the combustion chamber. If the regulator doesn't work correctly, the methane-to-oxygen ratio will be off. If there is too little methane, the system won't be efficient and won't burn hot enough and the school will be cold. But if there is too much methane, then the methane that does enter does not burn completely. To oversimplify, in such a situation, there are not enough oxygen atoms to go around for all of the carbon atoms, so instead of the carbon atoms bonding with two oxygen atoms to form a highly stable compound, some carbon atoms bond with only one oxygen atom. In other words, instead of just carbon dioxide, you also get some carbon monoxide.
Again, no boiler is "perfect." All such systems can be expected to produce some amount of carbon monoxide. But a system which is working properly will produce a very small amount of carbon monoxide, at a level very safe for people.
Based on the information that the gas regulator failed, it can be reasonably presumed that the failed regulator was allowing too much natural gas into the system. The methane was in turn not being completely combusted, which led to overproduction of carbon monoxide. CPS has not addressed the question of how or why the regulator failed, but it may very well not be knowable. A regulator is a sensitive mechanical device that relies on pressurization levels to function properly. If debris like soot or dirt were to somehow get into the regulator, it could fail. It could also just wear out over time.
The regulator is part of a much larger system, including not only the boiler proper, but also numerous valves and pipes, the radiators throughout the school building, and numerous electric controls which would instruct the boiler when to operate and at what level, not unlike how a home thermostat can send a signal to a furnace to fire up. From all of the available information, it is not known (and may not be knowable) whether the regulator failed on its own, or whether the regulator's failure was likely or necessarily related to other issues with the system. It is also not known whether the regulator suddenly failed, or if that process took time. Given that the detector in the boiler room apparently did not work at all, it is possible that the carbon monoxide leak had been present for a while, and only reached more serious levels because Oct. 30 was up to that point the coldest day of the school year.
There is an additional issue beyond the leak and the lack of detection, and that is the question of how the carbon monoxide managed to enter the school at all. The boiler room is in a separate mechanical building, connected to the main building by a tunnel. At least they know where the tunnel is.
The distance between the mechanical building and the main building is about 60 feet. The mechanical building has a smoke stack, dating to when the boiler system would have been coal-fired. There is also a visible exhaust louver on the side of the mechanical building. For carbon monoxide to have exited the boiler room through the tunnel and into the main building, instead of exhausting through the smoke stack and louver, would mean that no exhaust fan was running in the mechanical building, and the main building had negative pressurization relative to the mechanical building. Even if the boiler system itself were operating properly, the pressurization between the buildings should never be like that.
The boiler system has had a history of problems with which CPS was well aware. (Prussing's system actually has two boilers, and as of this time, it is not clear which of the two boilers was involved.) While the cited issues never specifically addressed the regulator or the potential for a carbon monoxide leak, the following timeframe helps establish how parents and Prussing staff might reasonably point to the boiler's history. These notes were originally compiled from publicly available Prussing LSC minutes by Eileen Espinosa, a parent representative:
Jan. 8, 2013 - The principal reported that the boiler room had water seepage and was out of compliance and the boiler room heating unit needed to be replaced; and that this information was faxed to CPS Facilities on Jan. 3, 2013.
Aug. 29, 2013 - The principal reported that the heater in the boiler room needed to be replaced.
Sept. 26, 2013 - The principal reported that the boiler needed repairs and the steam traps had still not been addressed.
Jan. 10, 2014 - The principal reported that in submitting a questionnaire response to CPS Facilities, he reported that the boiler room provided a structural concern and needed to be addressed, and that he had rated the school's heating system as poor.
Jan. 20, 2015 - The principal reported that the school could only have one of two boilers operational at any given time, as both units had issues and were not reliable. He further reported that CPS Facilities and Capital were aware of the issues and several individuals had been at the school to try and resolve the problems, but that the ultimate problem is that the boilers simply needed to be replaced.
Feb. 10, 2015 - The principal reported that the boilers required periodic manual adjustments during the day for them to operate properly, per the facilities manager. The principal further reported that since Prussing did not have a full-time engineer, the roving engineer would stop by periodically to check on the system on days the school engineer was not present.
March 10, 2015 - The principal reported that boiler one was still awaiting the installation of a gas pressure pump, and that boiler two had a fan which was acting up and blowing fuses. The engineer had told the principal that boiler two was "on its last leg" and that all of this had been reported to Facilities.
April 21, 2015 - The principal provided a list of building issues to the LSC, including the need for new boilers, pneumatic controllers, actuators, and fresh air intake dampers for the main building.
Sept. 11, 2015 - Prussing failed a health inspection, in part because of standing water found in the boiler room, as a result of one or both boilers leaking.
Oct. 21, 2015 - The principal reported that CPS had corrected the issues with the boilers which had led to the failed health inspection.
It should again be stressed here that across all of the reported problems, none specifically mentioned a gas regulator or the potential for a carbon monoxide leak. Nevertheless, a clear pattern emerges, dating back 33 months, of numerous reported issues with the boiler system, numerous times the LSC had been informed that the boilers actually needed to be replaced, and numerous times it was specifically mentioned that CPS Facilities had been made aware of the situation. One other item of particular note is the April 2015 report that the fresh air intake dampers on the main building needed to be replaced, calling into question whether this was a potential cause of the negative pressurization of the building.
Inexplicably, given the history of the boiler system, this is the response the Prussing LSC received from CPS officials on Nov. 9:
We understand the school community is requesting a new boiler, and we are committed to a long-term solution that prioritizes the student's safety. At this point, it is unclear if a new boiler is necessary or if other elements of the heating system need to be upgraded to ensure the lasting stability of the system; this is part of our investigative process.
On the day of the leak, some teachers, unable to control the level of heat in their rooms, actually had their windows open. In other words, the carbon monoxide leak could have been worse, and sent more kids to the hospital, had the controls for the heating system actually worked properly. To borrow from Kurt Vonnegut: I had to laugh like hell.
One thing that the LSC did not receive in its response was the concurrent information that CPS has suspended the school's engineer. This is the same engineer noted above as having repeatedly informed CPS that the boilers needed to be repaired or replaced. With no other information available about the investigation, and with the way the word got out -- having not even bothered to inform the LSC directly but instead telling the press first -- the immediate reaction from parents has been even more heightened anger. It's as though CPS can't even try to find a scapegoat effectively.
In the narrative for the FY2014 capital budget, CPS includes the following language under a section header called "Guiding Principles":
Health/safety must be maintained. Because the scope of our capital investment is limited, we are focusing directly on investments to protect the health and safety of the students, teachers, and adults in the school community. This means repairing masonry that is cracked and at risk of crumbling, chimneys that are in danger of collapse, roofs that are leaking and causing interior damage, and boilers that are in urgent need of replacement.
In the 2013 Educational Facilities Master Plan, the boiler system at Prussing had not been identified as being "in urgent need of replacement." Instead, the report on Prussing from February 2013 assigned the primary boiler assembly a composite rank of 4, where 4 means "The item/system has reached its expected useful life, but is still fully operational. CPS will maintain until replacement occurs." Clearly, the system has degraded since that report was written, or the report missed some less obvious problems with the system.
The same report also suggests that the sum total expense for replacing the boiler system would be under $700,000. A recent boiler replacement project at a different CPS school was $3,000,000, so it is hard to say with certainty what expense might be incurred at Prussing. But given the totality of the information available, and what has happened at the school, why would any parent of a Prussing student conclude anything else than that the boiler system is "in urgent need of replacement," and would expect CPS to hold to its "Guiding Principle" that "health/safety must be maintained"?
It's not exactly a secret that CPS is not in good financial shape. For the sake of argument, though, let's set aside massive chunks of financial issues dogging CPS, things like the SUPES contract and the pension payments and money set aside for new charter schools those communities don't want. In terms of pure facility administration, CPS has to reckon with a large number of aging facilities. Government can often make a positive splash through new construction, but try as people might, nobody has yet envisioned the sexy boiler replacement project. It could be reasonably argued that what CPS could really use right now is a new influx of capital cash into the billions, to repair everything that legitimately ought to be repaired.
Think of recent reports about crumbling bridges and rail lines across America. Think closer to home about the pervasive pothole problem across Chicago. America has a serious problem with a deeply crumbling infrastructure, and while transportation has gotten more attention, the kinds of problems we see in evidence in CPS, as epitomized by the boiler system at Prussing, are really part of a larger fabric. Anecdotally, parents from three other CPS schools have told me that their schools have reported long-term issues with their boilers very similar to those reported by Prussing. Why would anyone want to be in charge of CPS Facilities under such circumstances?
Given the depth of these kinds of problems and the financial difficulties afflicting so many governmental entities, there can be an understandable tendency to step back and say, well, these administrators really do have a lot to juggle, and how can they pay for everything?
And then the rest of reality comes crashing back. The SUPES debacle happened, and not only did CPS pay for "principal training," CPS has also been paying a pretty penny for Barbara Byrd-Bennett's legal fees. CPS released new principal evaluation forms this year, with 50 percent of the weight assigned to something called "Student Growth & Other Measures," which essentially means CPS is moving even more in the direction of high-stakes standardized testing, even though principals are having to spend their time chasing down critical maintenance issues. And, as ever, money keeps being siphoned away from neighborhood schools into more and more charter schools.
It may be a "guiding principle" that health and safety be maintained, but in terms of coherent visible priorities, the evidence suggests that CPS has prioritized privatization and profiteering over not just communities generally but even over student safety. It is no wonder that the desire for an elected school board is so high, and in turn that such desire keeps being rebuked by Mike Madigan, Rahm Emanuel, and Bruce Rauner.
For the parents of students at Prussing, it is not just that the carbon monoxide leak occurred, or even that the whole incident would not have been nearly as bad with proper safety protocols in place. It is also that in the aftermath, 11 days after so many students and staff went to hospitals, not a single member of the Board of Education has visited the school, or even so much as publicly acknowledged what happened. The regrets expressed from CPS Central Office have come across as less sincere than they might have been given to a co-worker whose niece's dog had to get a cone around its neck. "Awww, poor doggie!" "Yeah, that's too bad about those kids."
Maybe this sounds too harsh. But this is an honest reflection of what numerous Prussing parents are feeling today. They think that the core CPS administration simply doesn't give a damn about their kids.
It's going to take a new boiler system -- and a lot more than that -- to prove otherwise.
]]>There are a lot of questions which still need to be answered about the boiler. For two and a half years, administrators at Prussing have reported problems with the boiler. While none of those issues suggested the potential for a carbon monoxide leak, the trail of complaints is lengthy, and Chicago Public Schools officials have been put on notice that the school community expects a decision to come down this week that the boiler will not be "fixed" yet again, but outright replaced, and soon.
The other immediate issue raised regards the school carbon monoxide detectors, or the lack thereof. How did CO levels get so high without any alarm going off? The boiler room at Prussing was equipped with a detector. At this time, it is not clear why it did not go off. But the situation begs the question of why a school with 700 children had only one detector in the first place.
As it turns out, there are some answers to be found in state law and Chicago building code, and they're not that great. For a city which prides itself on the most stringent fire codes in the country, the city code regarding carbon monoxide detectors is inadequate, and it is clear that CPS protocols regarding detectors don't even yet exist.
]]> At this point, I need to be clear that I am not a bystander in the situation. As a community representative on the Prussing Local School Council, I was at the school on Friday within an hour of the Chicago Fire Department arriving. For a couple of hours, I was standing at the corner of the school lot where news crews had assembled and a couple of hundred parents and community members had gathered, trying to understand what was going on. Some of the parents were very angry about the insufficient communication. The parents I remember, though, weren't the angry ones. One mother in particular was terrified, not understanding what was happening, not understanding what questions to ask. Chicago Public Schools officials from Central Office should have been right there, but instead I was the closest thing to a school official amid the parents. But of course, the communications issues are secondary to the situation having occurred at all.On Monday night our LSC held an emergency meeting, with an auditorium packed with parents. Many of the parents had heart-wrenching stories of the experiences of their children. All of the parents wanted to know what was going to be done to prevent something like this from happening again. Some CPS officials were on hand, but the two main officials CPS sent who could speak to the boiler and carbon monoxide detectors were completely inadequate, incapable of providing sufficient answers. CPS CEO Forrest Claypool was not among the officials on hand.
One piece of information that did come out is that there is a new state law which goes into effect on January 1, specifically regarding carbon monoxide detectors in schools. The suggestion was put out there that since the law isn't in effect yet, CPS hasn't complied with it yet. Let's set that timing issue aside for the moment, though. My thinking, and the thinking of several other people in the room, was that Chicago municipal ordinance should have had something relevant to say about this. After all, the city famously has extremely stringent fire codes, dating back to the Great Fire of 1871. Surely the state law would just be redundant.
Some background on the state law is in order. In August, Gov. Rauner signed House Bill 152. Similar versions of this bill had introduced in 2013 and 2014, but the circumstances had changed. On September 15, 2014, a carbon monoxide leak at North Mac Intermediate School in downstate Girard sent 181 students and staff to area hospitals. Legislators from the Girard area then championed the legislation, which passed the General Assembly in June.
There are two almost identical sections in the law, since Chicago schools are in a different section of the School Code. The most relevant portions of the new law, as would be applied to a school like Prussing, read as follows:
The [Chicago Board of Education] shall require that each school under its authority be equipped with approved carbon monoxide alarms or carbon monoxide detectors.... Alarms or detectors must be located within 20 feet of a carbon monoxide emitting device. Alarms or detectors must be in operating condition and be inspected annually.... A school must require plans, protocols, and procedures in response to the activation of a carbon monoxide alarm or carbon monoxide detection system.
After extensive hunting, this appears to be the only section of the Chicago Building Code which is relevant to the matter at hand:
18-28-1013.1 Carbon monoxide detectors shall be installed in accordance with for Residential or Institutional Occupancies covered in the above sections. A carbon monoxide detector shall be installed in every room that contains a fossil-fuel burning boiler or water heater. A carbon monoxide detector shall be installed in unit immediately adjacent to or one floor above any room containing a fossil-fueled burning boiler or hot water heater.
The "above sections" pertain to an article named "Boilers, Water Heaters and Pressure Vessels." A school would be an "Institutional Occupancy." The typo in the section is glaring, as it says "in accordance with" but then didn't say with what; but this would probably just refer to the method of installation, i.e. powered by battery or by direct connection to building power.
Based on the information provided at the LSC meeting, it is not clear whether Prussing was in compliance, because the ordinance requires not only the placement of a detector in the boiler room, but also in "unit immediately adjacent." Prussing is such an old building that the boiler was originally coal-fired and is located in an out building, connected to the main school building by a tunnel. Is the tunnel a "unit immediately adjacent"? Is the main building as a whole a "unit immediately adjacent"? The section at hand is too vague, and clearly was not written with a building layout like Prussing's in mind.
The new state law doesn't especially help, either. The only additions the state law provides are a requirement for annual inspection, some language about how such units would be powered, and a requirement for "plans, protocols, and procedures" in the event that an alarm goes off. It should be stressed here that there is a huge difference between what needs to happen when an alarm goes off and what needs to happen when no alarm goes off and students begin passing out.
In reaction to the CO incident, CPS went ahead and installed nine CO detectors at Prussing on Monday. While many parents expressed the opinion that all classrooms should have detectors, the relevant ordinance and the state law coming online provide context for how far apart the wishes of parents and the actual relevant laws are.
Prussing opened in 1927, but it is far from the oldest school in the city. Numerous Chicago schools do not have any kind of central heating and cooling system, having relied for decades on radiant heat supplied by a large boiler system, and in more recent years by air conditioning units installed room by room (as occurred at Prussing last year). The boiler system at Prussing dates to the school's construction, and this too is hardly uncommon in the city. As noted above, numerous complaints about the boiler system at Prussing had been made over the last couple of years. It is likely that there are similar issues at other buildings, where very old boilers are in need of outright replacement, not just perpetual patch-and-cross-your-fingers solutions.
One other related situation which should now come into focus is that Chicago schools no longer have full-time engineers on site. Prussing's school engineer, for example, covers two schools. Boilers are large machines. Things can happen which can cause them to malfunction. It should be considered inexcusable that there not be an engineer on site when the school is in full operation. But not only were engineer positions cut in recent years by CPS, they were also outsourced to Aramark along with custodial services. Neither school engineers nor custodians actually report to the school's principal. This situation deserves a more in-depth look on its own, but it must be mentioned alongside the CO detector issue and the failure of CPS Central Office to properly deal with the boiler.
But, again, industrial boilers are large machines, and a lot of things can go wrong with them. This is why having appropriate laws and protocols in place governing safety are so essential -- and this is why the combination of Chicago city ordinance, state law and CPS policy is clearly inadequate.
The City Council should immediately consider amendments to the Building Code providing for clearer instructions about the number, placement, and inspection of carbon monoxide detectors in facilities like schools.
Chicago Public Schools should go a step further and ensure that not only are carbon monoxide detectors in place in every boiler room or equivalent location, but that multiple detectors are installed in every school building which contains a potential CO producing source like a boiler. (Not all buildings will have such requirements; for example, the mobile units in use at Prussing and other schools are entirely electric-sourced for heating and cooling, and such sources do not produce carbon monoxide.) In addition to installation, clear district protocols for annual inspection of such units should be in place. If the CPS Director of Facilities, when speaking to a room of angry parents at an emergency meeting, is incapable of addressing something as simple as inspection protocols, then that is a huge problem which must be addressed at once.
CPS also needs to deal with the engineer and custodial situation. As has been widely reported in the last year, custodial cuts have left numerous schools insufficiently clean. The engineering cuts got less attention, but that is because there had not yet been an incident like the one at Prussing to help shine a light on this absurd policy. Engineers and custodians should not be outsourced personnel, and should instead report directly to school principals, or at least as a matter of policy co-report to principals as well as supervisors downtown or at the network level. Staffing levels should be restored to pre-Aramark levels.
The money question should not even be raised here. All of the above are safety issues. If money needs to be moved around to address these issues, I can recommend several places to find the money. If the Board can see fit to approve new unnecessary charter schools which take money away from neighborhood schools, clearly there is actually money there, regardless of what else they might say. They should also slash the funding for all of the advisors for the nonsensical Neighborhood Advisory Councils, which are clearly just expensive sham operations since the Board doesn't care what local residents think anyway, given that new charters are still being approved.
As for Prussing's boiler, there are dozens of angry parents preparing to show up at the Board meeting on Nov. 18, and they all expect that a new boiler installation will be underway by that point. In the long run, installation of a new boiler will almost certainly save money anyway, and with a recent $25,000,000 capital levy to tap, there can be no excuse for CPS not taking action this week to get started on a new installation. The questions about why it took an incident like this to truly get the attention of Central Office are not so easily answered are not likely to go away any time soon. I, for one, will keep pushing that point, and I anticipate there will be several upcoming FOIA requests regarding the Prussing boiler and why more decisive action was not taken in the last two years.
]]>When I was 6 years old, I believed you could not be Mexican and American. In my world, they did not go together. It was like wearing polka dots and plaid: each was interesting on their own, but they could never be together. To me, there was a time to a time to be Mexican and a time to be American. Being Mexican was a private affair, reserved for people who did not need an explanation for my differences.
I grew up on the Northwest Side of Chicago in a mostly Polish, Irish, and Italian neighborhood. I clearly recall being in kindergarten and telling my teacher that I was the youngest of 10 siblings. Shocked, my teacher asked me to tell her the names of my siblings. Afterwards, she walked me over to one of her colleague's classrooms and asked me to recite the names for her. What followed was thunderous laughter. Then I was escorted off to a new classroom to recite my siblings' names again. To this day, I'm not sure why the teachers were so amused. Was it my siblings' names? Was it that I had 10 siblings? All I know is that I was being singled out for being different. In later years, whenever my teachers asked for the number of siblings in my family, I told them I had two sisters and one brother. Every time I told that lie, I felt my heart sink. I hated knowing that I had allowed others to make me reject a part of me.
]]> Every time a teacher assigned a project that required me to share about my home life, I felt anxious. I constantly had to explain the things that made me different from my peers. TV images, the stereotypes I suspected my classmates believed, and my early unpleasant encounters with teachers made me think that people like my family were not welcomed in this country. I felt out of place and I wanted to remove myself from the source of this anguish, my family.This confusion about being different lasted until I was in 8th grade. Something happened to me then. I started to get angry at myself for rejecting a part of me and I longed to learn about myself and my history. I purposely chose to attend an all-girl Catholic high school with a large population of Latinas. Unfortunately, while the population at this high school was extremely diverse, the curriculum was not. I remember feeling frustration because I was an honor student and I had to follow the honors track. This meant I had to take British Literature instead of World Literature, or Freshman Humanities which focused on European History. Latin American history wasn't even an option. I didn't understand why the students who were deemed "smart" would only be exposed to the literature and history of a colonizing empire, and not of other countries. So, instead of going with the norm, I chose differently. If I wanted to take World Literature, I would have to give up one of my study periods and take it as an elective, and I did.
It was in that class that I read Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street. The book spoke to me. I could not believe that the book was about a Mexican-American girl from Chicago written by a Mexican-American author. I could not believe that she was talking about things that were never talked about in school, like chanclas, our Spanish names, and our family life. More importantly, I could not believe that I was reading about this in school and not just for fun on my own. It was part of the curriculum. I was hooked.
But I still wanted to learn more. From there on, every research paper, book report or presentation I had to do, I made sure I learned about the history of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans. But I did this all on my own without the help of a teacher. I would not meet my first and only Mexican-American teacher until my junior year at DePaul University.
Today, I'm in my 13th year of teaching history in the Chicago Public Schools. I know how important it is that my students see themselves in their school's curriculum. As a teacher, I make sure we celebrate the stories of all my students, no matter where they are from and regardless of their socio-economic status. It is important that my students know who they are and why society is a certain way. I want them to have as much information possible to tell the world who they are, and more importantly, to tell the world who they are not. I want them to be able to write their story before somebody else does. I know how it feels to wonder if people from your ethnic background have any real contribution to make to society. I know exactly how awful it feels to go through 13 years of school and have your history mentioned only a few times. So much was left out that could have changed my interpretation of who I was and what I could contribute. Instead of a window, I wish I would have been given a mirror that would one day help me see that perhaps plaid and polka dots could go together. Yet I am profoundly grateful for the sacrifices my family endured to give me an education, and for the experiences I endured that ensure I will never forget to give power to my students' stories.
Recently, as I was organizing my garage and looking through my teacher materials, I came across several letters by a few of my Mexican-American female students: Like me, they had parents who worked long hours, sometimes overtime, to make ends meet. Like my parents, their parents spoke little to no English and required interpreters when they came to pick up report cards. Like mine, their parents wanted nothing more than to have their children succeed in this country but lacked the resources or information to help. Like me, these students had to look after younger siblings or had older siblings that looked after them and acted as second parents.
But unlike me, my students had a Mexican-American teacher with a similar upbringing as theirs, a teacher who was able to speak to their parents in their native language, and who understood the perils of being bicultural in this country. Some of the lines from those letters that stand out are:
"Thank you for teaching me about my roots. Thank you for helping me feel important..."
"When I found out I would have you, my first Mexican teacher ever, I knew I had to stay in this class..."
"Before this class, I was ashamed of my dark skin, my indigenous features, and my straight black hair. Thank you for helping me believe that my culture is beautiful and worthy of intellectual discourse..."
Like most teachers, I have great days, and not-so-great days. These letters remind me of my story and why I chose this profession; they also help me get through my not-so-great days.
~*~
Mayra Almaraz-De Santiago, wife and mother of two boys, is a proud Chicagoan, born and raised in the Northwest Side. Her teaching career began 13 years ago in Chicago's Back of the Yards neighborhood and she is now back to her Northwest Side roots, teaching high school history for CPS. Mayra has a deep passion for social justice and for helping students critically examine the world so they can change it. She is a Golden Apple Scholar, and received her Secondary Education in History degree from DePaul University. She is currently a candidate for National Board Certification. You can follow Mayra on Twitter at @maera_me.
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