My Blog

Tag: Rahm

  • Emanuel vs. Lewis

    Karen Lewis, the Chicago Teacher’s Union President, and Mayor Rahm Emanuel, have a testy relationship at best.  …

    The two leaders met privately last year ahead of Emanuel’s inauguration.  They went for dinner and to attend a dance — both are fans of the art form — and to develop a working relationship.   …

    “In that conversation he did say to me that 25 percent of the students in this city are never going to be anything, never going to amount to anything and he was never going to throw money at them.”

    via NBC Chicago.

    But naturally Emanuel’s people respond:

    The Mayor’s Office said Lewis made up the anecdote.

    “That’s simply false,” said Emanuel Press Secretary Sarah Hamilton. “The Mayor is committed to making sure that every single child in Chicago has access to an excellent education, which is why he is fighting so hard to transform the Chicago public schools that have failed our children year after year.”

    No one knows what was true except those who there.  But that’s not really the point is it?

    The real issue is that CTU President Karen Lewis believes that the way to improve education is to throw money at it.  And doesn’t that just about say about everything that needs to be said?

    We have been throwing more and more money at CPS for years.  The results have not trended with the spending.  Check this out:

    Educational Spending Over the Years

    I wonder how much more money Ms. Lewis want to spend?

  • Sun Times Editorial Board = Morons

    I came across this while looking for something else:

    Some critics have said this won’t make as much of a dent in pedestrian fatalities as Emanuel suggests, and they may be right. Citing statistics from a city pedestrian study, the Chicago Tribune found that more than half of the city’s 251 fatalities between 2005 and 2009 occurred outside Emanuel’s safety zones.

    This is an argument for more cameras, not fewer. But if installing the cameras is all that’s done, it’s still worth it. Between 2005 and 2009, more than 7,700 pedestrian crashes occurred within one-eighth mile of a school or park, city data shows.

    One life saved, one life-altering injury prevented, is more than enough. Studies clearly show that the lower the speed the more likely a pedestrian is to survive a crash.

    via Editorial @ Chicago Sun-Times.

    Really?  That’s the argument you want to go with?  “One life saved … is more than enough?”  Ok then, follow this dumb-asses.

    If it is true that lower vehicle speed means greater pedestrian survival, then why stop at cameras?  What we should do is change the speed limit on all streets wherever pedestrians may be present to 5 MPH.  After all, one life saved is more than enough.  Effective immediately the speed limit on Michigan Ave, Sheridan Rd,  Roosevelt Rd, Halstead, Western, Harlem, Devon, Broadway, etc will be 5 MPH.  And the fine for speeding will be raised to $10,000.  Just think of the lives we can save.

    Fools.

    If one really wanted to save pedestrian lives what we should do is (1) increase the training requirement for all licensed drivers in the state; (2) stop selling cars to people who cannot prove they have a valid drivers license and proof of insurance; (3) hire more police so that some (at least a few of them) can focus on traffic stops and not just run from 911 call to 911 call; and (4) strictly enforce the jaywalking laws already on the books.  Watch any corner downtown for 5 minutes and count the number of people crossing against the light.  It’s like their just begging to get run over.

    We have to get beyond the notion that every car vs. person accident is the drivers fault.  When some jackass is trying to cross 4 (or more) lanes of Michigan Ave against the light and runs in front of a bus… well… they get what they have coming.  Most of the accidents in the city are not kids chasing a ball into the street.

  • Aldermen Push For What?

    This is just insane:

    On Sunday, Aldermen Deborah Graham (29th), Robert Fioretti (2nd), and Toni Foulkes (15th) joined members of the Chicago Teachers Union, Action Now, and a group of parents and community safety advocates for a press conference urging Mayor Rahm Emanuel to make the Vacant Property Safe Passages Ordinance a priority.

    If approved, the ordinance […] would require daylight watchmen to guard schoolchildren as they pass by vacant properties near public schools.

    “Recently, the mayor said he cares so much about student safety on the way to school that he’s installing speed cameras,” said Aileen Kelleher, Action Now communications director, during a phone interview Tuesday. “We’re saying if you care so much about safety this ordinance should be your number one priority.”  …

    This most recent push for the Vacant Property Safe Passages Ordinance comes just three months after the city passed a law requiring vacant property owners, whether an individual or a bank, to pay to register and maintain their abandoned buildings.  Similarly, last week Gov. Pat Quinn introduced a new program aimed at rehabilitating foreclosed homes in Cook County.

    With November’s ordinance in mind, those in support of the Safe Passages law say vacant property owners should also foot the bill for hiring the proposed watchmen.

    “We want the guards to be hired from within the communities where the vacant buildings are so that it’s also a job-creation program, because along with the housing crisis there’s also an employment crisis,” said Kelleher.

    Additionally, the ordinance would levy fines of up to $500 if the building’s mortgage holder fails to provide a watchman between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m.

    via Progress Illinois.

    This can never pass.  Nothing good can come of it.

    According to Illinois Statute — namely 225 ILCS 447 the Private Detective, Private Alarm, Private Security, Fingerprint Vendor, and Locksmith Act of 2004 — every one of these “watchmen” would be required to have a PERC.  The statute provides that:

     “Private security contractor” means a person who engages in the business of providing a private security officer, watchman, patrol, guard dog, canine odor detection, or a similar service by any other title or name on a contractual basis for another person, firm, corporation, or other entity for a fee or other consideration and performing one or more of the following functions:   …

    See 225 ILCS 447.

    This means that anyone who’s going to watch these houses must take and pass a 20-hour course with test.  They must also not have been convicted of a felony and submit their fingerprints for a background check.  Despite the requirements, it’s not uncommon to see these jobs listed on Craigslist for $10-12/hour.

    The proposed ordinance would require watchmen (or watchwomen I would assume) to be present between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. or 8 hours per day.  That’s $80 per day in pay for someone to basically sit on their duff and read the paper in front of a vacant building.  Of course the real cost (vacation, medical, workemen’s comp, payroll taxes, overhead, training, etc) would mean that the property owner would likely be charged more like $120/day.

    Even at $100/day, that’s $3,000/month… just to have someone watch a vacant property.  Who can afford to pay that?  The property owner will essentially be left with two options:  tear the place down or rent it out for someone well below market value.

    Given that one can get a building (single family house on a single lot) torn down and hauled away for $10,000-20,000 (depending on the size and condition of the place,) it stands to reason that anyone who expects their place to be vacant for a long time to just may be better off just tearing the place down.  The property owner can also now save on taxes (vacant land is hardly taxed) and insurance as well.  This will minimize the property expense over the long-haul.

    Equally problematic is that the ordinance may force the property owner to place anyone as a tenant in the property regardless of rent.  If you’re going to charge me $3,000/mo to keep the place empty and secured then it’s just better for me to find someone, anyone, who’s willing to stay in the place for $10/mo.  The question is then who’s renting the place for $10/mo?  Maybe someone who shouldn’t be living next to a school in the first place?

    And there’s the rub.  What makes these people think that a tenant on the property would be better than having the property vacant?  Would you rather have your child walk by a vacant property or Jeffery Dahmer’s place?

    Of course if the city was at full police strength wouldn’t there be more cops on the street looking over these places?  I’m just say’n.

    The article states there are 19,000 vacant properties in the city.  At $3,000 per month that’s $57,000,000 in new costs that would have to picked-up by property owners each month.

    That’s $57,000,000 in monthly transfer payments from “property owners” to  “guards to be hired from within the communities where the vacant buildings” exist.  Annually that a $684 million tax on property owners in the city.

    It’s a complete joke.  Just like paying mommies to walk their children to school when they should be doing it anyway.

     

  • No Tax Refund if You Owe Parking Tickets

    Really?

    Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Wednesday referred to people and businesses with unpaid city debts as “the deadbeats and the delinquents” after winning City Council approval to intercept their state income tax refunds to collect millions of dollars.  …

    At every level we have protected the taxpayers of the city of Chicago by not raising property taxes, not raising or creating an income tax, not raising a sales taxes, not raising a gas tax,” Emanuel said. …

    Under the diversion measure approved Wednesday, Illinois income tax refunds of those who owe will be redirected to the city, possibly as soon as this spring. …

    The citys measure, made possible by a state law that took effect in December, will affect individuals and businesses that received final notices for debt owed on parking tickets, red-light citations and administrative hearing judgments.  More than 100,000 people and businesses owe the city about $80 million, but refunds wont cover all of that, officials said.  About 51 percent of the debt can be traced to addresses outside the city, the administration said.

    Ald. Robert Fioretti, 2nd, one of the aldermen to vote against, described the citys administrative hearing system as “a kangaroo court” that needs to be fixed before income tax refunds are diverted to the city.

    via Chicago Tribune.

    As someone who does a little bit of legal practice over at 400 E. Superior I can attest to what a kangaroo court it is.  The process dealing with building violations is so bad that I truly believe they simply make it up as they go along.  It’s not quite as bad with parking tickets but it’s still a case of any given Sunday as to whether the judge will follow the law or not.

  • New Ward Map Confusing? Try Getting a Garbage Can

    Excellent points raised by Greg Hinz over at Crain’s.

    Ask folks at City Hall whether new or old wards apply for purposes of voting, zoning and distribution of services and the like and, after a couple of shrugs, you’ll get a multipart answer fit for an SAT test.  …

    “We’re dealing with the old aldermen,” another official says.  But, just to be safe, the city also is consulting with the new aldermen, too, in the many cases in which blocks or whole neighborhoods are being moved around.  Suffice it to say “there’s at least two aldermen involved in every issue,” that source adds.  “It’s a fairly complicated issue.”  …
    Officially, the new map goes into effect upon publication and approval of the official Journal of City Council proceedings….  But the lines on the new map are so contorted to protect incumbents and racial and ethnic minorities that doing so immediately is all but impossible.  For instance, the council majority and Mayor Rahm Emanuel pretty much hate Ald. Bob Fioretti, 2nd, a rabble-rousing independent sort with a bit of hot dog in him.  So they carved up and parceled out his current ward on the Near South and Near West sides and created a brand-new ward two miles north—not a square inch of which is in Mr. Fioretti’s current ward.  As a result, a 3½-mile stretch of Roosevelt Road that’s now pretty much within the old 2nd Ward has been divided among the new 3rd, 4th, 11th, 25th, 27th and 28th wards.  Man, I’m glad I’m not the executive director of the Roosevelt Road Improvement Association.

    via Crain’s Chicago Business.

    I have no idea how this can be permitted to stand.

  • Rahm Wants Handgun Registry

    Stupidity in human form.

    Mayor Rahm Emanuel today said he wants state lawmakers to approve a statewide handgun registry.  …

    Rep. Brandon Phelps, who has championed efforts to pass a concealed weapons bill in Illinois, said the mayor’s office called him Thursday morning to let him know the registration proposal would be introduced.

    “Number 1,  my first response was I don’t know why you’re trying to do this statewide because we don’t want your policies on us downstate,” said Phelps, a Southern Illinois Democrat from Harrisburg. “Number. 2, it’s never going to work. They’re trying to go after criminals. They’re never going to register their guns. They won’t pay the fee. “

    Phelps called Emanuel’s initiative a “slap in the face of every law-abiding gun owner.”

    via Chicago Tribune.com.

    It’s been shown time and time again that gun registries simply do not work.  The greatest national experience was Canada’s long gun registry.

    Department of Justice reported to Parliament that the system would cost $119 million to implement, and that the income generated fromlicensingfees would be $117 million. This gives a net cost of $2 million. At the time of the 2002 audit, the revised estimates from the Department of Justice were that the cost of the program would be more than $1 billion by 2004/05 and that the income from licence fees in the same period would be $140 million.[6]

    In February 2004, documents obtained by Zone Libre of Télévision de Radio-Canada suggest that the gun registry has cost around $2 billion so far.

    So we know that a registry is crazy expensive and becomes another government boondoggle.

    Well, maybe it’s still worthwhile because it really reduces crime.

    Former Ontario Provincial Police Commissioner Julian Fantino (who was opposed to the gun registry) stated in a press release in 2003:

    We have an ongoing gun crisis including firearms-related homicides lately in Toronto, and a law registering firearms has neither deterred these crimes nor helped us solve any of them. None of the guns we know to have been used were registered, although we believe that more than half of them were smuggled into Canada from the United States. The firearms registry is long on philosophy and short on practical results considering the money could be more effectively used for security against terrorism as well as a host of other public safety initiatives.”

    Well ok, maybe he was really really biased.  Perhaps other police really thought the registry was a great idea?

    In April 2011, a survey was conducted by the Edmonton Police Association. Its members voted 81 percent in favour of scrapping the long-gun registry.

    Well, at least law abiding citizens who do register their guns will know that their data is safe right?

    John Hicks, an Orillia-area computer consultant, and webmaster for the Canada Firearms Centre, has said that anyone with a home computer could have easily accessed names, addresses and detailed shopping lists (including make, model and serial number) of registered guns belonging to licenced firearms owners. Hicks told the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters (OFAH) that “During my tenure as the CFC webmaster I duly informed management that the website that interfaced to the firearms registry was flawed. It took some $15 million to develop and I broke inside into it within 30 minutes.”

    The Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters questioned the security of the gun registry after a home invasion that seemed to target a licenced gun collector. The OFAH argues that, in the wrong hands, a database detailing the whereabouts of every legally-owned firearm in Canada is a potential shopping list for criminals.

    Given that any handgun registry would likely include all of the guns owned by police officers (& county sheriffs, state troopers, etc.) means that a whole big batch of government bureaucrats and anyone who wants to hack into the database would have the name, address, and list of owned handguns of everyone law enforcement officer in the state.

    This could be the dumbest idea from the Rahmfather yet.

  • Your Water Bill Doubles For What?

    God bless Ben Joravsky.

    All summer long, in press conferences and at public hearings, Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s budget refrain remained the same: no more accounting gimmicks and no new taxes.

    “We have been doing smoke and mirrors on the budget and avoided taking control of our own future as a city,” he said at a public budget hearing in Englewood in August. “That moment of reckoning is here.”

    But the mayor who vowed to bring honesty to the budgeting process continues to rely on one of the oldest tricks of them all: the water/sewer fund sleight of hand.

    That’s the one where the mayor says he’s jacking up your water and sewer bill to pay for infrastructure and environmental protection—but then diverts millions of dollars a year to finance other city operations that have little direct connection to water, sewers, or protecting the lake.

    In this case, Emanuel is proposing to double water and sewer fees over the next decade, an eventual increase of about $500 a year for the average household. Yet how much of that money will actually make it to the water and sewer system is hard to determine, since, despite Emanuel’s promises of transparency, his first budget obscures what’s being diverted.

    A conservative estimate is that the mayor’s 2012 budget will siphon off at least $70 million in water and sewer fees to cover other city spending, according to our analysis of budget documents and interviews with current and former city officials.

    via Chicago Reader.

    Another amazing piece from the Reader.  A must read.