Yesterday, City Council approved a map for Chicago’s 50 aldermanic wards. The decision comes after a many-month saga of debate both in and out of city hall.

“This has taken longer than the Sistine Chapel,” said 40th ward alderman Pat O’Connor to the Chicago Sun-Times.

Discussions got so heated in early December Aldermen almost came to blows in a racially tinged argument. According to the Sun-Times:

[Richard] Mell was described as genuinely “afraid somebody was gonna hit him.” A police officer was summoned to the third-floor to restore order. At one point, Ald. Pat O’Connor (40th), Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s City Council floor leader, told Mell to shut up because he was exacerbating racial tensions, a source said.

Luckily, the new map passed without too much bloodletting. However the map puts six incumbents on the chopping block, including Alderman Bob Fioretti who attempted to delay the vote by employing a parliamentary maneuver. Mayor Rahm Emanuel promptly used a different parliamentary maneuver to counter Fioretti’s motion.

In the subsequent vote, the city map passed by a 41 to 8 vote; it takes exactly 41 aldermen to skirt a costly referendum; a referendum in 1991 cost taxpayers a whopping $20 million. So when it is time for Chicagoans to vote on March 20th, they will not be forced to choose between two rival versions of the map.

Some major changes are being made. As a consequence of Chicago losing over 200,000 African Americans in the past decade, the black caucus will lose one aldermanic seat. Conversely, the Latino Caucus, due to their 25,000 person increase, will get 13 Hispanic wards as opposed to their current eight. Englewood downsized from six wards to five.

But City Council isn’t completely out of the woods; although a referendum is being avoided, other parties could potentially file a lawsuit against the city if they deem the map unfair.

For previous coverage, check out our article.

Mehves Konuk

Last year, we published a feature story about the lack of a trauma center on the South Side. Here’s an update on that issue.

Today (October 31) at 3:30pm, members of Fearless Leading by the Youth and Students for Health Equity will lead a march from 61st Street and Cottage Grove Avenue, the site of youth activist Damian Turner’s August 14, 2010 fatal shooting, to the Quad, as part of an ongoing effort to establish a South Side trauma center at the U of C Medical Center.

The event closely follows a teach-in hosted on October 20 by the two groups (along with South Side Solidarity Network), intended to educate the public about the “feasibility and necessity” of a UCMC trauma center. Turner’s memory was close at hand through the discussion, where several panel members spoke to his case directly, and his sister sat on the panel as a community representative. Much of the information was geared towards those less acquainted with the bureaucratic situation, as it has stood more-or-less unchanged for many months.

But one panelist, Dr. Marie Crandall of Northwestern, had some new information to share which has changed the timbre of the trauma center debate. Crandall shared with the audience the results of a forthcoming study she conducted which focused specifically on trauma facilities which receive a ‘high’ volume (> 40% of total cases) of gun- and knife-wound victims–a similar proportion of total trauma to what the South Side generates. Statistical analysis of this suggests that the link between geographic distance from trauma care and survival is not only intuitive in these cases but is likely actual; in her opinion, the sooner a facility is reached, the better. The state of Illinois currently requires trauma patients to be less than 30 minutes from a level 1 (i.e. 24-hour, surgery-ready) trauma center, but this law fails to take clinical differences within the designation of “traumatic injury” into account. Dr. Crandall concluded that a trauma center at UCMC, although it would incur about 15 million dollars in annual net losses, would save, on average, 7 lives a year.

With such a stark articulation, how UCMC chooses to proceed will be a judgement between the lives of seven South Side residents and a fifteen million dollar annual institutional loss. What is really at stake has now been made clear, but Dr. Crandall knows this information won’t bring any solutions on its own: “Is it worth it? I don’t know. I think that’s a philosophical question more than anything.”

Last year, the Chicago Weekly published a feature entitled Swept Under the Rug about University of Chicago housekeeping staff layoffs. Here’s an update on that issue.

Matt Wan

It remains to be seen whether the massive protests on Wall Street and other financial centers around the country will lead to any real change; but students at the University of Chicago can take to heart the fact that their own protests appear to have ended in victory.
Last spring, university administrators announced (during Housekeeper Appreciation Week, no less) that they were planning to outsource dormitory housekeeping jobs to a private subcontractor. Would the current housekeepers get to keep their jobs, or could they all be fired? That administration kept mum about that issue, leaving workers to fear the worst.

Students Organizing United with Labor (SOUL), a labor-rights group on campus, organized weeks of protests, demanding that the university guarantee that each worker would get to keep his or her job and benefits. They held sit-ins, teach-ins, study-ins and rallies for several weeks, but as the students left at the end of Spring Quarter, there were still no guarantees from the administration. It was possible that the protests would do nothing: even weeks of rallying can be forgotten in the long months of summer.

However, it appears that, whether they were the cause of it or not, protestors got what they wanted. On September 28, Karen Coleman, the Associate Dean of Students, stated in a letter to university students that all staff members were offered a choice between a job or retirement with a severance package. The housekeepers have a new union and a new boss, but at least they still have their jobs. Coleman wrote:

“More than 75 percent of the staff members affected by this transition were selected for new positions within the University or were hired into new jobs with ABM [the new sub-contractor]. Most of the remaining staff elected to leave the University and accepted an enhanced severance package. All housekeeping staff that applied for new positions are now working, either with the University or with ABM (with the exception of one staff member currently unable to work). We are pleased that this outcome means that residents and staff will continue to see many of the same faces in their buildings that they have come to know over the years.”

According to University Spokesman Steve Kloehn, 55 housekeepers were affected by the transition: 24 were hired by ABM; 16 found other University positions; and the remaining 15 workers chose to leave. Both the retiring workers and those now working for ABM received severance packages. Just as SOUL was about to celebrate, however, they discovered that its victory was more than a little bittersweet.

“Our job load has doubled,” explained Mazurie Wright, a housekeeper at the South campus dormitory, in a SOUL meeting last Thursday. According to her, out of the 16 workers in South before the transition, 8 remained in the dormitory as housekeepers. Wright went from cleaning one house in the dormitory to cleaning the entire first floor, which includes six lounges, four kitchens and ten bathrooms.

She also took a pay cut of two dollars per hour, but is now working an hour extra per day (this returns housekeepers to the amount of hours they were working a few years ago). According to Kloehn, because of the longer work day and a better benefits package, “total compensation is now higher” for the housekeepers. When a student at the SOUL meeting asked Wright if she made more or less the same amount of money per day as before, she answered yes – but that it doesn’t really matter when “you’re too tired at the end of the day to spend it.”

Not all of the housekeepers have taken a pay cut: some moved to different positions on campus, and a lucky few are now “Building Maintenance Workers,” or BMWs. Their job role is to respond to certain maintenance issues, such as heating/cooling or moving furniture, and they enjoyed a pay raise.

The point of the consolidation of Housekeeping and Facilities service was to “take advantage of the expertise and experience in Facilities Services,” according to Coleman; however, Wright says, “The quality of the work is going to go down because we just don’t have enough time.” Moreover, she says, it’s been difficult to adjust to the new, stricter rules and protocols that go with the new contractor.

However, Wright is still happy to have a job at the university – an institution she’s worked for since she was 18 years old. She stressed, “We have to say thank you [to students]. The first meeting, they said we’d be laid off.”

For now, Wright and the other housekeepers will just have to adjust to the new contractor and the new workload. Not much can be done until next year, when the housekeeping contract will be up for renewal. In the meantime, my guess is that SOUL will be occupying its time on Wall Street.

Despite a steady drizzle of rain, numerous children clambered about the playground at Butternut Playlot Park on a Saturday morning. Some of their parents looked on, taking shelter under umbrellas and rain jackets. The children were clearly enjoying the haven of greenery and jungle gym where they could run about together in the most fundamental expression of youthful energy.

This small lot of open space in Hyde Park exemplifies what should be the mission of parks across Chicago and beyond: to provide an area of community enjoyment and enrichment as a respite from city streets.

However, many parts of Chicago are not privilege to easy access to quality public parks. A recent series of reports by the Chicago Tribune drew attention to Chicago’s “park deserts”: areas in which the city’s self-established standard of two acres of open space per 1,000 citizens is not met.

The dearth of open space affects roughly half of Chicago’s population and 32 of its 77 neighborhoods, including many on the South Side. South Lawndale, Bridgeport, and Greater Grand Crossing, to name a few, are all among the ranks of neighborhoods lacking in sufficient park acreage by a range of less than 15 acres to more than 40 acres.

With seemingly more pressing issues at hand, from economic worries to issues of social justice, one might wonder why a few acres of park are of any concern. Perhaps parks are a luxury. That dismissal, however, would reduce a powerful presence to a mere patch of grass.

While the impact of a park may not be demonstrated in increased test scores in schools or reduced levels of violence, their positive, magnetic influence is apparent in the multitudes of citizens who flock to Chicago’s parks on a sunny – or not so sunny – day.

Furthermore, Chicago takes pride in the variety of its neighborhoods, each with a unique character that coalesces into the diverse yet cohesive unit of the city. In the efforts of these neighborhoods to retain and strengthen their sense of community while positively influencing the lives of their inhabitants, parks can act as cornerstones of significant merit.

Che “Rhymefest” Smith kicks off his campaign for alderman of the 20th ward tonight at the South Loop nightclub The Shrine. Already Kanye-endorsed, the rapper will be joined on stage tonight by Lupe Fiasco. But his campaign is already facing less glittery attention.

Two weeks ago, CW writer Tobi Haslett covered Rhymefest’s press conference announcing his intention to run, emphasizing the bizarre and potentially dangerous blur of Smith’s star status with the ambiguity of his political platform. Tonight’s show comes while Smith is still scrambling to limit the damage of recent media coverage of a 2001 guilty plea for misdemeanor domestic battery, and a 2005 conviction for a misdemeanor gun charge for firing shots in the air after an altercation with a real estate agent at his home near Indianapolis. Smith’s biggest opponent, the incumbent Willie Cochran, says he new about the charges but wanted to wait until closer to February’s election to bring them to voters attention. In a November 4th article, The Chicago News Cooperative (CNC) reported his sarcastic response. “That’s just what we need in an alderman.”

In the same article, Smith said he thinks voters will forgive his troubled past. “I’ve grown and evolved. I’ve learned to be a better man than where I come from. I come from a background that I call Poverty Incorporated. That’s no excuse for bad behavior, but that experience is why I’m here in my community, trying to make a difference.”

The wavy line between redeemed native son and ego tripping celebrity is getting harder to define by the week, and probably won’t get any clearer as February approaches. To be fair though, it isn’t limited to Rhymefest. Speaking to the CNC, the rapper at least showed he knows his environment. “Welcome to Chicago Politics.”

The official flier for the campaign kickoff

On October 28th, forty three days after parents at Whittier Elementary School in Pilsen began a sit-in to prevent the destruction of the school’s fieldhouse, CPS delivered a letter signed by CEO Ron Huberman that formalized agreements made eight days earlier. The field-house will be leased to the Parent Committee for $1 a year as soon as the group officially incorporates as a nonprofit, and a library will be built for Whittier students. The Whittier Parent Committee officially ended the sit-in that same day, but some questions remain. The parents’ group issued the following statements qualifying their victory:

1) The location of the library has NOT been determined or agreed upon by the Whittier Parent Committee. The parents DID NOT agree to the library being built inside of the Whittier school as the letter from CPS states.

3) We want to make it clear that we are ONLY ending the sit-in portion of the struggle. The Whittier Parent Committee remains in control of the fieldhouse and the programming that is currently taking place in the fieldhouse. We ARE NOT abandoning the fieldhouse nor are we ending our fight for the library. The negotiations will continue!

In the meantime, Huberman has announced that he will be stepping down as head of CPS on November 29th, his resignation apparently hurried along by Mayor Daley, the Sun-Times reports. The Sun-Times’ sources suggest that Huberman’s replacement will likely be Terry Mazany, a former public school administrator and current CEO of the Chicago Community Trust with a much stronger background in public education.

ALSO:a slight correction. In the original text of this article I wrote that proving all of the Parent Committee’s allegations “would require a thorough investigation into TIF funding records, something no major media outlet has attempted.” While it’s true that thorough database reporting is lacking, there have been some important stories on the issue. Ben Joravsky’s pieces for the Chicago Reader are worth reading.

Read the original CW feature on the Whittier occupation here.

The Chicago Reader’s Mick Dumke went to the CAPS meeting for beat 234 in Washington Park last Thursday night, and it sounds like the locals weren’t happy. From sinkholes in the streets to prostitutes in the park to an alley drug market disguised as an impromptu auto shop, Washington Park residents have a lot to complain about. Alderman Willie Cochran (20th), who didn’t attend the meeting, took a share of the blame for not being responsive.

Our former Editor-in-Chief Sam Feldman has written an excellent feature for this week’s Newcity on the aftermath of Chicago’s failed 2016 bid, some six months after losing to Rio de Janeiro. The remants of Chicago’s plans, plans it hoped would “stir the blood of men,” in the (alleged) words of Daniel Burnham, can especially be seen near the Michael Reese Hospital campus in Bronzeville, site of the proposed Olympic Village, and Washington Park, the site of the proposed 80,000 seat Olympic Stadium. Sam discovers what community developers, students, government officials, preservationists, and others have planned for these places now.

Gapers Block recently published an article and video about Chicago’s street vendors, many of whom can be found on the sidewalks of Little Village selling elotes (corn with mayo, cheese, and chili powder), chicharrones (pork rinds), and other cheap, delicious snacks. It’s currently illegal to sell food that’s been prepared at a street cart in Chicago, and the Little Village-based Asociación de Vendedores Ambulantes (AVA) is lobbying the city to create a new license that would allow them to do so. You can read more about the issue in an In These Times article by CW writer Robin Peterson.

Toni Preckwinkle, the Hyde Park alderman who Clare Fentress profiled in our pages earlier this winter, has handily won the Democratic primary for the highest office in Cook County government, and with it, probably, the office itself. More at the Tribune.

(photo by Sam Bowman)

Toni Preckwinkle, the 4th Ward alderman we profiled in this week’s feature, may not be ahead in the polls, but she’s winning the hearts of newspapers right and left in her campaign for the Democratic nomination for Cook County Board President. The Tribune and the Sun-Times both enthusiastically endorsed her earlier this week, and the Austin Weekly News, a West Side community newspaper, added its voice to the Preckwinkle chorus last night. The Illinois chapter of the Sierra Club also endorsed her last week. Add in the endorsement from Daley fan Phil Krone at the Chicago Daily Observer and the fact that Mayor Daley’s brother’s law firm donated $1,500 to Preckwinkle’s campaign, and it looks like everyone’s lining up behind the Hyde Park alderman. We’ll see if the voters follow suit on February 2.

South Shore Train (amtrak_russ/Flickr)

State Sen. Kwame Raoul (D-Hyde Park) introduced legislation that would require all commuter trains to provide service to all stations, according to an article in the Tribune. Sen. Raoul aims this bill at the South Shore Line, which shares a portion of its route from downtown Chicago to South Bend, Indiana with the Metra Electric Line. He hopes to address the concerns of groups like SOUL (Southsiders Organized for Unity and Liberation) who take issue with the South Shore Line’s policy of not allowing passengers to board inbound trains or disembark from outbound trains at stops within Chicago—stops in areas which many believe are underserved by transportation.

Sen. Raoul admits the bill is flawed and would basically put an end to any kind of express train. Even if it’s unlikely to pass, he thinks it succeeded in “stimulating the discussion.” Additionally, the RTA has approved the $450,000 South Lakefront Corridor Transit Study to find ways to improve transportation and stimulate economic growth on the South Side.

Our indicted former governor Rod Blagojevich will be speaking and signing his new memoir, “The Governor,” at the University of Chicago Bookstore (Barnes & Noble) this week.

The signing will take place Tuesday, December 8, at 2pm.

From the Times’s review:

His publicist has described the book, published by Phoenix Books, as a “six-figure deal.” But in his writing, Mr. Blagojevich seems to have a specific message for the public, and perhaps more precisely, for those who might sit on his jury in a federal trial next year: He did nothing corrupt, though others have. He then lays out what he portrays as Chicago’s gritty, crass political rules, established long before him, in which power is traded for favors.

…

Ms. Aimen suggested that Mr. Blagojevich might struggle to keep his own legal team because of his desire to talk openly about the charges. “I think he must be a hard guy to handle,” she said.

For those who don’t remember his term, this quote from a press conference about sums it up: “It’s like the little boy with a pile of horse manure, I kept digging cheerfully in that and found a pony in there — the pony is free public transportation for all seniors in the state of Illinois.”

The local branch of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty will be hosting a study break tomorrow at the University of Chicago with Mark Clements, a recently-freed victim of police torture. According to promotional materials by the group, Clements was wrongly imprisoned for 28 years (beginning when he was 16) and brutalized while in police custody, experiences which he will speak about at the event. This will all take place from noon to 2 pm at the Community Lounge at 5710 Woodlawn Ave.

The Chicago Police have a checkered history with regard to torture; former CPD detective Jon Burge’s 1993 conviction on charges of having, among other things, used a cattle-prod to elicit confessions from suspects in police custody led to a general scandal a few years back. The talk will address these and other issues in local criminal justice, including juvenile sentencing, along with its main issue of ending capital punishment. Check it out.

Maoist polemicist Raymond Lotta issued a reply to Keith Jamieson’s recent essay, Everything You Know About Communism is Right, and had it passed out in front of the University’s Cobb Hall today.

The reply argues that the atrocities carried out in the last century by Communist revolutionary governments are part of the “learning curve” of the revolutionary project, and corrects the claim that Stalin killed millions of people to reflect the mere 700,000 or so death sentences carried out between 1937 and 1938. He asserts that regardless of the atrocities of communism, people have been lied to about it, and that the record needs to be corrected. His rebuttal also corrects some factual errors from his recent speech.

One of Lotta’s fellow Revolutionary Communist Party members and polemicists (who is curiously unnamed on the flier) will be on campus to informally “take on all comers” next Tuesday, Dec 1, 11am to 3pm in Hutchinson Commons at the University of Chicago.

Observing the lecture delivered by Communist grand panjandrum Raymond Lotta, I couldn’t help but feel as though I should share my thoughts on his scintillating exegesis of two or three mid-1960s Mao Zedong speeches. Enjoy. Stay tuned for a blurb on this talk in next week’s issue.

7:13: Lotta begins with a parable about Christian fundamentalists seizing control of America and suppressing the theory of evolution. This is, according to Lotta, “an analogy for the situation that exists in intellectual discourse today with regard to Communism,” which is true insofar as Robert Conquest bases his entire opposition to Communist doctrine on a fervent belief in Jesus. Meaning it is not true.

7:15: Lotta can’t seem to find a comfortable distance from the microphone.

7:16: Lotta claims that the U.S. women’s movement was sparked by the Cultural Revolution. This explains that weird three-year period in which Betty Friedan was such a vocal supporter of the Red Guards.

7:18: Environmentalism is also Communist! Huzzah.

7:20: Lotta asserts that it is the capitalists who are living in the utopian Jesus Cloud Heaven Land, while the ultrarealistic governments of Laos and Cuba continue with their hard-nosed pen-pushing.

7:23: The greatest weapon in the capitalist arsenal appears to be PowerPoint, which Lotta still struggles to use.

7:24:  “Socialism is a new form of political power in which the formerly oppressed and exploited, in alliance with the middle classes and professionals and great majority of society, rule over society with the leadership of a visionary, vanguard party.” Guess who thinks they’re in the vanguard party?

7:28: Lotta attempts to imitate the voice of a Japanese imperialist and winds up sounding like Mickey Mouse. Read the rest of this entry »

Of all the pampleteers and signature-gatherers on the University of Chicago campus, one type stands out in particular for its smoldering eyes and overall inscrutability. No, I don’t mean the anti-circumcision activist by the Hospital, I’m talking about the Revolutionary Communist Party USA, a Marxist-Leninist-Maoist-Avakianist entity that dispatches a mix of balding, shabbily-dressed weirdos and weirdo-ettes to hand out socialist newspapers and try to persuade students that the Cultural Revolution was a net plus, and that Stalin wasn’t bad, really, honest, check out our website.

A bonfire on Saturday, October 24 shows support for the 61st Street Community Garden. (Sam Feldman)

The 61st Street Community Garden was founded about a decade ago as a shared garden for families. Each family or individual pays about $40/year for a 10′ x 10′ plot of land with few restrictions to grow. The Garden, however, is owned by the University of Chicago and was built on top of a vacant lot. Earlier this year, the University announced its intentions to demolish the garden so it could use the land as a staging ground for the construction of the new Chicago Theological Seminary campus. The individuals and community involved with the garden have had various conversations with the University about relocating or preserving the garden, but the University still plans to demolish it next month. There are a few events coming up to celebrate the garden and raise awareness about its closing. Both of them will be held at the garden.

• Saturday, October 24, 2-5 PM – Come Say Hello, Come Say Goodbye?: Food, bonfire, and a drum circle to show support for the garden. I had the distinct pleasure of overhearing a planning meeting for this event hosted by University of Chicago students, and their basic mission is to show appreciation and hope from students that the University will change their plans.
• Sunday, November 1, 10AM-4PM – Last BBQ and Potluck: This event is hosted by community members and meant to be a last goodbye to the garden. There is more information on volunteering to help gardeners relocate their equipment, but the gardeners still do not have another site for the planned relocation.

Chicago Sun-Times

Chicagoist

For years, Walmart has sought permission to build in Chicago, and for months their proposal to build at 83rd and Stewart in Chatham was tied up in the City Council. As of yesterday’s meeting, it remains tied up, under the watch of decidedly anti-Walmart Ald. Ed Burke’s Finance Committee. The background for the union-driven fight was our print version’s cover story; you can pick up copies on stands right now. It’ll be interesting to see what happens next. During the meeting, Ald. Howard Brookins (21st) told Burke he would “hound him” on the issue and gave him a plush dog.

The received wisdom in my NPR-listening milieu seems to be that Walmart is vulgar at best, so I was intrigued to discover a community organization called Jobs or Else is trying to bring them to Chatham. Among its members: Rhymefest, Kanye’s Grammy-winning cowriter for “Jesus Walks,” and Dr. Leon Finney, veteran community organizer and pastor of Metropolitan Apostolic Community Church. A citywide poll the Tribune took a few weeks back found 68% of respondents supported the store.

Truly fascinating: GMU economist (and University of Chicago PhD) Russ Roberts interviews journalist Charles Platt on the experience of being hired and working at Walmart.

And: Is craigslist more evil than Walmart?