Monday, May 18, 2009
News / Clout City Parking Meters -- The Easy Version
Posted by Ben Joravsky on 05.18.09 at 11:23 AM
The last time Mick Dumke and I wrote about the cockamamie parking-meter deal, an alderman phoned in to say that the story was too long and complicated for him to follow.
The conversation veered into a discussion about our favorite TV shows, and I wound up thinking: if only we'd thrown in a sex scene or two we might have held his interest.
We've just posted Fail, Part II. Sorry--no sex scenes. But in case it's too long and complicated, here's a brief version for aldermen and other attention-challenged readers:
The parking meter deal that my aldermanic caller and his City Council colleagues voted for last December--at Mayor Daley's insistence--sucks. It sucked then. It sucks now. It will suck even more in the future.
How's that for keeping it simple, alderman?
Of course, I suppose most of you--aldermen excluded--probably suspected as much from the start. But the thing about this deal is that the more you study it--and Mick and I have been turning it inside and out for months--the worse it looks.
Here's what we've learned so far:
On October 17, 2007, Sun-Times columnist Michael Sneed wrote about a tip obviously fed to her by the Daley administration. The city was gearing up to lease its parking meters for about $1 billion. Or as Sneed put it: "1 BILLION bucks for the cash-strapped city."
I guess us peasants were supposed to be impressed by that figure. Just to be clear, she put it in caps. She went on to report, "The sweetener to the deal is already on the books: a provision to raise the parking meter rates, which is clearly a carrot for whomever buys the meters."
Over a year later, on December 2, 2008, Mayor Daley held a press conference to announce that after a rigorously monitored bidding process (as opposed to handing the deal to a company that employs his nephew) he was going to lease the meters to Morgan Stanley for--surprise!--about $1 billion.
It turns out to be a winning move for Mayor Daley. He gets the money--nearly 1.16 billion--up front. He's pretty much free to spend it any way he wants. For all we know he may just want to put it in a big pile and burn it. Or spend it on the Olympics, which amounts to the same thing.
And it's a great deal for Morgan Stanley, which quadrupled parking rates and can look forward to hauling in buckets and buckets of cash for the next 75 years.
As for the suckers who call Chicago home: sorry chumps, you lose--again. That parking rate hike Sneed alluded to was supposed to bring in about $55 million to the "cash-strapped city." Instead, we're only getting at most $20 million a year in interest from the portion of the $1.15 billion Mayor Daley has socked away. So that means we're facing a $35 million a year hole in the budget where parking meter revenue used to be, which our mayor can either make up by raising fees or taxes or by cutting services, like, oh, fixing potholes.
Meanwhile, the city has informed alderman Scott Waguespack that the meters are worth considerably more than $1 billion--probably closer to $5 billion.
So Mayor Daley sells the meters for less than they're worth and will have to raise fees or taxes to compensate for the revenue that's going to Morgan Stanley instead of into public coffers. You pay more in parking meter fees and you get less in service. Is this a great deal or what?
As for all the careful analysis the mayor conducted before leasing the meters, for the last five months Mick and I have been begging the city to turn over documents that reveal what analysis they did at all. They best they could come up with is about a couple dozen pages of gibberish, much of which is blacked out. I'm not making this up. It's like a suspense novel with the good parts missing. On November 21 and December 1, 2008, for instance, they held a bid opening meeting. The documents say that Jim McDonald, a lawyer for the city, reviews the bid packages and . . . then they black out three quarters of the page. What in the world could they be concealing--Jack Ruby's accomplice? Seriously, what are they trying to keep from us? Was there someone in the room they don't want us to know about?
If Cook County Board president Todd Stroger had come up with this harebrained scheme the Tribune would be screaming and Mayor Daley would be lecturing him on the need for fiduciary responsibility.
Come to think of it, I wish Todd Stroger had come up with this deal. Then there might have been some pressure to kill it.
Comments (19)
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Chicago Parking Meter Contract - Not Yet Challenged in Court? Whoops. Go to ChicagoNLA2011 at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ChicagoNLA2011/message/466 Bummer. Joe Lake, Chicago (Bucktown)
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Daley is racist, I am no fan of John/Todd Stroger but they have been loyal to the Mayor. He is going to give them the Gene Sawyer treatment only this time instead of NOI Steve Coakley they will use the busboy or Donna Dunnings. Look at the corruption at the Counsy Vs the City and you will see 10 X the crimes on the city side. But the media is also racist, this guy would have never made it this long without there help, look at Avis Lavelle, Carol Grisko, Petyer Karl, Ken Davis, Jim Williams, etc etc etc
"They best they could come up with is about a couple dozen pages of gibberish, much of which is blacked out." Pleas post these. Thanks!
Napoleon is working on his Legacy...the Olympics...a billion here a billion there..monuments to the "Little Man of Chitown", he could care less about any of the citizens..construction for his cronies and then a big party and he retires into the sunset..while we pay for the privilege of watching it...at a meter!
@ Anthony: Shut the f*** up. We're ALL getting reamed by this $hitty parking meter deal, whether you're black, brown, white or polka-dotted. We got seriously screwed here -- and I'll vote for anyone who can defeat Dicktator Daley.
"Napoleon is working on his Legacy...the Olympics..." a 5th star on our flag, something his father never managed Chicago Flag May Get New Star If Olympics Come Current 4-Star Flag Has Been In Use Since 1939 http://cbs2chicago.com/topstories/Chicago.flag.2016.2.337774.html
"...an alderman phoned in to say that the story was too long and complicated for him to follow." aw, come on now - name names!
I'm with Hugh...I would love to know which alderman complained that the story was too long and difficult to follow. I could run against him/her with the simple message that I am not this stupid... Ben, I'll chip in $20 on behalf of Chicago for the name!
Daley's finally created some real problems for himself. Check it out: http://secondcitycop.blogspot.com/ Some VERY interesting problems.
Daley is nuts. the Aldermen are useless. they are ranting about the meters being sold now? It will never be back in city control for 75 years, they will be dead and gone and wont care. Vote out Daley and your alderman in Feb 2011.
We, the citizens of this city, county and state, find ourselves in a unique situation. On the one hand, our natural inclination is to think that our democracy depends upon us choosing the best, the brightest and the most honest candidates for elected office to vote for. It does. On the other hand, we find ourselves handicapped with a political enterprise, commonly known as 'the machine', the 'combine', etc., which effectively obstructs all but a pitiful handful of best, brightest and honest candidates from ever getting on the election ballots. And even when there are honest, intelligent candidates who manage to survive running the gauntlet of the various politically controlled 'nominating committees' and stacked election 'boards', these rare few candidates are often lost in the crowd of shill fake candidates put up to split the voters' votes, by the very Incumbents who have brought this city, county and state to the brink of economic and civil disaster, the very Incumbents whom we seek to rid ourselves of. We citizens seem to have resigned ourselves to believing that these professional politicians have it all figured out, all down to a science, all being their efficient control of our democratic election processes, so tightly controlled and so invulnerable, that we've surrendered to that control. You know, the 'resistance is futile' and the 'since you can't beat 'em, join 'em' mantras. To 'beat them', the voters first have to change their natural goal of seeking to vote FOR an honest candidate, said truly honest candidates being in short supply, and realize that, in order to vote out an Incumbent, one must vote FOR a SINGLE challenger candidate, in sufficient numbers to defeat said Incumbent. So here's the thing: 1. Party Primaries are held to determine which candidates for elected office will be chosen to run in the ONLY election that really matters, the General Election. 2. Unless you care about which specific Republican, or other party, candidate will face off against the Democratic candidate, (in crook county and chicago, that is almost always an Incumbent), there is NO reason for you to cast your party primary votes in the Republican Primary and EVERY reason for you to utilize your votes in the Democratic Primary, using your votes to DENY the nomination, to be the Democratic Party's candidates in the General Election, to the Democratic INCUMBENTS. BECAUSE: 3. The Incumbent Democrat is MOST vulnerable to being denied reelection by NOT winning their party's nomination in said party's PRIMARY elections. THAT'S how you get rid of these Democratic Incumbents, by knocking them off the General Election ballot, which is what happens when your votes succeed in denying them their party's Primary victory. Q: Now, how can the voters be assured that the votes they cast in the Democratic Party's Primary will ensure that the Incumbent Democrats will NOT win their primary contests? A: By casting your votes using the following voting strategy: 1. Compile a list of all Democratic Incumbents who you want to NOT make it onto the General Election ballot. Organize your list of Democratic Incumbents by the office(s) which they currently hold. 2. Bring this list with you when you go to vote. 3. Locate the Incumbent Democrat's name on the voting ballot, via the public office which they currently hold. 4. If the Incumbent Democrat's name is listed FIRST, then cast your vote for whichever candidate's name is listed LAST OR If the Incumbent Democrat's name is NOT listed first, cast your vote for whichever candidate's name IS listed FIRST. Casting your votes in this manner will, if enough citizens apply this strategy, result in every voter NOT wanting the Incumbent Democrats to win their primary casting their votes for the same SINGLE challenger candidate in each contest for public office. In order to ensure that Incumbent Democrats fail to win their party's nominations in the General Election, the voters must, for this purpose, disregard WHO they are specifically voting for, and focus on WHO they are specifically voting AGAINST, voting AGAINST the Incumbent by voting FOR the SAME, single challenger candidate. This strategy, if applied by a sufficient number of voters, is the most certain to result in the Incumbent Democrats not being reelected, since, if the Incumbent Democrats fail to win their party's nomination to the General Election, said Incumbent Democrats, being no longer their party's primary victors, are left with only one option, ie., to attempt to run in the General Election as 'Independents'. The application of this voting strategy can be the first step in restoring authentic Democracy to this city, county and state. If Authentic Democracy is what you, the voter, want, the use of this voting strategy will effectively help you to begin the process of it's restoration. No other voting strategy is as mathematically effective. No other voting strategy can effectively neutralize the vote splitting tactics used to dilute the votes of the dissatisfied. No other voting strategy has the potential of sweeping out of office practically all of the entrenched Incumbent machine politicians in one election cycle. REGISTER TO VOTE VOTE IN EVERY ELECTION HAVE NO DOUBT, VOTE INCUMBENTS OUT
Support term limits and new parties. Don't support more of the same in new faces.
"Real Reform May 27th - 2:09 a.m. Support term limits and new parties. Don't support more of the same in new faces." 'Really'? Gee, you mean support the 3rd, 4th, 5th, etc., political parties who have consistently siphoned off votes, thus allowing the major party incumbents to get reelected? Are those the 'new parties' you are referring to? BEFORE any 'new parties' will EVER have a chance at winning elections, the entrenched political combines will have to be taken out of the equation. That can only happen if the voters continue to cast their votes with voting out the entrenched incumbents as their goal, and begin to utilize the HAVE NO DOUBT, VOTE INCUMBENTS OUT voting strategy to do so. As for supporting term limits, that's another pansy attitude, seeking to usurp the built in authority of the voters to determine who they want to represent their public interests, and to further promote the false premise that an honest, effective and truly representative democracy can fulfill the promise of governments 'Of the People, By the People and For the People' on autopilot. You, my phony 'friend', are '...more of the same...'. Pop another pill and try peddling your panacea of easy fixes somewhere else.
Although we are a republic, you keep saying democracy. If you really want democracy, then you'd want more parties. Those other parties aren't siphoning off votes. Tell your Democrats to get off their arse and vote. Your votes incumbents' strategy won't work, until people have term limits and multi-party voting. You are the phony of more of the same with your easy fixes. Hey, where's the Obama reform?
First off, let the readers decide which definition they believe fits our form of governments: "Main Entry: re·pub·lic Pronunciation: \ri-ˈpə-blik\ Function: noun Etymology: French république, from Middle French republique, from Latin respublica, from res thing, wealth + publica, feminine of publicus public — more at real, public Date: 1604 1 a (1): a government having a chief of state who is not a monarch and who in modern times is usually a president (2): a political unit (as a nation) having such a form of government 1 b (1): a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law (2): a political unit (as a nation) having such a form of government" OR "Main Entry: de·moc·ra·cy Pronunciation: \di-ˈmä-krə-sē\ Function: noun Inflected Form(s): plural de·moc·ra·cies Etymology: Middle French democratie, from Late Latin democratia, from Greek dēmokratia, from dēmos + -kratia -cracy Date: 1576 1 a: government by the people; especially: rule of the majority b: a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections 2: a political unit that has a democratic government 3 capitalized: the principles and policies of the Democratic party in the United States (from emancipation Republicanism to New Deal Democracy — C. M. Roberts) 4: the common people especially when constituting the source of political authority 5: the absence of hereditary or arbitrary class distinctions or privileges" Second, your deceptive assertion of "If you really want democracy, then you'd want more parties." is revealed as such by the sentence which follows it, namely, your false statement "Those other parties aren't siphoning off votes.". Of course they are, and you know it. And for those readers who haven't figured out the how and why of the phony 'real reform' poster's fervent support of multiple party politics, here's a few realities to ponder: 1. Our Representative Democracy elects it's citizen's representatives via a geographic and/or demographic determinant; that is, elections of each single representative, are held based on a specifically defined geographical area's boundaries and/or a specific portion of the citizen population residing therein. 2. Legislative, (ie., the makers of Law), determinants are portions of a greater whole, and thus, of lesser size, both in population, (voters), and geographical area. 3. Judicial, (ie., the interpreters and adjudicators of Law), determinants are also portions of a greater whole, and thus, are also of lesser size, both in population, (voters), and geographical area. 4. Executive, (ie., the managers of the functions of government), determinants are the greater whole, thus, encompassing the whole geographical and demographical area of a given representative government. 5. The hierarchy of governments, based upon geographic and demographic determinants, begins at the town/village level, increasing in the size of the whole through the city, township, county, state and federal levels. 6. Executive Branch (managers) representatives are elected by the geographical population as a whole. 7. Legislative Branch (makers of law) representatives are elected by their subdivided geographically based portions of the whole population. 8. Judicial (interpreters and adjudicators of law) representatives are also elected by their subdivided geographically based portions of the whole population. It can be seen that the intent is to localize the will of the people when they are electing those who will make law, and those who will interpret/adjudicate law, and to generalize the will of the people, as a whole, when they are electing those who will manage the fundamental functions of their governments. For multiple party politics to effectively represent the will of the people as a whole, the Legislative and Judicial branches of our governments would have to have their elected representatives elected as the Executive branch does, ie., as the whole of the population of a given geographical area. As an example: citywide election of not only the Executive branch of city government, but also of the Legislative (city council) and the Judicial. That would mean no wards, no ward elected aldermen, no appointed city hearing officers, every elected city official being elected by the citizens as a whole, with the city council made up of the top 50 vote getters, (assuming that 50 city council members would still be desired). Under this system, multiple party politics would flourish, with the political parties competing citywide, neighborhood to neighborhood, frantically trying to convince enough citizens to vote for their party's candidates. The present ward system of electing our city's Legislative representatives is perfect for the major, dominant political party's utilization of multiple minor league political parties as a means to split, dilute and render impotent the votes of the dissatisfied citizens. The HAVE NO DOUBT, VOTE INCUMBENTS OUT voting strategy is designed to neutralize and render impotent that means, so effectively used to prevent any political party BUT the dominant one from ever having a rat's ass's chance of winning any elected office. As for your 'term limits' bullshit false panacea, it's a crack pipe dream dreamt by crack pipe smokers, who either don't want to have to get up off of their piss stained mattresses or by those who want the vote splitting tactics to continue unabated, via lulling the citizens into the false belief that limiting the term of an elected office holder will, in any way, diminish the collective abilities of the group of professional politicians to continue bleeding the citizens dry. You said it yourself, changing the faces of the corrupted, via term limits, results in more of the same. Rendering the means by which the corrupted maintain their elected office authorities, via utilizing the HAVE NO DOUBT, VOTE INCUMBENTS OUT voting strategy, provides the opportunity for the citizens to both impose their own, actually effective term limits upon the elected offices they, the citizens actually own, and neutralizes the corrupting effects of ALL political party style politics. Using the HAVE NO DOUBT, VOTE INCUMBENTS OUT voting strategy transforms our elections from the political party dominated fake democracy they are, into truly wide open citizen driven democracy in action. The only valid complaint you can have is that you don't trust the citizenry to define and control their own governing. How American would that be, were that to be your perspective?
unreal, the citizens have shown where their loyalties are-the Democratic Party. Take a walk about Chicago and Cook County some time. Who created the slums? Democrats! I did NOT say term limits would create more of the same. I said voting for the same Democrats is more of the same, because all you support is Democrats. Take a civics class sometime and learn we are a republic, not a democracy! The other parties aren't siphoning votes. It's your Democrat Loyalists who are too lazy to get off the couch that are the vote siphoners who are feeding at the Democratic Trough. You make a good Communist with your way or the highway.
