Clout City: Bleader, Chicago Reader

The Save Prentice Coalition gives up the fight to preserve Prentice

Deanna Isaacs — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 16:25:00 -0600

One day before they were due back in court, the Save Prentice Coalition has given up the fight over Bertrand Goldberg's unique hospital building, which Northwestern University plans to tear down to make way for a medical research facility.

Here's the statement the coalition issued today:

Today, the National Trust for Historic Preservation and Landmarks Illinois moved for a voluntary dismissal of their complaint in Cook County Circuit Court, signaling the end of their legal challenge against the City of Chicago and the Commission on Chicago Landmarks.…
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Prentice suit amended, but not as judge intended?

Deanna Isaacs — Tue, 12 Feb 2013 17:55:00 -0600

Last month, Cook County Circuit Court judge Neil Cohen gave the National Trust for Historic Preservation 30 days to fix up its lawsuit against the City of Chicago and the Commission on Chicago Landmarks over their haste in giving preliminary landmark designation to the former Prentice Hospital and then taking it away, all in a single afternoon.

Which left Northwestern University, owner (but no lover) of the distinctive Bertrand Goldberg structure, free to blow it to smithereens.…

The landmarks commission stages a Prentice do-over, with the same result

Deanna Isaacs — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 18:07:00 -0600

The hero of the Prentice Hospital saga wasn't there on Thursday, when the Commission on Chicago Landmarks voted once again to take back the landmark designation it had given—and rescinded—in a single day last November.

And since he wasn't there, the vote was unanimous.…

Groundhog Day: Landmarks Commission will vote on Prentice

Deanna Isaacs — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 15:21:00 -0600

Wait a minute: haven't we been here before?

Late last week, the Commission on Chicago Landmarks posted an agenda for its February 7 meeting that contains a couple of surprising items at the bottom of the list.

First, they're going to consider a report from the Department of Housing and Economic Development on the impact of landmark status for Bertrand Goldberg's Prentice Hospital building, which Northwestern University wants to tear down.…

Mayor's allies protect City Council from plan to protect your tax dollars

Mick Dumke — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 10:00:00 -0600

First-term alderman Ameya Pawar is careful to emphasize that he's not an opponent of Mayor Rahm Emanuel's. He doesn't go around criticizing the mayor and he doesn't want to fight with him, largely because he hasn't had any reason to.…

City Council gets in the spirit of giving, approves Rahm's billboard deal

Mick Dumke — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 18:01:00 -0600

Since it's the holiday season, 27th Ward alderman Walter Burnett Jr. took the opportunity Wednesday to remind his colleagues of the true meaning of voting for the latest city privatization deal.

"Happy Hanukkah!"…

Court date set in battle to save Prentice: January 11

Deanna Isaacs — Fri, 07 Dec 2012 15:42:42 -0600

This should be interesting: in Cook County court today Judge Neil Cohen said he'll hear oral arguments January 11 on the city's motion to dismiss a suit filed last month by preservationists trying to keep Northwestern University from destroying the former Prentice Women's Hospital building, which it owns.

The plaintiffs in that suit, Landmarks Illinois and the National Trust for Historic Preservation, maintain that a vote last month by the Commission on Chicago Landmarks to take back protective designation it had just granted the Bertrand Goldberg building was illegal.…

Aldermen raise serious questions about billboard deal, then advance it anyway

Mick Dumke — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 08:25:00 -0600

You know they did.

A Chicago City Council committee signed off Monday on Mayor Rahm Emanuel's latest privatization deal—even though, after nearly five hours of testimony, aldermen still didn't quite know how it added up for taxpayers, what its shortfalls might be, or exactly which companies were included in putting it together.…

Here comes another city privatization deal forged behind closed doors

Mick Dumke — Fri, 30 Nov 2012 10:00:00 -0600

This is one of three posts to win a Peter Lisagor Award for Blog, Individual Blog Post, Affiliated.

One hundred and fifty-five million bucks is a lot of money. Or maybe it isn’t.

It’s more than most of us have to spend on holiday gifts this year.…

Abbate case is just the tip of the iceberg in city legal payouts

Mick Dumke — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 10:00:00 -0600

If only it were an isolated incident.

Last week a federal jury ordered the city of Chicago to pay $850,000 in damages to bartender Karolina Obrycka, blaming a police code of silence for her 2007 beating by off-duty cop Anthony Abbate.…

Why your alderman (and mine) always votes yes on the Chicago city budget

Mick Dumke — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 10:00:00 -0600

Mayor Rahm Emanuel made a keen observation after the City Council voted 46-3 to approve his 2013 city budget on Thursday:

"Reform never ends."

It's true—the reform process has been under way in Chicago for decades, yet somehow things just never seem to get fixed.

Take the city's $8.3 billion budget as an example.…

Preservationists sue, win temporary protection for Goldberg's Prentice Hospital

Deanna Isaacs — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 15:33:00 -0600

Preservationists filed suit in Cook County court against the city and the Chicago Commission on Public Landmarks this afternoon, seeking to reinstate landmark designation for Bertand Goldberg's Prentice Women's Hospital. The designation was rescinded by the landmarks commission two weeks ago, immediately after it was bestowed.…

Mayor Emanuel ensures parking meters remain in private hands

Mick Dumke — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 08:00:00 -0600

There's a major reason Chicago hasn't been able to get rid of its street parking privatization deal: because Mayor Rahm Emanuel has fought to keep it in place.

That's the gist of a ruling Tuesday afternoon by a Cook County judge, who found that the 75-year privatization agreement may be "a bad deal" but can't be declared illegal as long as the city claims to be benefiting from it.…

"Future Prentice": How's this for global, Rahm?

Deanna Isaacs — Tue, 13 Nov 2012 18:00:00 -0600

Architects from 13 countries have contributed 71 entries to the the Chicago Architectural Club's "Future Prentice" competition.

Three winning entries, chosen by a panel of jurors last week, will be announced Thursday; you can get a look at them in a related exhibit opening at the Chicago Architecture Foundation Friday.…

Even on election night, some Republicans have a little love to give

Mick Dumke — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 06:46:00 -0600

I was sitting next to state comptroller Judy Baar Topinka on election night, trying to act like a gentleman, when she muttered something like, "What the heck is going on with this thing?"

At first I thought she was talking about the election. Then I realized she was merely having a difficult time removing the microphone clip from her lapel.…

The Reader did election night

Reader staff — Tue, 06 Nov 2012 18:36:00 -0600

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What a robbery in Edgewater says about the police staffing debate, part two of two

Mick Dumke — Sat, 03 Nov 2012 10:00:00 -0500

This is the second of two parts. You can read the first one here.

Experts caution that what's true about policing one neighborhood in one city isn't necessarily true for another.…

The Chicago service request app is a decent metaphor for Chicago service requests

Asher Klein — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 18:00:00 -0500

It's a good idea, this app that's meant to streamline routine requests to the city. Download Chicago Works to your phone, and you should be able to report most of what you'd call 311 for—restaurant complaints, abandoned vehicles, blank traffic signals—and track those requests.…

What a robbery in Edgewater says about the police staffing debate, part one of two

Mick Dumke — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 10:00:00 -0500

The jewelry store robbery was just the latest sign of trouble in the neighborhood—and a disturbing illustration of why police staffing has been one of the most passionately debated issues in Chicago and beyond this year.

Just before 2 PM on October 8, a thin white man and a Hispanic woman with strawberry-blond hair stepped into the Bryn Mawr Jewelry Company.…

A statement by Rahm means high noon for Prentice

Deanna Isaacs — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 18:00:00 -0500

It looks like we can kiss Bertrand Goldberg's distinctive Prentice Women's Hospital building good-bye.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel came out today in favor of Northwestern University's plan to tear the iconic structure down in order to build a new medical research facility on the Prentice site.

Two weeks ago, 42nd Ward alderman Brendan Reilly announced that he'd reached the same conclusion.…

Top cops can't explain what's up with CAPS

Mick Dumke — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 18:32:58 -0500

Chicago police officials are contradicting each other and withholding information about the future of the program designed to open communication networks with the community.

On Friday afternoon, the director of the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy, or CAPS, added the latest twist, denying that anything will be different next year—except where it is.

"Nothing has been changed, so to speak," says CAPS director Ron Holt.…

Superintendent McCarthy dismantles CAPS, will replace it with something at some point

Mick Dumke — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 10:00:00 -0500

Before he began his City Council budget testimony on Wednesday, police superintendent Garry McCarthy introduced a number of top department officials who were also on hand, from first deputy superintendent Al Wysinger to department spokeswoman Melissa Stratton. But then he drew a blank.…

Surrogate of insanely rich neighborhood developer casts it as savior in dumb article

Asher Klein — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 17:04:00 -0500

In a recent and fucking dumb New York Times article about the University of Chicago's $250 million program to add a hotel, movie theater, Chipotle, LA Fitness, Akira, and a Starbucks it already had, U. of C. executive vice president David Greene actually called that development "enlightened self-interest for us." The area was referred to as "blighted" in the article, though it failed to mention that plenty of the so-called blight, like closing Barack Obama's favorite restaurant, was thanks to the University itself.…

South-side residents fend off pawnshop plan

Mick Dumke — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 10:20:00 -0500

In the fight between the people and the pawnshop, the people have won.

"The applicant has withdrawn the application," a city official announced at the meeting of the zoning board of appeals last Friday—meaning that a proposal to build a new Cash America pawnshop on a vacant lot at the corner of 79th and Western was dead, at least for the time being.…

City sheds hundreds more jobs in black and Hispanic neighborhoods

Mick Dumke — Fri, 19 Oct 2012 10:00:00 -0500

It's becoming an annual tradition.

Over the last year the city of Chicago cut nearly 1,200 middle-class jobs, the vast majority of them held by residents of black and Hispanic neighborhoods on the south and southwest sides that were already coping with disinvestment, vacant lots, empty storefronts, foreclosed homes, persistent joblessness, and crime.…