A crucial public service, or a place to lounge? The purpose of a dog park

Reviewing the various aspects of the budget that officials prepared for Illinois state government’s upcoming (beginning July 1) fiscal year, there’s one aspect that has managed to catch my eye – dog parks!

Rocco, Carmelo encounter a friend (left) at the local dog park. Photos by Gregory Tejeda

It seems that Illinois officials thought to include some $400,000 that will be given to officials in Chicago and Aurora to be used to either develop new, or improve existing, facilities where pet owners can legally let loose their animals.

AS IN THOSE areas completely fenced in so that a dog owner can legally bring their precious pet, unhook their leash and let them run about. Working off the frustration of being chained up the rest of the day.

The idea is that it’s pet exercise. They can run. They can play. They can interact with other dogs – although one aspect of every dog park I’ve ever seen is the separate portion maintained for dogs who act up.

Almost like a ‘doggie jail’ for those pets who just can’t “play nice” with each other.

My own experience with dog parks involves the two canines my father and step-mother have. I help out with their walking, and periodically am the one who puts the dogs in the car so we can make a 5-minute drive to their neighborhood dog park.

WHICH I HAVE to admit, it’s like the two dogs (Rocco and Carmelo, a black standard poodle and tan goldendoodle respectively) eagerly anticipate the trip. Getting them to climb in the car is never a hassle. Although sometimes, Carmelo tries to then move to the front driver seat – and oftentimes will have his paws up on the steering wheel as though he’s going to take the automobile out for a spin.

Carmelo (right) encounters a pack at the park

Then, we arrive at the dog park (which is a fenced-in area about the size of two football fields where it is legal to unleash the animals and they’re encouraged to run around to their heart’s delight). It’s like the excitement level boosts the moment the dogs realize exactly where they’re going.

In fact, the real trick is to wrestle with the dogs long enough until we actually get past the locked gates that demark the point at which the municipal “leash” laws no longer apply.

Plus, I always find it intriguing the notion that any dogs who happen to already be in the park come running over to the gate to “check out” the newcomers.

WHICH INVARIABLY CREATES a noisy racket – everybody in sight is barking at each other, and it doesn’t end until the dogs are safely inside and off the leash.

Then, there’s the sight of dogs galore running all about. And sometimes my father’s pooches managing to find another doggie or two whom they feel some special bit of attention for. They make a new “friend,” so to speak. Other times, they “wrestle” with each other.

Carmelo gets playful at the dog park

Personally, I find it enjoyable to know I can let the dog off the leash and they can have some freedom (of sorts) to run about as they please. Which is why I find it odd that some people seem to think the dog park is a place to find a bench to sit in the sun and watch while their own dog is perched nearby. It’s like those people won’t let their pets have any fun.

Then again, I’ve heard of some dog owners insist they’ll never take their pets to one of these public parks. They insist their precious pooches will get contaminated by the germs carried about by everybody else’s mutts!

OF COURSE, I have to admit that Rocco once developed a pretty serious cough – one severe enough that he was taken to the “vet.” Who ultimately diagnosed it as “kennel cough,” and said it most likely was something he caught off another pet at the dog park. Some medication and a two-week time period away from the park turned out to be the cure.

My father playing w/ pooches at park

Now I know some communities have had these facilities for some time, while others are trying to turn any sizable plot of land they have into a dog park. I know in Gary, Ind., officials are contemplating using a one-time Little League baseball field as a dog park – on the grounds that the outfield fences already are in place. A one-time center field can become a new doggie playland.

Over here in Illinois, the General Assembly signed off on providing $50,000 to the Chicago Public Schools to develop a dog park in the Mount Greenwood neighborhood, and $200,000 to the Chicago Park District for a place in the Hyde Park neighborhood and another such facility elsewhere. While the Fox Valley Park District will get $150,000 for a new dog park in Aurora and upgrades to an existing park in Montgomery.

It might be the smartest money spent, if it encourages people to not let their pets roam free and unleashed. Now if only we can get all pet owners to pick up their animals’ poop, we’d have a better world.

  -30-

Will electorate trust Lori Lightfoot to fill city school board vacancies?

I’ve never been amongst those people who think we ought to be putting it up to the Chicago electorate to decide every few years who should be serving on the board of education for the Chicago Public Schools.

del VALLE: New school board president

Yet there are those who have argued incessantly that giving the mayor the authority to make such appointments is far too much power and influence to be entrusting to one individual.

SO I’M GOING to be curious to see what kind of reaction arises to the fact that newly-elected Mayor Lori Lightfoot has gone ahead and made appointments to the school board.

Seven, to be exact, including the pick of one-time city Clerk and state Senator Miguel del Valle to serve as the new school board president.

Who, as somebody who once tried himself running for mayor against Richard M. Daley, has a political reputation of someone who wasn’t exactly a part of the old boys network and was interested in bringing about change.

Which would sort of put him in line with the image the Lightfoot is trying to create for her own term as mayor. Although Lightfoot herself was opposed to the bill that would have created an elected school board for Chicago (just like all the suburbs have), because she thought the bill’s mechanism was too convoluted.

BUT ARE THE people who view Lightfoot as being all about change and shaking everything up going to accept a school board that they didn’t personally pick?

It could be the big issue. Although I don’t have much of a qualm about accepting it – largely because I think it’s absurd to go about expecting voters (many of whom think there already are too many obscure political posts to have to pick people for) to make qualified choices.

I could easily envision an elected school board becoming a lot like all those judicial posts people are asked to make picks for. Many would wind up skipping over the ballot spots, while others would randomly pick people without much of a clue as to who they’re voting for.

LIGHTFOOT: Picks former mayoral challenger

And yes, I’d put into that category the kind of people who say only semi-jokingly that they look for good Irish-sounding names on the ballot; figuring that’s a sound of respectability and experience.

PERSONALLY, I THINK it is nonsense, and there have been times I’ve been spiteful enough to deliberately vote against an Irish-sounding name – just because I figure that candidate will get too many votes from other people.

I did find it interesting that Lightfoot, amongst her school board picks, were people with education backgrounds – instead of what often becomes of school boards. They get filled with people who have electoral ambitions who, for whatever reason, wind up being unable to find any other office for which to run.

And the idea of del Valle in the top post is also intriguing – and not just because I personally have an interest in seeing increased political empowerment of officials with Latino ethnic backgrounds.

I’ll admit that any Spanish-sounding name on a ballot usually gets a second-glance and extra bit of consideration. So the idea of del Valle – once the first head of a Latino caucus in the General Assembly – isn’t exactly the most outrageous pick that a mayor could make to be in charge of the school board.

WOULD HE HAVE had a chance of getting the post if it had been up to voters making picks on the ballot?

EMANUEL: Would he have ever appointed del Valle?

I don’t know. I suppose he might have, IF the political bosses who put together candidate slates would have seen a benefit to themselves to having del Valle be in the running for the post.

But this may have been an example of how we’re better off with the school board members being political appointees. After all, we always can hold the mayor accountable for her picks if they turn out to be poor ones.

Besides, I suspect the desire of many people to have an elected school board will wither away, now that we have a mayor, such as Rahm Emanuel, whom many of them found so objectionable and whom they were eager to diminish in authority to whatever degree was possible.

  -30-

Rauner remembrance of tragedy – an effort to divert public’s attention?

Reading Gov. Bruce Rauner’s formal address to present a state budget for Fiscal 2019, I couldn’t help but notice his opening bit.

RAUNER: Trying to redeem his pol priorities?

The reference to it being exactly 10 years since the day a former Northern Illinois University student felt compelled to fire off his weapon – killing five students before he turned his gun on himself.

THE NEWS EVENTS of the day even called for a last-minute rewrite, also offering a mention of the death Tuesday of Chicago Police Cmdr. Paul Bauer – the officer who tried to stop a fleeing suspect being chased by other police, only to get shot and killed.

Both tragic happenings. In the case of the DeKalb slayings a decade ago, I’m sure the memories remain as strong now in the minds of those who were there as they were back then.

But a part of me couldn’t help but wonder how much this bit of rhetoric was an attempt at misdirection.

Rather than get worked up over the details of the budget proposal Rauner wants the General Assembly to approve for Illinois government for the fiscal year beginning July 1, he’d rather we think of these other happenings.

BECAUSE IF WE think too much of budgetary matters, then we wind up touching on some sore spots of the Rauner era of state government.

Let’s not forget that Rauner, although in his third year of government, has never managed to get a budget proposal of his implemented into law. Heck, he’s never offered up anything that wound up becoming policy.

The only reason we have a budget in place now is because Democratic legislators were joined by a few Republicans willing to put the daily workings of government at the forefront to pass a budget that Rauner himself tried to use his veto powers to kill off!

Because Rauner is the guy who came into the governor’s post thinking he could strong-arm the rest of state government into going along with his vision – one in which organized labor and unions take a severe blow to their influence over Illinois.

THAT CONCEPT WAS more important for the past two years to Rauner than anything concerning the daily operations of the state, which does have responsibilities to fulfill – regardless of one’s ideological hang-ups.

The question we ought to be asking ourselves is whether Rauner is willing to get serious and try to put together budget proposals this year – or if we’re headed for another budgetary standoff.

The last of which stretched out over two years, caused serious complications for daily government operations and created financial problems that will take Illinois years (if not decades) to resolve.

You’d think that Rauner, facing a re-election cycle complicated by the fact that the conservative ideologues the governor is counting on to support him have their own partisan objections (being anti-union isn’t conservative enough for them), would want a straight-forward budget process. Something to ensure that he signs into law the Fiscal ’19 budget on or before June 30.

BECAUSE THE $37.6 billion spending plan for state government the governor put forth includes some serious changes to the way retired teacher pensions are funded – mostly by sticking them on the school districts.

Something I’m sure will tick off the Chicago Public Schools, where officials would actually like to have the state assume a larger share of those pension costs. Is the governor’s budget address merely another excuse to set up a political brawl with Chicago interests later this year?

Some reports made mention of the fact that Wednesday’s budget address, in addition to being 10 years since the bloodshed at DeKalb, was 225 days from the end of the budget standoff.

Will it also become the beginning of a political sequel – one in which Rauner will try to redeem his political self-image at the expense of the people of Illinois. Elections day are March 20 and Nov. 6; those dates can’t come soon enough.

  -30-

Here we go again playing Blame Game

It took Gov. Bruce Rauner about one hour following his drop-dead date threat of Noon on Monday to issue the order saying the General Assembly will have to return to Springfield on Wednesday and remain until they follow his demands.

Not happy unless there's infighting?

Those demands are to allow him to put his grubby paws all over the education funding bill that he's made it clear he hates, and wants to alter through his amendatory veto powers – something the General Assembly most certainly doesn’t want to have done.

RAUNER LAST WEEK set the Monday at Noon deadline, with the threats that there’d be a special session of the Legislature called to force them into action.

Monday morning, he said such session would begin Wednesday and could run through July 31 if legislators don’t act promptly.

Not that I don’t doubt Rauner was sincere in his threats. It’s just that they seem so ridiculous.

Because as we saw during the end-of-June special session mandated by the governor over the budget dispute, just because Rauner orders their presence in Springfield doesn’t mean that anything will get done.

HECK, EVEN AFTER the sides reached agreement (over Rauner’s objections) on the budget, the final action still had to wait a couple of days because not enough legislators were present for them to legally do any government business.

So the idea that something will happen by July 31 just because Rauner says it must? Hah! That’s such a laughable notion.

The fact is that Rauner wants alterations to the proposal for education funding spending because he officially claims it gives too much to the Chicago Public Schools – particularly in the aid it provides to help cover costs of pensions for retired school teachers from the city.

Are they really at fault?

Not that I think he really cares much about any such inequity. He’s playing the typical urban vs. rural game of Illinois politics, going around to rural communities and claiming he’s merely trying to keep Chicago from taking too much. Implying they’d get a little extra in funding if he succeeds.

THAT MAY GET him a few extra votes come Nov. 6, 2018 when he seeks re-election. But it will also harden the desire of Chicago voters to dump his sorry behind come next year’s Election Day.

Although one has to admit the touch of politicking being played by Democratic leaders of the Legislature with regards to holding back on the education funding portion of the budget, where the money exists but it is a matter of approving a measure allocating how it gets spent.

Schools are going to be desperate to have their funding by Aug. 10 if they’re to open for the new school year come mid-August. Legislators are hoping that by delaying Rauner’s ability to act, they will give him so little time and the pressure from public schools will be so intense that he’ll have to just go ahead and sign the bill regardless of what he really thinks.

Anybody who thought the politicking was over early this month when a budget agreement was finally put in place for the first time in over two full fiscal years is seriously misguided.

THE FACT IS that our political people, at times, only seem happy when they’re in a crisis mode and all hell threatens to break loose if they don’t act promptly on something – even though the crisis is usually one of their own making.

So for as much as I want to blame Bruce Rauner for being a hard-head and a pathetic ideologue, I also have to confess that the politicking is being aggravated by the people he opposes. Or maybe they’re being driven to their own hard-line stances by Rauner’s ideological leanings.

Or maybe it’s just like in that song “Blame Game” that includes the lyric, “At the end of it, you know we both were wrong.”

You have to admit we’re in a pretty sorry state of affairs when one can find words of wisdom in the lyrics of Kanye West.

  -30-

A DAY IN THE LIFE (of Chicago): Not living up to bloody reputation Trump tries to tag our city with?

Whatever shall Donald J. Trump have rants about when he sits at his keyboard and taps out another 140-character missive meant to make himself feel better about his existence?

TRUMP: He should stifle self on Chicago

For a common topic for Trump to get worked up over is the homicide rate for Chicago, which is actually running a little bit lower this year compared to last but is still significantly higher than it has been in most recent years.

BUT FOR THE time period stretching from Feb. 26 through Saturday, there were no deaths in Chicago caused by any other human being's deliberate actions. On Sunday, a 23-year-old man was shot repeatedly in the Austin neighborhood, dying from his wounds. You have to go back to a week in December of 2009 to find a stretch of time with less fatal activity than we had in Chicago this past week.

Now as the Chicago Tribune points out, we have had more shootings occur in Chicago this year compared to last. But fewer fatalities. People are surviving. Which is good.

For everybody except Trump and his miscreant followers who are absolutely determined to look down upon the Second City. My own suspicion is they are bitter that a Chicagoan provided our society with the president they came to despise so intensely because he was so unlike them, so they're going to keep up the rants for as long as they're alive.

Maybe we'd hear less ranting about Chicago if the city hadn't been so overwhelmingly opposed to Trump last Election Day that his campaign might have been somewhat competitive in Illinois and this state might have joined other Great Lakes/Rust Belt states like Michigan and Ohio in backing the Trumpster.

De Blasio: Ate a Portillos, but prefers Nathans

WE'D BE HEARING more about New York or Los Angeles or the neighborhoods of Washington, D.C., that many of us don't have a clue even exist. Anacostia?

Even New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, in Chicago for a speaking engagement last week said he was tired of hearing Trump's Chicago rants, adding they surprise him because Trump himself is not some rural bumpkin but a genuine Noo Yawker.

Although I'd argue the view on the 69th floor of the Trump Tower in Manhattan provides a much different glimpse of urban life than does living in a place like Brooklyn. Particularly if they have the Mar a Lago mansion in Florida (whom various reports have pointed out is near a Florida municipality whose crime rates per capita are remarkably similar to that of Chicago).

An old Peanuts comic strip has Lucy spew a slew of statistics for Charlie Brown about how bad their baseball team is, with the final panel having Charlie retort, "Lucy, tell your statistics to shut up!" Don't you wish we could do the same to The Donald? What else is notable about life these days on the southwestern shores of Lake Michigan?

RAUNER: Needs to find education solution

YOU WILL LISTEN TO WHAT I HAVE TO SAY!!!: Chance the Rapper, who on Friday was granted a token audience with Gov. Bruce Rauner to talk about the financial problems confronted by the Chicago Public Schools, felt the need to speak out again Monday.

Then again, he only got a half-hour, and I suspect the governor wasn't exactly subtle in letting it be known he wasn't terribly interested in hearing opinions other than his own about how the state's financial mess (which he wants us to believe is the fault of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan and state Comptroller Susana Mendoza) is impacting public education programs.

Anyway, the music star who actually won a Grammy Award this year held a press conference at the Westcott Elementary School in the Auburn/Gresham neighborhood, where he made a $1 million donation to the Chicago Public Schools. People were able to watch his largess via his personal Instagram account.

Which means you could have heard the whole lot of nothing being spewed that Rauner was ignoring. Of course, I have to confess the entity that is most worthy of criticism in this whole matter are those news media organizations that felt compelled to cover any of this as though it mattered. Focusing on the trivia is the easy way of pretending to have significance, rather than pushing people to try to find a real solution to the state's financial mess.

IT'S GOOD TO BE THE KING (and Queen):  Barack and Michelle Obama may not live at their Kenwood neighborhood residence these days, but they are capable of possessing drivers' licenses issued by the state of Illinois.

Nobody gets drivers' license photos ...

The State Journal-Register newspaper in Springfield reported that the secretary of state's office issued the now-former first couple new licenses without them having to make a return trip to Illinois. The deal was done through the mail, and the state even waived the $30 renewal fee, sending the new licenses -- which used old photographs the state already had on file -- to a D.C.-area address.

... that look this good

Officials said the deal was done right about the time of Election Day, and they say they would have made a similar accomodation for anyone "serving in that office" who happened to have an Illinois license. Not that any others have had one.

It also helped that both Barack and Michelle qualified for the automatic renewal program intended for anyone who manages to go all four years without accumulating traffic tickets. Then again, it's not like Obama has been in a position to get a ticket -- unless you really think some motorcycle beat cop is going to pull over the presidential motorcade to cite the president for having a busted taillight.

  -30-

Feds need a warrant to get into public schools; what’s wrong with that idea?

When you think about it, it makes all the sense in the world. Although I can already envision the nativist element of our society ranting and raging about the unjustness of the Chicago Public Schools’ new policy.

I’m referring to the memorandum sent out this week to principals throughout the city school system, informing them that any agents of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency had better have proper arrest warrants on them if they decide to set foot on any school property.

IF THEY HAVE such warrants indicating they’re looking for a specific individual and also details exactly what it is they suspect that individual of, then no one is going to even remotely think of telling those agents to stop.

But if they think they can come onto school properties on a fishing expedition, of sorts, in hopes of finding evidence of people in violation of federal immigration laws, then it is only proper that such actions ought to be halted. Although it should be noted that officials say that immigration officials haven't actually tried showing up at schools. Not yet!

While I realize some people with a “law and order” mentality think police ought to be given great authority to scour amongst our society, the fact is that we expect law enforcement personnel to show some sort of cause before we allow them to legitimately restrict someone’s freedom.

That is the American Way, even though we now have the Trump mentality developing that thinks a more authoritarian way of doing things is somehow more appropriate.

TO BE SPECIFIC about this new policy, Chicago Public Schools chief education officer Janice Jackson wrote to principals to tell them they should forbid federal immigration officials from setting foot on school property unless they have that warrant.

Which would mean that a federal judge somewhere has given at least a cursory review to the circumstances and decided that there is a legitimate reason to be suspicious.

School officials also are making an effort to gather up more information about their students that would be needed in the event that a parent gets caught up in an immigration situation. The schools want to be informed about who is next in line to be responsible for a child if the parents suddenly “disappear.”

All of this is coming about because of fears that immigration, in this era of Trump, is going to step up its efforts and will be overbearing in its desire to remove people from our society whom some amongst us are determined to believe should never have been here to begin with.

I’VE NOTICED AMONGST my own Facebook friends those who live in neighborhoods with higher-than-average populations of non-Anglo residents warnings that “ICE agents” are out and about, on the lookout for people whom they want to believe are candidates for deportation.

People are feeling the need to be wary. The Obama era of wanting to think that such people have a place in our society and do make worthy contributions is most definitely over.

In fact, I wonder if amongst the Trump-ites, which Obama-era sentiment is a bigger priority to erase – serious immigration reform or health care reform.

It may be amongst the nativist element that foreigners, particularly if they habla en Español, are a bigger threat than having one’s tax dollars help to cover the cost of providing health insurance to all (or as many as possible).

IN LIGHT OF such attitudes spreading through our neighborhoods, it is reassuring that schools officials are showing a little bit of sense. And because they’re asking to see a warrant, it means legitimate law enforcement efforts won’t be thwarted.

Do ideologues hate health care or immigration more?

Just like the concept of “sanctuary cities” does NOT mean that people without valid Visas are capable of hiding out in Chicago, or any other place with that distinction.

It’s about requiring Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials to do their own work, which makes sense because they’re the ones trained in the nuances of immigration policy. Local cops have enough to do without being required to add immigration tasks to their work load – even though the new Trump policies seem to want to make just such an addition.

Just as schools officials have enough responsibilities to deal with, without having to monitor their student bodies and try to figure out which ones have parents whose immigration status is questionable!

  -30-

Will Rauner be eaten by Chicago “bear” now sleeping in Illinois “woods?”

A large part of the reason why I downplay the rhetoric about the Republicans’ great Election Day victories in Illinois (they took a half dozen seats in the Legislature last month in rural parts of the state formerly occupied by Democrats) is because I don’t see how it impacts the way things get done.
 

RAUNER: Taking on the bear sleeping in woods

Or don’t get done, within the context of Illinois state government operations.

GOP POLITICAL OPERATIVES argue that the 60 percent Democratic majorities in both legislative chambers have been broken, and that when Gov. Bruce Rauner hands down a veto, now it will be able to stand (unless he manages to offend Republican officials as well).

But as anyone who watched this week’s legislative nonsense with regards to state financial assistance for the Chicago Public Schools realizes, Rauner already had that power. What has he gained?

For those not paying attention, Rauner this week issued a veto to a bill approved back in the summer that would have provided some $215 million in assistance to cover pensions for the Chicago Public Schools – money that District 299 was desperately relying on to balance out their budget for the year.

The Illinois Senate immediately took up the veto override, and gave their support to rejecting Rauner’s rejection – to having the state make the payment.

YET OVER IN the Illinois House, where Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago, supposedly (if you listen to Rauner) rules like a warlord of old and deliberately disregards the needs of the public, nothing happened.

MADIGAN: Inaction because he knew he couldn't?

The General Assembly adjourned its fall session on Thursday with no plans to return until their final day in January – which will be followed up by the swearing-in of the newly-elected Legislature.

The one that has six more Republican members and no longer has the illusion of Madigan having a “veto-proof” majority.

There is speculation that legislators could be called into session for a special day of activity to take up the issue. But that’s presuming they could actually get their members all coordinated for such an event.

IF IT WERE possible, I suspect the Illinois House would have acted like the state Senate did – and voted right away to dump all over Rauner’s veto. I'm sure Madigan wishes he could make it so. I suspect his offer to meet Saturday and Sunday with the governor were less than sincere.

 

LEWIS: Union never expected gov to keep word

Meaning it is most likely that Rauner’s rejection of the school funding measure for Chicago schools stands, and the financial help promise is deader than the Chicago Bears’ dreams of playing in the upcoming Super Bowl! Which is the way things would have wound up before, and will turn out after, the transition on Jan. 11.

As for who is to blame, it’s the usual partisan political rhetoric. Both sides are blaming each other (Rauner didn’t approve the school funding like he promised he would, while Democrats leading the Legislature never came up with a companion bill providing pension funding relief).

It is dreadfully obvious that Rauner intends to use the whole issue to politick in his ongoing effort to use the 2018 election cycle to further decrease the number of Democrats representing rural parts of the state. Chicago Teachers Union officials say they believe Rauner never intended to give the schools anything, and that he was always looking for an excuse to back out of the deal. Mayor Rahm Emanuel said Rauner, by supporting a utility company bailout, chose big business over children.

IT IS A move that I could see coming back to bite him in the fanny, for all it means is that he’ll have solid control over the one-third of Illinois’ population that lives outside of the Chicago area.

Because the rhetoric he and political operatives are spewing certainly isn’t going to have a mass appeal to Illinoisans at-large. It’s too Chicago-focused, and may well get Chicago voters all riled up. Think of us as the Chicago “bear” sleeping in the woods who, upon being awoken, will be angered and wind up devouring him.

TRUMP: Did Rauner learn wrong lesson?

Perhaps Rauner spent too much time watching the recently-completed presidential election cycle and thinks he can make the label of “Chicagoans” sound as demonic as the label “Mexicans” was used by President-elect Donald Trump?

Trump may have been able to win the presidency with a minority of voters through the quirks of the Electoral College, but those wouldn’t apply to a statewide election. Rauner could wind up blowing his personal fortune trying to buy up every single rural Illinois vote in existence – only to learn that in singling out Chicago, he was attacking the very place where the overwhelming majority of our state’s residents live and work.

  -30-

No strike for Chicago school teachers! No pennant (not yet) for the Cubs

Believe it or not, something positive was happening in the early hours of Tuesday – even though I’m sure that segment of our city’s society determined to root for the Chicago Cubs thinks it was a miserable time.
 

LEWIS: Reached a late-night deal w/ schools

The Chicago Teachers Union was actually reaching an agreement with the Chicago Public Schools toward a new contract for public school faculty.

TUESDAY HAD BEEN the strike date previously set, meaning there was a good chance that this would have been the day in which we’d have to endure the sight of teachers walking the picket line, union President Karen Lewis taking the name of Rahm Emanuel in vain, and parents trying to figure out what to do with their kids while they go to work.

Which I’m sure would have added to the sense of depression that the Cubs-fan segment of our city would have felt; after seeing the would-be heroics of Jake Arietta and Kris Bryant erased in what became a 6-5 loss to the San Francisco Giants that meant the Cubs would have to wait a day or two before seeing if they advance in the National League playoffs.

It really was a surprise moment – the teachers deciding not to take to the picket lines, that is. I had braced myself for the thought of outraged labor rhetoric to be spewed in coming days as long-lasting tensions would come pouring out.

Heck, it was around 10 p.m. that Lewis was making public statements saying we should expect the worst to happen. Only for the decision to be made about Midnight that the sides were close enough that there would be no need for picket lines – or a strike.

OF COURSE, UNION officials made it be known that the agreement was merely a “tentative” one, meaning that things could still fall apart.

“A tentative agreement is not a final contract,” union officials said in a midnight statement. “Every active member of the Chicago Teachers Union will have an opportunity to review and vote on the agreement before a contract is ratified.”

 

EMANUEL: Mayor spared aggravation

It wasn’t sure when the union’s House of Delegates, then the full union, would take the votes that would formally approve a contract on their part.

But it ought to give us a sigh of relief that we’re not going to have to endure the rigors of a teachers’ strike in Chicago – which would have caused so many frayed tempers and I’m sure would have given pleasure to no one.

EXCEPT MAYBE DONALD Trump, who would have gleefully used it as a rhetorical excuse to bash us about some more. Heck, it’s not like anyone here was going to vote for the goober. What does he have to lose?

For the record, the agreement is for a four-year contract, meaning that Emanuel will be able to get through the rest of his current mayoral term without having labor strife from the teachers’ union. He can focus on all the other entities that want to demean him for their own various reasons.

The offer includes cost-of-living increases of 2 percent and 2.5 percent in the two final years of the deal, and does not require teachers to pay a larger share to cover the cost of their eventual pensions. Although people hired to teach in the Chicago Public Schools in the future will have to pay a larger share of their pensions. Which I’m sure they view as a problem to deal with in the future, so long as the current faculty are protected.

Money to cover the cost of the slight pay raise and pension expenses will come from tax increment finance district funds made available by the city, which Cook County Clerk David Orr said was "a short-term fix" and that, "City Hall continues to dodge a fundamental problem with TIFs."

FOR HIS PART, Emanuel acted pleased, particularly by the fact he won’t have all those p-o’ed parents to deal with. “Students across Chicago will be in school this morning and on the path to a stronger and brighter future,” the mayor told reporter-types Tuesday morning at City Hall.

 

The source of Wrigleyville's aggravation Tuesday

That part about “stronger and brighter” might be a touch of exaggeration. But I don’t doubt the sincerity of pleasure at not having the Chicago schools in the national attention because of a teachers’ strike.

Who knows? It may even turn out that not having to deal with a strike will help some of those Cubs fan-types of people deal with the fact their favorite ball club didn’t clinch its spot Monday in the next round of the National League playoffs – even though they jumped out to an early lead with that Arietta home run.

And now, the schoolchildren of Chicago will be able to discuss Monday night’s victory in the schoolyards of the city – that is, if they were even capable of staying up that late on a school night, just to watch a ball game.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Hopefully, by now you've figured out where to find Channel FS1. Otherwise known as Fox Sports on your cable television lineup. And if you haven't keep in mind that maybe you're being spared much anguish watching ballgames like the one Monday night.

EXTRA: It’s beginning to look a lot like a strike will take place this autumn

We’ll know more come Wednesday, but it’s becoming more apparent that the Chicago Teachers Union is not likely to reach any contract agreement any time soon in their ongoing dispute with the public schools system.

Union officials on Monday let it be known the results of its recent vote over whether to issue a strike authorization. That’s the step by which the actual teachers give the teachers’ union leadership the authority to decide whether to call for a strike.

AS IN PICKET lines, protests and teachers chanting slogans that take the name of Mayor Rahm Emanuel in vain, all while parents get all peeved that they now have to find alternate daycare for their children – whom they had counted on being able to shuttle off to school.

For the record, 90.6 percent of union members took part in the vote, and 95.6 percent of those people voted “yes” to the idea of going out on strike.

In short, teachers are upset with the idea that school management has tried to make it seem as though it’s their greed that is causing the financial problems that confront the Chicago Public Schools system.

So after going through decades of leadership during the years of Mayor Richard M. Daley without labor disputes, it appears that Emanuel could face the prospect of his third strike to occur during his five years, thus far, as mayor.

THE NEXT STEP is for the teachers’ union’s governing body to meet, and that is scheduled for Wednesday. At that time, the union could proceed to approve the 10-day notice required by law of the teachers’ intent to take to the picket lines.

It also means the first day we could actually see picketing school teachers is Oct. 11 – one day after the official day for celebrating Columbus Day. Which means we could literally get the sight of picketing American Indian activists calling Christopher Columbus a slave trader and a tyrant, followed up a day later by the sight of school teachers coming up with nastier things to say about Emanuel.

There really is no love lost between the two sides, as most people perceive the Chicago Public Schools management as nothing more than a batch of lackeys doing the mayor’s bidding.

Is it all Rahm's fault?

One other potential issue, for those who are religious-minded.

TECHNICALLY, THE JEWISH holiday of Yom Kippur is Oct. 12, with certain aspects of its celebration beginning the night before.

Could someone who is Jewish and who teaches in the Chicago schools claim they’re not working because they’re honoring their religious beliefs? Or would they have to make their religious statement by not participating in the picketing that could place that day?

On a serious note, I realize there are real issues at stake in this labor dispute, and this one religious issue is likely to be a minor point, if significant at all.

But with the proposed cuts that union officials say will hurt special education classes, librarians, counselors, social workers and teachers’ aides – along with leaving many needed teachers out-of-work – we have to find some way of alleviating the hurt that likely is going to spill out publicly in coming weeks.

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“Incompetent” and “Illiterate?” Could we say governor is “Clueless?”

I feel a little cheap referring to a five-year-old e-mail written back before anybody in public life cared one bit who Bruce Rauner was.

 

RAUNER: Revising his words

But the man who is now governor is going to have to take some political abuse from people on account of an e-mail message he sent back in 2011 where he was critical of the Chicago Public Schools.

SPECIFICALLY, RAUNER SAID management of the public schools was “incompetent” while the quality of teachers was also lacking, since they were – he felt – “illiterate.”

I’m not about to come to Rauner’s defense. I have aunts, uncles and cousins who either have worked for, or are currently employed by, the Chicago Public Schools in one capacity or another.

So yes, a part of me writes this commentary with a sentiment similar to that expressed in the film “The Godfather” when Al Pacino’s “Michael” warned brother “Fredo” (actor John Cazale) to “Don’t ever take sides with anyone against the family again.”

I’m aware that there are people who made a conscious choice to devote a portion of their lives to a cause they feel is noble, even though there likely are other things they could do in life that would provide them with much better financial compensation.

BUT LET’S ALSO be honest and admit that bad-mouthing the quality of the Chicago Public Schools is something that many of us do all too freely. I know in my case, my parents timed a suburban move to just weeks before I was old enough to begin school and I didn’t return to live in Chicago proper until I was of college-age.

So perhaps I’m not the prime person to try to defend the honor of the Chicago Public Schools.

But reading cheap wisecracks such as those written by Rauner all those years ago just comes across as something we shouldn’t take the least bit seriously. It’s just the same old rant being spewed yet again.

It’s not terribly original. It does nothing to enhance the quality of the schools or persuade people to want to work better at their jobs.

IF ANYTHING, IT encourages the alleged incompetents whom some want to believe only keep their jobs through the power of organized labor to dig in their heels all the harder to remain in place.

Keeping their jobs out of spite, it would seem!

Besides, I know there also are people who would say that government employees aren’t exactly the most motivated – counting purely on partisan politics and the ability of their “sponsors” to keep winning elections to ensure they keep their jobs.

Which is why Rauner seemed eager Thursday night to promptly issue an apology when the old e-mails became publicly known. His trash talk of old had the ability to create problems for him, and he’d better be quick to apologize.

OR ELSE THE people who are critical of Rauner’s performance as governor during the past two years would be quick to come up with their own labels for his administration; and they’d probably come up with tags that would stick far longer than the ones he tried to put on Chicago Public School officials.

Besides, there isn’t much for Rauner to gain by wanting to step up his hostility toward the Chicago Teachers Union – which already regards Mayor Rahm Emanuel as a sworn enemy. Does the governor really want to compete with Hizzoner for the title of “Most Despised” government official?

Besides, I already can envision the “prize” one would receive for that title – my late aunt Charlene (who worked at Chicago Vocational School for many years) would come back from the great beyond to haunt them.

Rauner a new Chicago Public Schools 'enemy?'

It would not be a pleasant experience. While my Tia Charlene was a loving woman, she was not someone you’d want to be on her bad side.

HER PERSISTENCE IN pursuing a cause (at her life’s end, she was one of the activist-types fighting against the presence of pet coke in her South Deering neighborhood) meant she’d keep on your case eternally.

Which may be the fate that Rauner will now suffer at the hands of Chicago schoolteachers everywhere!

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Reality usually worse than imagination. Campaigning against Chicago just the same old partisan political nonsense?

There’s nothing new about a local political person trying to score points for themselves by trying to portray Chicago as a rat hole.

Rauner allies ad could have found a real Chicago school in bad shape if they tried

The city does comprise only about one-quarter of Illinois’ overall population (about two-thirds if one includes the entire metro area), and there are those who figure getting all the rural Illinois people all riled up can create a large mass of support for themselves.

BUT SOMETIMES, IT just comes across a little too stupid to be believed, and I want to believe that the people of Southern Illinois who are being hit with the latest such use of this tactic by Gov. Bruce Rauner will be intelligent enough to see through this.

At stake is a television spot put together by Rauner backers who are airing it on stations in the Cape Girardeau, Mo./Paducah, Ky. and Carbondale television market. It’s intent is to claim that local state legislators who are Democrats are really nothing more than lackeys of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago.

Because we’re all supposed to realize that Madigan is the root of all evil in Illinois, particularly since he actually lives within the city of Chicago proper (near Midway Airport, to be exact).

This particular television spot includes one moment that brings up “Bailout for Chicago Public Schools” and uses a stock photo image of one of the most decrepit buildings one can envision.

WINDOWS ALL SMASHED up, Doors broken. It’s a wonder the place hasn’t been condemned!

As though that is what has become of the Chicago Public Schools and that is what Madigan and allies are willing to waste state funds on trying to save.

The only problem is that the image comes from the Shutterstock.com website and is described as being an “abandoned office or school building.” And as the Capitol Fax newsletter out of Springfield points out, a look at an alternate image of the same building shows the mountain range off in the background.

 

MADIGAN: Why not just put horns, forked tail on him?

This image meant to depict the Chicago Public Schools in all their decrepit-ness may not actually be a school, and it certainly isn’t from anywhere in the city. The only thing we have close to mountains in Chicago are the landfills of old containing all the garbage our grandparents’ generation accumulated during their lifetimes.

WHICH GIVES THIS particular advertising spot the stink of all that garbage. It’s as nonsensical as Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump’s revoking of the Washington Post’s credentials to cover his campaign on the grounds their coverage is “phony and dishonest.”

It’s really pathetic to use such an image, because of the same fact I always bring up whenever a reporter-type person gets accused of exaggerating facts in a news story. They deserve our ridicule because they’re lazy.

Reality always turns out to be more absurd than anything they could possibly make up. They could have found a real school in decrepit condition and used that image. Of course, that would have required them to do some extra work. And work is just so hard!

Of course, we in Chicago will never see this particular television spot. It wasn’t meant for us, and we’ve never given any thought to the specific legislators (John Bradley of Marion, Gary Forby of Benton and Brandon Phelps of Harrisburg) who are supposedly Madigan’s lackeys.

RAUNER: Will demonization strategy work?

BUT THIS IS part of the Rauner strategy of trying to cut into the sizable Democratic caucus of the General Assembly that has shown the will to stand up to all the anti-labor union rhetoric the governor has spewed in the name of “reform.”

Maybe he thinks he can succeed where other Republican politicos have failed – in trying to demonize the Madigan name as the very image of Chicago that many of them just do not comprehend. It’s on such a larger scale than anything they ever envisioned for their own lives.

Which makes this ad more of the same nonsense, and perhaps the root of the real problem – we’d rather complain about each other than try to work to resolve the real problems that exist.

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