I am pasting Ald. Moore's email below. It's very readable. Here's the Mayoral proposal he addresses:
The new proposal would have reduced the City's 50 sweepers to 33 and eliminate local control by each ward's Streets and Sanitation Superintendent...
See the results of a called special aldermanic council meeting, keeping in mind that "an aldermanic special meeting has not been held successfully since the "Council War" days in the 1980's."
Chicago City Clerk Miguel del Valle's office anounces a major step toward transparency in Chicago city government. Starting today, the public can watch (Chicago) City Council meetings live and on-demand through a new archive video page on the City Clerk website.
The archive video feature was created in collaboration with and through the recommendation of Dick Simpson and several community groups and good government organizations, including IVI-IPO, the BGA, the League of Women Voters and the Union League Club.
Clerk del Valle noted that bill info and video will soon be linked, searchable, and cross-referenced
[UPDATE: Per Progress Illinois (http://www.progressillinois.com) Alderman Margaret Laurino, Chair of the Committee on Economic, Capital and Technoloy Development, has signed on as a primary sponsor. This is a good sign for a positive result at Monday's hearing.]
If you don't live in Cook County, skip to the next diary. But if you do, read on for the who why and when on the TIF Sunshine Ordinance, and how you can help stick it to the man by sending an email.
A few of you know me, and know that I have been working on Chris Persons' campaign for 48th Ward Alderman. By now most of you know that Mary Ann Smith's (current 48th Ward Alderman) campaign has been successful at removing all 3 of her challengers from the ballot for petty filing errors, and hers will be the only name on the ballot -- there's more about this below the fold.
I'm still in mourning for what I feel is a great injustice that has been heaped upon our campaign. I still can't believe Chris' name won't appear on the ballot. We'd worked so hard, we'd come a long way, and to be stopped for a truly petty mistake is heartbreaking.
I've decided to take my disappointment and my anger and work towards changing the election laws. I'm writing this post to ask you to support me in this effort.
Short term actions:
Build base of support - contacting you, contacting all those that have been objected to this year, contacting various organizations, etc.
Research - gather information on objections (how many, what types, etc.), information on the election laws themselves and also on the responsibilities of boards of elections, etc.
Contact all members of the general assembly (house and senate) - inform them of our research, ask them if they would support a change in the law that would allow a fair opportunity to comply with the rules before removing a candidate from the ballot, and finally would they sponsor, co-sponsor, and/or draft the needed legislation.
Re-evaluate where we are based on responses from the general assembly.
Democracy Denied website
I've created a website at www.democracydenied.com to house all this information. It's also a place where people can voice support and get involved with this campaign.
I was curious to see how well CFL's endorsements aligned with Dick Simpson's research on split votes in City Council.
I decided to do two comparisons, one against seven of the votes that have been mentioned as being significant to labor and the other against only two specific votes regarding the Living Wage ordinance. NOTE: I only used a simple calculation (number of votes agree / total votes). This equation doesn't handle Absences, Not Voting or Not in Council, and those votes should be taken into consideration when forming an opinion.
Rich Miller is reporting over at Capitol Fax that the Chicago Federation of Labor has made its endorsement decisions for the upcoming Chicago municipal elections.
Daley is not endorsed.
From Capitol Fax:
The CFL also didn't endorse anyone in Daley's 11th Ward.
Non-incumbents endorsed by the CFL include Sandi Jackson (7), Carina Sanchez (12), Toni L. Foulkes (15), Joann Thompson (16), Paul Stewart (18), Leroy J. Jones, Jr. (21), Brendan Reilly (42), Michele Smith (43) and Greg Brewer (50). The CFL didn't endorse any candidate in several races, including 2, 5, 11, 20, 25, 29, 34, 37 and 44.
Some of you may already know that I am the field director for Greg Brewer's campaign in the 50th ward. Needless to say, I am thrilled that CFL has chosen to get behind Greg! Our press release is below the fold...
i wouldn't necessarily have thought that my first post about the chicago aldermanic races would have focused on david askew, a loop dfa member, but then events unfold as they do!
lots of us are out circulating petitions for aldermanic candidates, who began to circulate on september 19. the loop group has been out collecting signatures for david askew, a committed progressive who has campaigned for progressive candidates in the past couple of years and who has organized a strong campaign team around former obama campaign volunteers.
my wife was at the farmers market at dearborn and polk for david, when another person who running against madeline heathcock, bob fioretti, came up to her and said, "david askew should drop out, no one can win a three-man race."
(You mean, you can't just come in and put all the local stores out of business while paying your employees just enough to get them to qualify for government aid, shifting the burden for health care and other services away from your corporation and to the public sector and tax payer dollars? - promoted by michael in chicago)
I don't know how many people caught the article in the Sun Times last week about Wal-Mart's plans to put 10 to 20 stores in Chicago over the next five years, and which had this amazing quote:
"But Wal-Mart will "put the brakes" on those ambitious expansion plans unless the City Council defeats a so-called "big-box" ordinance co-signed by 33 of Chicago's 50 aldermen. Introduced by Ald. Joe Moore (49th) and championed by Finance Committee Chairman Ed Burke (14th), the ordinance would apply to both newly built and existing stores with at least 75,000 square feet of space owned by companies with $1 billion in annual gross revenues. Those 35 Chicago stores would be required to pay any employee who works more than five hours a week a "living wage" of at least $10 an hour, along with $3 an hour in benefits."
