There’s a stark parallel between problems in the Chicago Police Department and CPS. In both cases, accountability systems that should have protected those being served by the agencies from mistreatment ended up protecting the bureaucracy instead of the people.
In both systems, individuals who complained were ignored and staff with long records of complaints went unchecked. In CPD, oversight investigators (until recently) sustained very few civilian complaints, supervision was lax and early intervention systems were nonfunctional. Cops (and a civilian investigator) who disregarded the code of silence were punished. In CPS, the same law department investigating complaints lodged by students and parents also opposed their lawsuits in court.
The challenge of police reform is vast, but some steps have been taken to strengthen investigatory agencies – though creation of a civilian oversight body is again bogged down by a mayor who doesn’t believe in sharing power. Meanwhile, the cost of misconduct lawsuits continues to pile up.
In CPS, with a school board accountable only to the mayor, the school system has experienced one scandal after another. Emanuel’s board has failed to object to corrupt contracts or to conflicts of interest. It approved a series of cuts to school budgets and then approved a consultant’s scheme to save money on special education with reductions that turned out to be illegal. Faced with complaints that private contractors were failing to keep school buildings clean (contractors passed inspections because they were informed of them ahead of time), the board is considering expanding the contracts.
Marching to the mayor’s orders – ignoring pleas from school communities and experts arguing their utilization data was flawed – the board approved the largest school closing in U.S. history five years ago. This year, ignoring the performance and utilization criteria in CPS’s school closing policy, they followed orders and approved the closing of National Teachers Academy, a politically-motivated decision that leaves the clear impression that the only thing that counts in closing a school is that its students be predominantly African-American.