That would require prioritizing community needs and listening to community voices. It would also require political will. Currently Metra is desperate for funding but, by focusing solely on suburban commuter ridership, is ignoring huge potential revenue from city residents.
Ultimately, that effort could link to a region-wide rail network, serving residents of small cities around the Midwest who want to get to O’Hare. That’s a ways off, but that’s visionary.
Emanuel’s vision is different, though: a global city in which neighborhood residents are lucky to get low-wage jobs serving the international business elite – if they can get to the jobs.
The mayor’s development policies embody this vision, and they are equally unaccountable. His emphasis is on attracting corporate headquarters, on the Riverwalk, on developing the North Branch and Rezkoville. Details of the massive subsidy offered to Amazon have yet to be publicly released. Huge TIF subsidies to developers are handed down from the fifth floor of City Hall with cursory OKs by the City Council. They dwarf the scale of neighborhood investment programs Emanuel has launched, which are also handed out by the mayor and may serve best to provide him with photo ops to counter his ‘Mayor One Percent’ image.
Emanuel is raising campaign funds furiously in order to dominate next year’s election and forestall a serious discussion of issues. On police, on schools, on transportation, on development, the problem is that the people Emanuel is accountable to are the big-money donors (like Elon Musk) who helped put him in office.
Article Appeared @http://www.chicagoreporter.com/from-police-to-schools-to-transit-a-crisis-of-accountability-in-chicago/