Rahm Emanuel: C/D? (probably going to be a Chicago politics complaint thread too)

Yeah, of course it's more complicated than money in/out. But damn that 1.5 billion would be useful. I know it would be impossible to collect 100%, but even part of it would help with the cities obligation for police/firefighter pension for 2016 ($550 million) and teachers ($660 million). That would avoid all kinds of penalties without having to attempt to re-negotiate those bank swaps.

Other interesting election bits from aldertrack this morning. 82,504 early votes so far. In the February election, there were only 37,601. Five more days to go on early voting.

And regarding the latest polling numbers that show Rahm with a big lead:

It is not hyperbole to say that except for 1983, this is the closest and hottest mayoral race Chicago has experienced in living memory. Now that Election Day is only a week away, the latest poll results on everyone’s mind: 58% Rahm Emanuel and 30% for Jesus “Chuy” Garcia and 9% undecided according to Chicago Tribune's poll completed March 28.

According to the polls, Emanuel coming April 7 victory should be obvious.

And yet, yesterday Carol Feisenthal interviewed Garcia’s Finance Chair, David Schaffer, who says, “Our polls show there’s no way Rahm can win.” There’s doubt that Shaffer’s using some hyperbole of his own, but what he’s saying is not totally unreasonable. To understand where he’s coming from you have to ask a few important questions about polling and turnout. And as with most elections, these questions are not really answerable until Election Day. But these are the questions we ask ourselves when reviewing poll results.

How many of the Early Votes going in are for Emanuel versus Garcia? This election’s early voting results are almost double those of the general election, and much more than any previous contest. The biggest turnouts are in wards traditionally friendly to Emanuel, but what percentage actually voting for Emanuel is hard to quantify. For instance, the Northwest Side’s 45th, 41st, 39th and 38th Wards had low totals for Emanuel in the general (see map, starting page 61), and Garcia is campaigning hard there. The 47th, 48th, 49th and 19th Wards were also stronger for Garcia in the general than most observers anticipated.

How many Emanuel voters will travel on Spring Break next week? It is totally conjecture, but many assume wealthier voters who have the means to travel for Spring Break are Emanuel voters. Think 44th, 43rd, 2nd, 32nd and 42nd Wards. Nobody knows this for sure, but Sen. Dick Durbin has put big bucks behind the idea with a mailer to these wards encouraging people to early or absentee vote.

How effective will the Garcia ground game be? When asked about early voting, Garcia allies repeatedly say, “Rahm will win the early vote, but we’ll win Election Day with our ground game.” SEIU, CTU, UWF, Action Now and local community groups have been phone banking and knocking doors for Garcia, but exactly how big their operation is hard to quantify and we won’t know if they will show until at least next weekend.

How many voters are going unpolled? All pollsters agree, large portions of Chicago's poor minority community go unpolled because they have unreliable phone listings. It is hard to quantify the size of this group, but it could be as much as 15% of the electorate.

How many Latinos will turnout to vote? 23% of Chicago’s population is Latino, but traditionally only 15% have regularly turned out to vote. There is no doubt Garcia has fired up Latinos, but will they show?

Where will African-American voters land? Chicago’s African American community has always been vexingly hard to poll and polling results of African American voters that can be obtained often show large undecided numbers. It is significant that of the 18 majority African American wards, seven are in runoffs and one has a new alderman already. Nothing should be taken for granted here.

It is our opinion that, with still a week out, the outcome of the mayor’s race is far from clear. While some anticipated a runoff election, few expected Garcia to do as well as he did on February 24. Based on that history, It would be smart to keep asking questions until April 7.

Are you guys in Chicago seeing any public campaigning: leaflets on the sidewalk, handshaking, etc.?

I've gotten about 5 pieces of Rahm campaign mail but that's it.

i saw some cretin removing chuy signs and replacing them with rahm signs
i also don't think this parking ticket thing is going to solve any problems considering that i've gotten three $200 tickets for an infraction that i did not commit and i had to contest them all in writing with evidence

I've only gotten a lot of robocalls. Joy of owning a landline.

We've gotten a lot of Rahm mail, and holy shit so many roborahmcalls. If I was even inclined to vote for him, I would probably rethink it considering how obnoxious the phone calls are.

I get emails and calls from Garcia, but that's because I signed up for them in a moment of enthusiasm for getting involved that I have been unable to follow up on due to real life.

I haven't seen either candidate in person. Maybe that's because we live in a Very Rahm Ward so nobody feels compelled to come here. Plus I don't work in the Thompson Center anymore, which is where I used to see Rahm glad-handing the locals a couple times a week.

Maybe that's because we live in a Very Rahm Ward so nobody feels compelled to come here.

Less Rahm than you think, since it does include Logan Square. Not close to being as Rahm as 42/43/44 are. Very Rahm neighborhood though, for sure. Other than getting from his house to the loop, very little reason for Rahm to spend much time in Brown line stations.

There are definitely more Garcia signs than Rahm signs in my neighborhood, and the Garcia folks have been canvassing there too.

Garcia folks canvassing hard in west logan sq. area - came home to 5 flyers - 4 Garcia, 1 Emanual yesterday.

When I lived in Chicago a decade ago and would get tickets for being in the wrong spot during street cleaning, my neighbor said to just mark the "contest this ticket in court" box and drop it in the mail. I was assured that the wait for a court date would be so long that it just be stuck in limbo forever and I'd never end up having to pay it.

I tried it and sure enough, never did get a date assigned. I imagine a pretty fair amount of that $1.5b is tied up in a similar fashion.

(xposts)

don't worry, guys, all American cities are doomed, you may just get there first.

We'll let you know how it goes.

http://newcity.com/2015/03/30/checkerboard-city-transit-platforms/

Nothing new here that I haven't shared before, but summarized neatly.

If you're a follow the money type person, these are interesting:

http://apps.chicagotribune.com/news/local/politics/rahm-emanuel-contributions-2015/?#
http://apps.chicagotribune.com/news/local/politics/chuy-garcia-contributions-2015/#

tl;dr, big corps own Rahm, unions own Garcia. I find both problematic.

Also, lol my place of employment contributing <largish amount of money> to Rahm. Could have just added that to my salary.

http://www.timeout.com/chicago/blog/chicagos-most-gerrymandered-wards%E2%80%8B

the most demented jigsaw puzzle pieces ever

ha, we were just talking about the Second Ward at work after the previous election day, because one of my coworkers lives there and he was so confused about how it could possibly stretch as far E-W as it does. bizarre.

speaking of unions & garcia, guess who has two thumbs and is phone banking for chuy from the office next week

After unprecedented early voting numbers, early reports today say turnout at the polls has been about the same as it was for the primary.

There were 4 electioneers outside my polling place today compared to 1 in the primary.

I work at a polling place so I stopped in to chat with the ppl working there. "Jim" said that turnout has been steady and similar to primary. There weren't any ppl outside either, just signs.

http://www.yasminnair.net/content/rahm-chuy-and-real-problem-chicago-politics

This was a good read. Regardless of whether or not you agree with who she is voting for, I though the points about the power of the mayor were interesting.

But I won’t spend more time on the problems with either candidate. My bigger concern is that the current election is not a harbinger of change as much as a signal of a deeper, bigger problem for Chicago politics: That the desire for change continues to be defined not by real agendas but a desire to mimic and become part of the city’s infamous machine political structure.

The only way for Chicago to emerge from its current morass of deep political, social, and economic distress, the sort so easily papered over by images of its pristine downtown architectural skyline, is to release the stranglehold of the Mayor’s office over this city.

I voted! I was the only person at my polling place, but there's only one thing on the ballot so it's not like people were spending a lot of time on it.

It's ironic to chastise Chuy for not having a real plan behind his rhetoric and then call on Chicago to "release the stranglehold of the Mayor’s office over this city" without discussing how this would happen on a practical level. Like her plan is just ... stop caring about who the mayor is?

That's what we did for 22 years.

I think it's an interesting power balance between the mayor and the city council. Seems like the best chance of reducing mayoral power is to increase the members of the progressive caucus. Seven now, but potential for nine more after today's run-offs. Aldertrack did a good rundown of potential reorganization scenarios a few weeks ago: http://eepurl.com/bi1GYz

Wasn't that the common wisdom of what went wrong with Harold Washington? That he had insufficient power over an obstructionist city council so he wasn't able to get anything done?

Yes, the linked article above touches on that.

CBS called it already for Rahm. http://cbsloc.al/1FcpeCa

Very interested to see all the ward/precinct breakdowns tomorrow.

By ward:

http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150407/downtown/live-chicago-election-results-mayoral-aldermanic-races

Data visualization people, please make your maps bigger and stop cramming them in a tiny window.

32nd wards strong showing for Rahm definitely highlights how gentrified Logan Square has become.

I like this one: http://maxrust.cartodb.com/viz/56c84460-ddc8-11e4-88f1-0e0c41326911/public_map Zoom way out for an overview, close in for each precinct. Wish this one showed ward boundries too.

These are good to, brings in demographics. http://www.chicagomag.com/city-life/April-2015/Chicago-mayor-runoff-results/

Dan Hertz should have some maps up at some point. Always informative: http://danielkayhertz.com/

Progressive caucus gained 5 members, total 13 now: http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150407/downtown/five-wards-chicago-voters-reject-old-guard-aldermen

7 vote difference in the 10th ward: http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150406/hegewisch/ald-john-pope-susan-sadlowski-garza-ready-for-10th-ward-runoff

Still not decided in the 43rd ward, Smith leads by less than 100 votes. I have interest in this one because Smith supports bringing back the Lincoln bus. But both candidates said they'd think requiring bikes to have a license, lol stupid. http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150408/lincoln-park/43rd-ward-too-close-call-ald-michele-smith-leads-by-98-votes

A new Daley on city council. I thought it was interesting that he was running against a 26 year old 3rd year law student. How the frickfrack does he have time to be an alderman and go to law school? Anyway, good on him for at least forcing a run off against a Daley with a ward that contains Bridgeport: http://chicago.suntimes.com/chicago-politics/7/71/508058/daley-nephew-grandson-join-city-council-foulkes-fate-unclear

IMPORTANT: Garcia charging 8.50 for a domestic beer at his party, Rahm had an open bar: http://chicago.suntimes.com/chicago-politics/7/71/507803/national-beer-day-garcia-charging-8-one-election-party

Things I think are overblown:

All the articles about Rahm heard what Chicago is saying to him and he'll listen more, blah blah blah. You're not going to see a drastic change in the man, you know what you're getting when you vote for him, for better or for worse.

People saying that Karen Lewis would have won, and even won easily. She probably would have done better than Garcia, and it would have been a more interesting race. But she's so polarizing, I can't see any of the wards in which Rahm winning big changing that much. She would have picked up more votes in the majority black wards that supported Rahm over Garcia, but how much ground could she make up in those wards? Rahm won every majority black ward. He won every ward south of 67th street with the exception of 10. I don't know really, just my guess.

I need a break for politics now. No idea why I got drawn into this election so much. I'm going back to being apolitical for awhile. See ya!

so no Crazy Lefty Money Machine, ie RIP presidential election '16

I have enjoyed Chicago Politics Expert Jeff. Thank you!

A new Daley on city council. I thought it was interesting that he was running against a 26 year old 3rd year law student. How the frickfrack does he have time to be an alderman and go to law school? Anyway, good on him for at least forcing a run off against a Daley with a ward that contains Bridgeport: http://chicago.suntimes.com/chicago-politics/7/71/508058/daley-nephew-grandson-join-city-council-foulkes-fate-unclear

Ran into Kozlar while out walking the dog the other day and talked to him for a minute. Seems like a nice guy. I dunno how he could have the time, either. Also, this is the second time he's run for 11th alderman, so last time he was 22?

http://radaronline.com/photos/rod-blagojevich-prison-photos-mental-breakdown-claims/photo/1033970/

"I want a pack of cigarettes daily, a pillow and bedding, and a quality copy machine."

Okay, RB saying that a Texas gang and the mafia are after him isn't him losing his mind. That's just him being RB. Second, the only thing that could make his hair even more magnificent is for it to be silvery white, so that is a really good look.

And god help me, I feel kind of sorry for him. He seems to harmless compared to Rauner. What's a little corruption compared to cutting vital services that people in IL need to actually survive?

I read one of Blago's letters he sent from prison (don't ask) and the guy is a serial ellipsis abuser. Perhaps this was a sign of his impending mental break.

Thanks to lagoon for this gem.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CCFWBAAUsAAxOhf.jpg

http://www.citylab.com/politics/2015/04/what-rahm-emanuels-win-means-for-the-left/389991/

Interesting citylab piece that sees this as a victory for the progressives, despite the loss.

those maps of the mayoral election votes prove at least that the "rogers park hippie" is not just a stereotype -- east RP is one of the few white-plurality areas that didn't go for rahm.

also depressing that Chuy didn't win a single plurality-black area... the media narrative is that there is a sense of competition b/t blacks and hispanics that impeded his success with that demographic. i don't know how true that is.

do any of those maps indicate turnout? I wouldn't be surprised if black turnout was lower than usual.

I read a chart about turnout, I'll see if I can find it again.

Here we go: http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150408/beverly/voter-turnout-highest-beverly-nw-side-lowest-west-englewood

Voter turnout is interesting. It's declining for municipal elections in many places. And by today's standards, 40% isn't horrible for a city of comparable size to Chicago.

Sure you'd like more, but it's probably good enough. I don't know if we'd ever see the 82% that voted for the Harold Washington election again.

http://www.governing.com/topics/politics/gov-voter-turnout-municipal-elections.html

Wards with school closures:

Ward 1: 1 Rahm 44.1% Garcia 55.9% Black 6.7% Hispanic 43.1% Asian 3.0% White 45.1%
Ward 2: 4 Rahm 76.6% Garcia 23.4% Black 5.8% Hispanic 9.4% Asian 6.5% White 76.4%
Ward 3: 6 Rahm 65.8% Garcia 34.2% Black 64.1% Hispanic 3.7% Asian 7.6% White 22.4%
Ward 4: 1 Rahm 58.6% Garcia 41.4% Black 63.1% Hispanic 3.7% Asian 7.7% White 22.8%
Ward 5: 2 Rahm 54.9% Garcia 45.1% Black 63.5% Hispanic 3.7% Asian 6.5% White 23.2%
Ward 6: 2 Rahm 56.6% Garcia 43.4% Black 97.3% Hispanic 1.0% Asian 0.1% White 0.4%
Ward 7: 2 Rahm 56.1% Garcia 43.9% Black 91.7% Hispanic 5.0% Asian 0.2% White 1.5%
Ward 9: 1 Rahm 58.0% Garcia 42.0% Black 93.0% Hispanic 4.2% Asian 0.1% White 1.5%
Ward 15: 1 Rahm 31.6% Garcia 68.4% Black 22.1% Hispanic 71.6% Asian 0.9% White 4.7%
Ward 16: 2 Rahm 51.4% Garcia 48.6% Black 68.4% Hispanic 29.1% Asian 0.2% White 1.4%
Ward 17: 1 Rahm 54.4% Garcia 45.6% Black 80.8% Hispanic 15.8% Asian 0.2% White 2.2%
Ward 20: 2 Rahm 53.7% Garcia 46.3% Black 79.0% Hispanic 14.3% Asian 1.3% White 3.9%
Ward 21: 2 Rahm 58.5% Garcia 41.5% Black 97.7% Hispanic 0.9% Asian 0.0% White 0.3%
Ward 22: 1 Rahm 20.1% Garcia 79.9% Black 8.3% Hispanic 87.1% Asian 0.3% White 4.0%
Ward 24: 2 Rahm 52.0% Garcia 48.0% Black 85.5% Hispanic 9.6% Asian 0.2% White 4.0%
Ward 26: 2 Rahm 34.5% Garcia 65.5% Black 12.4% Hispanic 65.8% Asian 1.1% White 19.5%
Ward 27: 4 Rahm 63.5% Garcia 36.5% Black 59.4% Hispanic 10.1% Asian 3.4% White 25.2%
Ward 28: 6 Rahm 57.4% Garcia 42.6% Black 75.3% Hispanic 6.7% Asian 4.8% White 11.6%
Ward 29: 4 Rahm 56.7% Garcia 24.8% Black 68.8% Hispanic 13.1% Asian 1.2% White 15.6%
Ward 34: 4 Rahm 61.2% Garcia 38.8% Black 97.0% Hispanic 1.3% Asian 0.1% White 0.5%
Ward 40: 1 Rahm 53.0% Garcia 47.0% Black 6.9% Hispanic 23.6% Asian 15.8% White 50.9%
Ward 46: 2 Rahm 65.3% Garcia 34.7% Black 19.9% Hispanic 11.4% Asian 8.8% White 57.4%

http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20150409/norwood-park/chicago-city-council-no-longer-republican-free-zone

A republican on the city council now.