UNIT 5: How CTA's One-Day Fare Hike Hurts the Poor

View more videos at: http://nbcchicago.com.

[VIDEO] Carol Marin brought her cameras to a currency exchange at the corner of 79th & Cottage Grove to discuss the fare increases enacted by CTA. Well really these fare increases effects the various passes offered such as the one-day, seven-day, and 30-day passes. The prices for those passes were increased last month.

Basically the focus of this story is the one-day pass considered the cheapest option for CTA customers. It's considered cheaper than similar passes offered by other transit agencies around the nation.

Also who you see interviewed in this video is John Paul Jones who is listed here as part of the Sustainable Englewood Iniative. He's also part of an organization - Developing Communities Project - that wants to see the construction of the CTA Red Line to Altgeld Garden

Chatham McDonald's a Community Hub - DNAinfo.com Chicago

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Chatham McDonald's a Community Hub - DNAinfo.com Chicago

Derrick Taylor

A local business gets profiled over at DNAinfo. It's a business I'm sure many who read this blog are very familiar with:

When Derrick Taylor and his wife became franchise owners of a McDonald's in Chatham six years ago, they knew the restaurant would be a popular place to grab a quick bite to eat.

But they had no idea the restaurant at 7900 S. King Dr. would turn into a de facto community center and meeting space.

“It's the busiest place in Chatham," said Trina Burton, 44, a CTA bus driver for 11 years. "This place has relaxing music and not that rap stuff these kids listen to all day. It is clean, convenient, and the food is good, too."

Like other CTA drivers, Burton often just hangs out at the restaurant between shifts.

"I like it, and so do most of my co-workers,” she said.

Senior citizens who live in the area are also regulars.

Jerry Rodgers, 73, of Chatham, meets his friends “at least five days a week at McDonald’s.”

The retired mechanic has kept this routine up for the last five years.

79th & King Drive is a very busy corner and I can only imagine the traffic this Micky D's gets everyday. Taylor and his wife also owns the located near 87th & Dan Ryan as well as the one on the Chicago Skyway located at 8871 S. Kingston Ave.

Crain's: How ShoreBank's successor is digging out

It's about time we look at local institution Urban Partnership Bank as they have assumed operations in the branch located near 79th & Dan Ryan. How are they shaking out since they took over for the former ShoreBank:

The successor to ShoreBank, the high-profile urban community lender that failed in August 2010, finally got its loan machine working last year.

Urban Partnership Bank, based on Chicago's South Side, blew through its $26 million loan-origination goal for 2012, lending $35 million to small businesses and real estate investors on the city's South and West sides.

The $1.1 billion-asset bank, which employs 311, has set a $42 million lending goal for 2013. Bank executives said they continue to be cautious yet are finding opportunities in neighborhoods that have been devastated economically and are suffering through a rash of gun violence that has made national headlines.

The good news: “We think fundamentals are stabilizing in our neighborhoods,” CEO William Farrow said in an interview.

But Mr. Farrow's isn't sugarcoating the situation: “As a friend recently said, he could buy his parents' house for the same price they paid in 1963.”

Loans to small businesses such as day care providers, security firms, food-service companies and restaurants make up about 60 percent of Urban Partnership Bank's volume right now. The remainder is commercial real estate loans to apartment rehabbers and investors in single-family homes as Chicago's mainly African-American neighborhoods on the South and West sides begin the long recovery from a housing bust that was significantly deeper than better-off areas experienced.

New Geography: Why Are There So Many Murders in Chicago?

Aaron Renn who writes the Urbanophile blog penned this column recently analyzing Chicago's murder rate. The question here is what's going wrong. He mentioned the destruction of CHA housing projects, but he also points to the political meddling in the police department.

ABC 7: Controversy swirls on hiring for South Side Walmart construction

[VIDEO] The Walmart that Ald. Beale is touting as one of his accomplishments as the Alderman of the 9th Ward seems to have a controversy. It seems a man thought he had a job to help build this Walmart and now that he doesn't he claims that the hiring is politically based. I'm going to excerpt Ald. Beale's response:

Ninth Ward Alderman Anthony Beale, a candidate for Congress, said he's always recommended private contractors use hiring consultants on projects here to ensure local residents are hired.

"It's been successful for 14 years," Beale said. "It's a process that's in place and it works."
...
Beale denied any connection between his political organization and Maurice Williams.

"There's no connection between my office and Mr. Williams other than he has a company and we direct people to his particular company," Beale said.

Because of the hiring list, the Walmart construction workforce includes 40-percent minority workers, which is well over the city's requirement, according to Beale.

Lot's of questions to be asked here? And of course it's noted in the write-up that the 9th has one of the highest unemployment rates in this city. One question to ask, what's going on here?

Ward Room: Why Chicago Is America's Murder Capital

Ed McClelland writing for the Chicago politics section on the website of our local NBC affiliate talks with a retired police lieutenant to discuss the root cause of violence on our city streets:

The other day, I had a conversation with a retired police lieutenant, who explained to me that Chicago’s history of segregation reverberates to this day with street violence unparalleled in any big city.

Going back over 100 years, African-Americans were confined to a narrow strip of the South Side known as the Black Belt. As they migrated north in greater numbers, during and after World War II, the borders of the Black Belt remained the same, while the black population increased dramatically. Instead of allowing them to settle in white neighborhoods, Chicago politicians tried to cram as many as possible into their existing turf. Hence the creation of housing projects, such as the Robert Taylor Homes and the Ida B. Wells Homes. And of Chicago's reputation as the most segregated city in America.

The Vice Lords and the Gangster Disciples developed inside the projects, the lieutenant explained, and used them as strongholds to control drug sales for miles around. The projects were demolished in the 1990s and 2000s. Partly, that was because of the gang violence going on inside -- the killing of 7-year-old Dantrell Davis, accidentally gunned down in a gang crossfire, is referred to as “the shot that brought the projects down.”

When the projects disappeared, the gang culture born inside them didn’t. The gangbangers dispersed throughout the city, but without the projects, their organizing structure was gone. Gang lords operating out of the projects had controlled as many 500 members, allowing them to settle turf disputes and keep a lid on violence that might have drawn unwanted police attention to their drug enterprises.

Now, instead of a few well-organized gangs controlling entire neighborhoods, we have dozens of small gangs fighting over drug-sale territory as small as a street corner.

OK well I wish there was an easy answer for something that it appears no one has a great appetite to really fix. Well at least segregation now, but sadly it's even more difficult to cause something that's very deep.

Chicago Tonight: Cook County Treasurer Amps Up Transparency on Local Debt

[VIDEO] This video from a recent edition of Chicago Tonight was forwarded to us last night. It was certainly in relation to the coming event where property owners can visit with representatives of the Cook County Assessor to see if they can apply for any exemptions. Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas was on the show two nights ago to discuss where all the debt is in the county.

Sun-Times: City implements 911 dispatch changes freeing up officers for response

Very interesting:

With aldermen bracing for the political fallout, Chicago is implementing a dramatic change in 911 dispatch to free the equivalent of 44 police officers a day to respond to the most serious crimes.

As of Sunday, police officers are no longer responding in person to reports of a vehicle theft, garage burglary, or crime where the victim is “safe, secure and not in need of medical attention” and the offender is “not on the scene and not expected to return immediately.”

Instead, those 911 calls are being transferred to the Chicago Police Department’s Alternate Response Section, staffed by officers on light duty. Police reports will be taken over the phone. If necessary, evidence technicians will be assigned later. 

6th Ward Ald. Roderick Sawyer was quoted in this article about the policy change:

Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6th) said he’s willing to “take the heat” if it means freeing police officers to respond to more serious crimes.

“I’d rather them be upset than not responding to a domestic battery or burglary or some other crime going on in real time,” Sawyer said.

“We respond to a lot more calls than other cities do. Is there gonna be some push-back? Initially, there will be. But, this seems to be a reasonable response to the volume of calls we get to free officers who sometimes go on calls that turn out to be frivolous.”

Your thoughts?

Ward Room: Anthony Beale Q&A

Anthony Beale

Incidentially, at this Saturday's West Chesterfield neighborhood meeting Ald. Beale is expected to be a guest. I'm curious what he will talk about there during the course of that meeting. Here's one topic of interest to West Chesterfield at least, however, he does talk with the Ward Room about other things going on in the 9th Ward such as Walmart, guns, 2nd congressional district race or even a Presidential library in Roseland. In the case of West Chesterfield let's focus on the Red Line:

Q: What have you done so far to move the Red Line extension forward, and what can you do as a congressman to get the money?

A: Being chairman of Transportation, we've been aggressively pushing the Red Line upgrade and the Red Line extension. This summer, we're shutting down the Red Line for four months in order to get the Red Line upgraded, which will save people between 12 and 15 minutes between 95th and Cermak. Once the Red Line is upgraded, now we can start implementing the Red Line extension. We're in step 4 of 7. Once the Red Line is upgraded, then we can walk right into the transition for the extension.

REMINDER: February 5th event with the Cook County Assessor

We posted about this event January 15th. It's being heavily promoted by the Greater Chatham Alliance and will take place February 5, 2012 at Whitney Young Library - 7901 S. King Drive - from 12:30 PM to 3:30 PM. Refer to flyer below for more details!

Tribune: Companies 'enthusiastic' about partnership for Red, Purple Line projects

Also noted here is the possible savings by CTA "getting out of the fare-collection business". Of great interest to us here is how private-public partnerships could help build the CTA Red Line extension to 130th Street amongst other projects:

The CTA is receiving strong and enthusiastic feedback from the private sector about investing in two mega-projects along the Red and Purple lines that the transit agency could not afford to undertake on its own for many years, CTA President Forrest Claypool said Monday.

CTA officials and financial adviser Goldman Sachs are studying potential public-private partnerships to construct the proposed Red Line extension to 130th Street, and to demolish and rebuild track, aging stations and crumbling viaduct structure on the North Side, from north of the Belmont station through Evanston, Claypool told a gathering of transportation experts at Northwestern University.

"We believe that partnerships with the private sector are one piece of the key to keeping mass transit healthy,'' especially in a period of declining federal and state funding, Claypool said.

The response to the CTA's outreach to the financial industry on the two Red Line projects has been "overwhelmingly enthusiastic,'' Claypool said. The CTA's goal is not to sell off assets but rather to lower costs by 10 percent to 20 percent on major projects, he said.

Both proposed Red Line projects are in planning stages, but they are unfunded for the construction phase, officials said.

The approximately five-mile south extension of the Red Line, from the current terminus at 95th Street to 130th, is estimated to cost at least $1.5 billion. Mayor Rahm Emanuel said when he was campaigning for office that the Red Line extension was his top transit priority and he expected construction would begin within a few years.

Cost estimates on the Red Purple Modernization project range from about $2 billion to more than $4 billion, depending on the scope of the work that would be undertaken to replace infrastructure that is more than 90 years old, officials said. The north branch of the Red Line serves the largest ridership in the CTA rail system, and the transit agency is spending $86 million on temporary repairs to shore up dangerously dilapidated infrastructure.

Claypool said the CTA was not interested in privatizing the operation of the Red Line or selling it off to the private sector. Instead, any deals would involve a public-private partnership to design, build, finance and maintain the rail line, but CTA employees still would run the trains, he said. In return, the venture partners would assume part of the financial risk of building two complicated projects and receive "a small potential share'' of profit.

Recap of a Civic Discussion held on January 26th, 2013

This recap below came from the desk of West Chesterfield Community Association President Michael LaFargue. I'm sorry that I didn't put a lot of effort into posting about this although you may have seen a flyer for this on my scribd account. Did anyone else go and would like to offer their thoughts on this event?

Progress Illinois: Youth Unemployment Summit Highlights Illinois Teens' Urgent Need For Jobs

I recently found this article from Progress Illinois. There was a 19 person panel consisting of various politicians from the city, county, and state levels last Thursday hosted by the Chicago Urban League. The youth of Chicago gave testimony of their difficulty in finding a job:

Illinois’ teen unemployment rate is among the highest in the country and during a panel on Thursday at the Chicago Urban League, local elected officials came face-to-face with Chicago’s unemployed youth.

“Not being able to provide for your kid or help your family is an awful feeling, I feel like nothing, but I don’t have opportunities to work,” said Dwillie Bush, 18, during the panel. A senior at Banner Academy South High School in the far South Side neighborhood of Jeffrey Manor, Bush is father to a four-month-old boy and lives with his single mother and four siblings in Englewood.

“Point blank, I need a job,” he said.

In front of a 19-person panel that featured a collection of aldermen, commissioners and legislative representatives, more than 15 teenagers gave testimony to the struggles of unemployment in Chicagoland. Thursday’s panelists were also presented with a recent report explaining how teens, particularly low-income and minority teens, have been excluded from the labor market and the negative economic impact Illinois has seen as a result.

The American Interest: The Crisis of the Black Middle Class

Last year I started talking a bit about the Black Middle-Class. As a matter of fact the core areas this blog hopes to cover are mostly Black Middle-Class communities. And these communities are struggling with different issues, perhaps no more worse than the people who are residing in them.

I found this article primarily via a right-wing blog - Instapundit. Don't let this stop you from considering this issue and all the causes surrounding them.

What's at issue here is not only the housing market which it is argued have hurt many Blacks. It's also the jobs that have put them into the middle-class mainly jobs in the public sector. They mentions predatory lending, espeically those who have already owned their homes however they were convince to refinance their homes.

Since this is something you found on a right-wing site, there was a swipe at typical progressive (referred to here as blue or Democratic) policies. The bottom line here is that solutions are necessary. New answers are needed, but what are the questions?

ChicagoTalks: Roseland profile

Roseland Community Area

During the remap debate last year a lot of people were very apprehensive of being combined with Roseland in the 9th Ward. In fact they used Roseland and 9th Ward almost interchangeably in discussing this issue. There were concerns (although certainly baseless) that property values will dip if their neighborhood was drawn into 9th Ward. Aside from the change in electoral precinct and one Alderman wanting to use the new map in zoning decisions we're not quite there yet.

However, this article gives me an excuse to talk about Roseland. If you're concerned about Roseland I'm not sure this article will give anyone any ease at all.

According to EveryBlockChicago.com, a website that tracks crime, there were 116 crimes in Roseland during the past week. Meanwhile in Lincoln Park on the North Side, there were only 10 crimes reported during the same week. Crimes in Roseland were more violent, including theft, battery and narcotics possession. In other areas of the city, crimes reported often consisted of home burglaries and thefts of smart phones or iPods.

“This is a dangerous area, no doubt about it,” said Jamal Pearson, 47, a CPD officer who has worked in Roseland for 11 years. “You’ll be wanting to watch yourself in this area. This is one of the worst areas in the city.”

But some residents said they keep to themselves and manage to avoid becoming victims of crime.

“If you mind your own business then you’re safe. You don’t have to worry about nobody coming after you,” McCoy said.

Mike Smith, 28, who works at a clothing store in Roseland, said he has lived there for 10 years. He said the police don’t come around often.

“The [U.S. government] don’t care. As long as we killing each other, the [U.S. government] don’t care,” Smith said. He says he’s not scared and doesn’t plan to leave Roseland. He referred to Roseland as “baby Iraq.”

“I love this [neighborhood]. I’m used to it. It doesn’t bother me,” Smith said. “Its just a fact of life now.”

Staying safe is a matter of minding your own business. How many of you find that bothersome? Although to be sure no one should ask you to be a hero I wonder what it means to "mind your own business".

This area needs it's own version of RAGE!

Sun-Times: County edges closer to buying up vacant, foreclosed properties

A Cook County land bank was mentioned in an open letter from 6th Ward Alderman Roderick Sawyer back on January 15. Do you believe this to be a good idea in communities that have suffered as a result of the real estate crash and the current recession?

What is being dubbed the nation’s largest landbank — an independent agency set up to acquire vacant land and foreclosed homes and commercial property in Chicago and the suburbs — moved one step closer to setting up shop Tuesday.

The Cook County Board’s finance committee signed off on creating the new landbank – in hopes of cleaning up neighborhoods and returning abandoned property to the tax roles. Because the finance committee’s membership is identical to the full County Board, the measure is expected to sail through final approval during Wednesday’s meeting.

County Commissioner Bridget Gainer, credited with taking the lead on the measure, said the cash-strapped county government wouldn’t have to fund the landbank. Instead, the roughly $15 million in seed money needed during the first three years of operation will likely come from local foundations and grants.

The money will be used for anything from hiring staff to purchasing property to rehabbing or demolishing it.

We learned that as far as this proposal goes the Greater Chatham Alliance has some reservations about it believing there could be serious repercussions for south side neighborhoods if there is little community input on such a program. What do you think?

JEWEL-OSCO Kicks Off "A Taste of Black History

JEWEL-OSCO will get an early start at celebrating Black History Month with a special "A Taste of Black History" VIP Shopping Event.

Thursday
January 24,2013
3pm-7pm
Jewel-Osco
1655 E. 95th Street 
Chicago.
Open to the public, the free event will feature:

• 
  Appearance and autograph signing by Celebrity Chef Josh Marks, runner-up in FOX-TV's "MasterChef" reality cooking show.



• 
  Food sampling from more than 30 of the retailer's African-American food vendor partners, including several Chicago-based companies.



• 
  Live music by band Zzaje



• 
  JEWEL-OSCO will award a total of $10,000 in donations to St. Felicitas Church Food Pantry, Grant A Wish Food Pantry and one other community organization serving the African-American community



• 
  Enter sweepstakes for a chance to win up to $1,000 in JEWEL-OSCO gift cards



• 
  Special saving opportunities.

The purpose of the event is to recognize the contributions and achievements of JEWEL-OSCO's African-American vendor partners and celebrate "Black History Month."

The vendors will visit the following stores

Saturday, February 2nd	Noon – 5 p.m.	87 W. 87th St. (Chicago)
Sunday, February 3rd	Noon – 5 p.m.	7530 S. Stony Island Ave. (Chicago)
Monday, February 4th	Noon – 4 p.m.	3153 W. 183rd St. (Homewood, Ill.)
Saturday, February 9th	Noon – 5 p.m.	2485 W. Howard St. (Evanston, Ill.)
Sunday, February 10th	Noon – 5 p.m.	9400 S. Ashland Ave. (Chicago)
Monday, February 11th	Noon – 4 p.m.	17705 S. Halsted St. (Homewood, Ill.)
Saturday, February 16th	Noon – 5 p.m.	1655 E. 95th St. (Chicago)
Sunday, February 17th	Noon – 5 p.m.	9400 S. Ashland Ave. (Chicago)
Monday, February 18th	Noon – 4 p.m.	87 W. 87th St. (Chicago)
Saturday, February 23rd	Noon – 5 p.m.	7525 W. Lake St. (River Forest, Ill.)
Sunday, February 24th	Noon – 5 p.m.	443 E. 34th St. (Chicago)
Monday, February 25th	Noon – 5 p.m.	11730 S. Marshfield Ave. (Chicago)

Sun-Times: Powerful alderman sparks uproar by opting to use 2015 ward boundaries in zoning decisions now

First they changed the electoral precincts to the new ward map, now they want to use the remap for zoning decisions. If you live in West Chesterfield and Roseland Heights Ald. Solis wants to defer to Ald. Anthony Beale in zoning decisions affecting those communities:

A powerful Chicago alderman has decided to start recognizing the city’s new ward boundaries when it comes to making pivotal decisions on zoning and sign orders, infuriating incumbents endangered by the new map. 

Nearly one year to the day after the City Council approved the new map without a vote to spare, Zoning Committee Danny Solis (25th) sent a letter to his colleagues last week informing them of his decision to implement the new boundaries. 

Solis said he would continue to honor the long-standing tradition of “deferring to the aldermen of the ward in which a zoning change or sign order” is located. But, that political deference will now go to the new alderman — not the old one.

“It’s really a courtesy, a protocol. It’s not a legal thing,” the chairman said Tuesday. 

Solis said he made the decision to end a year of political limbo in response to complaints from developers who “wanted to start doing business” in Chicago, but were “confused about who to talk to.”

 Also:

Ald. Nick Sposato (36th) is livid. He’s one of a handful of incumbent aldermen endangered by a map that cut the heart out of his Northwest Side ward and nearly doubled its Hispanic population — from 32 percent to 61.2 percent.

“I was elected for a four-year term — not a year-and-a-half term. ... To say I can no longer represent the people who elected me after a year-and-a-half is unconscionable. People are furious in my ward,” Sposato said Tuesday.

“You can’t assign people to wards. People elect people to wards. I’m gonna keep representing the people to the best of my ability. If they’re not gonna allow me to do that — if [Solis] is gonna deny stuff that I approve for people — then I’ll have to look at other avenues.”

To bolster his case, Sposato released a Feb. 2, 2012, memorandum written by Corporation Counsel Stephen Patton.

In it, Patton cited legal precedent and wrote, “These cases establish that the 2011 aldermanic elections were for full four-year terms notwithstanding the intervening redistricting and that these aldermen represent the constituencies which elected them.”

I wonder if there is any new news with regards to any potential legal challenge to last year's ward remap?

EVENT: Black History Presentation Whitney Young library

What:    Black History Month Presentation
When:   Thursday, February 7th @ 6pm
Where:  Whitney Young Library 7901 S. King Dr.
Who:     Role Model Movement

Refer to graphic below for more details.

Ald. Beale - Political Forum CAN-TV

[VIDEO] Last Wednesday, 9th Ward Alderman Anthony Beale appeared on CAN-TV's Political Forum mainly to discuss his current bid for US Congress, proposals for gun laws, and public transportation. This program lasted a little over 25 minutes.

Were you able to chime in last week?