Daley Woos Minorities with Rich Rewards

By: Alysia Tate They used to call it plantation politics.

A hand-picked group of black politicians won elected offices but lacked any real power. Like overseers of the antebellum South, the white men who sponsored them controlled the purse strings and the clout that governed Chicago.

Fueled by the civil rights movement of the late 1960s, a few blacks, such as U.S. Rep. Ralph Metcalfe, rebelled against the Democratic Machine and its leader, Mayor Richard J. Daley. But it wasn’t until 1982 that changing demographics and massive voter registration awakened the electorate and swept U.S. Rep. Harold Washington, himself a product of the Machine, into office as Chicago’s first black mayor in 1983.

Washington boldly declared the Machine dead and buried, and some predicted that Chicago would never have another white mayor. Today, those same pundits may wonder if an African American will ever again ascend to the top post.

This month, as Mayor Richard M. Daley seeks his fourth term to the office he has held since 1989, black and Latino voters hold the key to Chicago’s political power more than ever before. But The Chicago Reporter’s analysis of election returns shows that with each election, Daley has attracted more minority voters, despite opposition from black candidates.

In his three successful runs for mayor, Daley has fared worst among voters in the city’s predominantly black wards. But his popularity has grown, from less than 7 percent of the vote in 1989 to more than 28 percent in 1995.

He has proven even more successful among Hispanics, with nearly 84 percent in the city’s seven Latino wards in 1995.

Daley’s critics, including his current challenger, U.S. Rep. Bobby L. Rush (D-Chicago), say he wins elections by using the old-style politics of his father. His supporters say Daley is sharing the political wealth with more groups than any of the white mayors who preceded him.

Others say, whatever the reason, they expect Daley to win this year. "It’s not the Machine his father had—I don’t think it’s anything close," said Columbia College Professor Dominic A. Pacyga, who specializes in Chicago history. "But it looks to me like he’s got a coalition that’s unbeatable."

Both sides agree Daley has become more popular in minority wards than almost anyone expected. "I think he was the beneficiary of low expectations," said Avis LaVelle, Daley’s campaign manager and a member of the Chicago School Reform Board of Trustees. "You know, there’s a virtue to being underestimated."

Visible Success
He began with dreams that would have made his father and other old-time, builder-politicians proud. With goals of economic growth and expansion at the start of his administration, Daley pitched a multibillion dollar airport at Lake Calumet and a $2 billion land-based casino near the Loop. Both ideas flopped, and Daley changed tactics.

He began focusing on the kind of local improvements that voters could easily see and touch. He paved streets, planted trees, spearheaded efforts to pump $2 billion into Chicago’s public schools and launched the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy, the city’s community policing program.

Mention any neighborhood and the Daley campaign can rattle off example after example of progress. Black wards are no exception, as shown in Daley’s recent ward-by-ward campaign mailing: $4 million earmarked for an "entertainment destination" in Alderman Dorothy Tillman’s South Side 3rd Ward; 260 blocks of streets resurfaced in the far South Side’s 9th Ward; and $17.5 million to restore the 28th’s Garfield Park Conservatory and Gardens on the West Side. The list goes on.

Those improvements have translated into votes—like his nearly 22 percentage point gain in the 3rd Ward between 1989 and 1995. A former ward resident, 25-year-old administrative assistant Kim Honey, has noticed the paved streets and abandoned buildings being torn down in her old neighborhood.

"I believe his popularity comes from his awareness of minority issues," said Honey, who is undecided in the race. "If he continues on that path, I believe he’ll get more popular."

Former Mayor Eugene Sawyer, whose election by the Chicago City Council after Washington’s death was engineered by Daley’s allies, said it’s hard to argue with solutions that work. Though problems such as unemployment and voter apathy remain in the city’s black neighborhoods, Sawyer said Daley largely has been responsive to community concerns. Sawyer, who lost the mayor’s seat to Daley in 1989, said, "He’s been a good mayor. He’s doing a good job."

But Rush and his supporters say the mayor has used 10 years of spin control to beautify and develop his way around the city’s hardcore problems.

Within the past year, for instance, Daley’s police department has been hit with a lawsuit alleging mass cheating on promotional exams; fired two white officers in connection with the beating of a black man, Jeremiah Mearday; and saw charges dropped against two young black boys wrongfully charged in the murder of 11-year-old Ryan Harris.

The Chicago Transit Authority, run by Daley ally Frank Kruesi, his former policy adviser, carried out service cuts that angered many in poor, minority neighborhoods, and then appeared incapable of keeping trains and buses running smoothly for days after the New Year’s blizzard.

Daley has escaped all of it virtually unscathed by using an approach known to both his allies and his foes: openly criticize those he deems responsible, remove them if necessary and focus on the positive.

"The way these things were handled they happened on Daley’s watch and no one’s called him on it," said Bess Bezirgan, Rush’s press secretary.

"Those are huge issues, but again, they’ve been brushed off," she said. "Is that democracy, or is that tyranny?"

And Rush isn’t the only one who has problems with the Daley agenda. A December report released by the Neighborhood Capital Budget Group, a Chicago non-profit government watchdog, found glaring inequities in the way the administration invests in the city’s neighborhoods.

Three wards, the 2nd, 27th and 42nd, account for 20 percent of those dollars—more than $880 million in planned city investments between 1990 and 2002. Those wards encompass the booming real estate markets of the Near West and Near South Sides, leaving other city neighborhoods behind, the report found.

Jacqueline Leavy, the group’s executive director, acknowledged that mended sidewalks and new curbs translate into votes. But she said community leaders such as herself have been pushing such improvements for years. "The city doesn’t look like it did in 1969," Leavy said. "It doesn’t even look like it did in 1989, and the mayor is going to take credit for whatever he can get away with taking credit for."

As in the other black wards, Daley’s performance improved in the 9th. But his showing in 1995—roughly 21 percent—was the lowest of any city ward.

Former 9th Ward Alderman Robert Shaw said black voters aren’t fooled, and that he hears nothing but dissatisfaction from people who live on blocks peppered with vacant lots and those who can tell story after story of police mistreatment.

"I don’t think there’s been a situation where the African American community has been treated fairly across the board," said Shaw, now a commissioner on the Cook County Board of Review.

Choosing Sides
As the campaign swung into its final three weeks, Daley had endorsements from three of the city’s 19 black aldermen: Daley appointees Madeline Haithcock of the 2nd Ward and Carrie M. Austin of the 34th, along with Walter Burnett Jr. of the 27th. Six of seven Latino aldermen—22nd Ward Alderman Ricardo Munoz was undecided—had pledged their support.

At least three black aldermen said they would not endorse either Rush or Daley. Fourth Ward Alderman Toni Preckwinkle declined to say why, while Joe Taft, field director for 5th Ward Alderman Barbara Holt, said his boss is "confident she’ll be able to work with whomever is mayor."

"The last time I tried to choose a mayor, the people got mad," said 7th Ward Alderman William M. Beavers. "And that’s the reason I’m not."

Paul Green, director of the Institute for Public Policy at Governors State University, said more black aldermen than usual appear to be sitting this one out, to avoid the ire of anti-Daley constituents while not ruffling the mayor as they seek re-election.

"This is one time where walking down the middle, from my perspective, has more benefits than going with either side," Green said.

Rush had earned endorsements from U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr.; one black alderman, Shirley A. Coleman of the South Side’s 16th Ward; and one white alderman, frequent Daley critic Helen Shiller of the north lakefront’s 46th Ward.

But given that Daley has hand-picked nearly 38 percent of the City Council (10 of those 19 appointees are black or Latino), he doesn’t have much opposition, said former 44th Ward Alderman Dick Simpson, now a political science professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

According to Simpson’s research, in the first year of Daley’s administration, 14 aldermen usually voted against the mayor on key issues, such as major development projects, committee chairmanships and the city’s operating budget. Nine were black, two Latino and three white. Now Simpson estimates that number has been cut in half, with just seven members of the 1998 Council reliably opposing Daley on key issues. Four are black and one Latino.

In 1991, nine aldermen voted against Daley’s proposed city operating budget. The number jumped to 18 the following year. By 1994, no one opposed him, and though as many as four at a time have voted "no" since, one alderman—Shiller—has been consistent. She cast the lone opposition vote in 1996, 1997 and 1998.

While he called the current council a "weak" rubber stamp, Simpson said Daley actually holds less sway than the mayors before him: Illinois Supreme Court Justice Michael A. Bilandic, for example, the former 11th Ward alderman who became mayor after Richard J. Daley’s death, had just three council opponents, Simpson said.

Winning Numbers
Daley has faced six black challengers in his last three elections; 1999 marks the first time the mayoral race is non-partisan, and Rush is his lone opponent.

Lu Palmer, longtime chairman of the Black Independent Political Organization, said Daley has disenfranchised the city’s black leaders. "I can’t name one black person in Chicago who has political power," Palmer said. "I don’t know one black person in the city of Chicago who can make a move without turning to some white person or white institution to get it approved."

Palmer sees a return to plantation politics, but Chicago’s minority voters haven’t been flexing their muscles of late.

Between 1980 and 1997, the city’s white population dropped from about 49.5 percent to 32 percent, according to the U.S. Census Bureau and projections from Claritas Inc., an Ithaca, N.Y.-based market research firm. African Americans held steady at 39 percent, and Latinos grew from 14 percent to 23.6 percent.

Rush argues that those numbers should favor a non-white candidate, but only if that person can produce a strong turnout and capture the lion’s share of those votes. Neither has happened lately. Chicagoans cast more than 1.2 million ballots in the three-way 1983 contest and have been losing interest ever since. By 1995, that number had dropped to about 579,000.

Turnout is down everywhere, but it is lowest in black wards, where only 33.8 percent of the registered voters showed up at the polls in 1995. By contrast, 46.5 percent of voters in white wards cast ballots that year. Add three out of every 10 black votes and more than 80 percent in Latino wards, Pacyga said, and Daley can win elections as long as he chooses.

And when the mayor decides to step down, Pacyga said, he expects the candidate will be Latino.

Simpson, however, refrains from branding Daley as invincible. The nation’s booming economy has carried Chicago—and Daley—along on its coattails, but the moment that changes, Simpson said, many of Daley’s allies could vanish.

Any additional voters from poor and non-white neighborhoods would be the first to go, he added. The question is whether another candidate will step in to unify them. "I think in four years, things may be very different," he said.

For more information on the mayoral race, visit the following Web sites:

• Biographies of Chicago's mayors, compiled by the Chicago Public Library

• The Chicago Board of Election Commissioners

• The Chicago Police Department's community policing program

Contributing: Rebecca Anderson, Kareem Muhammad, Stephen J. Stanis and Cedric L. Stines helped research this article.