Gangs, murders, unemployment and broken misters
Can it get any more depressing?
07/09/2012 8:38 PM
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Bob Fioretti addresses the West Loop in a town hall meeting tonight.
The national media started out the day with a virtual love letter to Chicago, a travel piece in the New York Times extolling the city as a great place for a single woman to spend a few days.
Then things went sour.
As the CBS Evenings News began, Scott Pelley dourly read off the not-so-tourist-friendly 2012 stats: homicides up 38%; 237 murders; 22% more murders than New York City during the first six months of the year. Take that, New York!
Pelley, in Chicago this week presumably to offer more bad news, confronted Rahm with his gloomy outlook. Hizzoner stuck to his message strategy of crime actually being down 10% in the city. He paused, then added, "except murders."
A half hour after Scott Pelley convinced many travelers to cancel their late summer trips to Chicago, Bob Fioretti took center stage at the Merit School of Music's concert hall for his traveling aldermanic road show. The 30 or so West Loopers in attendance got a full hour of Fioretti's PowerPoint state-of-the-ward overview.
During his regular bike rides around the neighborhood, Fioretti noted that the misters under the arches at Mary Bartelme Park are not misting. (I wonder how many people pushed the mist buttons last week during the extreme heat wave and stood waiting for mist that never came.) It turns out the Park Department never blew out the pipes last fall, so the misters are temporarily out of commission.
The good news is nearly $11 million in infrastructure improvements is going toward the West Loop, primarily in lighting and street resurfacing. Fioretti also gave an update on the new Target at Racine and Jackson. It's scheduled to open Oct. 14, and will create nearly 225 new jobs. Those should go fast, if the new Costco is any indication.
Fioretti said the Costco on Ashland has 42 employees. But get this: they had 30,000 applicants. And, there is a direct connection between jobs--or lack of them--and crime. The Alderman mentioned the Pelley piece on CBS, but he said it's not just gangs that are responsible for crime. Joblessness is also a key factor.
Then things went sour.
As the CBS Evenings News began, Scott Pelley dourly read off the not-so-tourist-friendly 2012 stats: homicides up 38%; 237 murders; 22% more murders than New York City during the first six months of the year. Take that, New York!
Pelley, in Chicago this week presumably to offer more bad news, confronted Rahm with his gloomy outlook. Hizzoner stuck to his message strategy of crime actually being down 10% in the city. He paused, then added, "except murders."
A half hour after Scott Pelley convinced many travelers to cancel their late summer trips to Chicago, Bob Fioretti took center stage at the Merit School of Music's concert hall for his traveling aldermanic road show. The 30 or so West Loopers in attendance got a full hour of Fioretti's PowerPoint state-of-the-ward overview.
During his regular bike rides around the neighborhood, Fioretti noted that the misters under the arches at Mary Bartelme Park are not misting. (I wonder how many people pushed the mist buttons last week during the extreme heat wave and stood waiting for mist that never came.) It turns out the Park Department never blew out the pipes last fall, so the misters are temporarily out of commission.
The good news is nearly $11 million in infrastructure improvements is going toward the West Loop, primarily in lighting and street resurfacing. Fioretti also gave an update on the new Target at Racine and Jackson. It's scheduled to open Oct. 14, and will create nearly 225 new jobs. Those should go fast, if the new Costco is any indication.
Fioretti said the Costco on Ashland has 42 employees. But get this: they had 30,000 applicants. And, there is a direct connection between jobs--or lack of them--and crime. The Alderman mentioned the Pelley piece on CBS, but he said it's not just gangs that are responsible for crime. Joblessness is also a key factor.
Rahm told Scott Pelley that the city has 23 police districts but gang violence is only a problem in eight of them. Turns out Blue Island is one of those areas. Fioretti explained that's where our police substation (at Racine and Monroe) is headed. We can only hope the lack of a police presence doesn't have the unintended consequences of increased crime here.