I’ve been belatedly reading Jeremiah Joyce’s
2021 book, Still Burning: Half a Century of Chicago, from the Streets to the
Corridors of Power; A Memoir.
The former 19th Ward Alderman and southwest side
state Senator is a conversational writer and speaks frankly about some very
divisive times, particularly regarding race (it can get cringey).
Joyce is remembered now as a consummate
insider, but he came up the hard way without regular party support. It wasn’t
until he forged a bond with Richard M. Daley, the first Mayor Daley’s son, that
he came into his own as a power broker.
Anyway, what I wanted to tell you about was
one of Joyce’s observations of Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley, who died in
office in 1976 during Joyce’s one and only aldermanic term.
“Over time,” Joyce wrote of the first Mayor
Daley, “he developed a firm though rarely spoken theory of Chicago government –
let some other entity pay, whether it be the state, the county, a regional body
or the federal government.”
It was true then and it’s still true today,
although perhaps stated more bluntly by the city’s current mayor and some of
his closest allies.
We saw it again for the umpteenth time last
week when Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates castigated the
governor and the Democratic legislative majorities for not spending more on the
city’s schools.
Gates, Mayor Brandon Johnson's most visible
ally, was responding to Gov. JB Pritzker's remarks to reporters that the
Chicago Teachers Union’s demand for $1.6 billion in additional state funding is
“just not going to happen.”
“And it’s not because we shouldn’t,” Pritzker
clarified. “We should try to find the money, but we don’t have those resources
today, and we’re not going to see the resources from the federal government
level either.”
Pritzker went on to blame the Trump
administration. "The federal government has taken away education funding
from schools all across the United States," he said, adding that the state
has increased funding by $2.5 billion during his time in office.
"We are all having to deal with the
onslaught of Donald Trump on education in this country, and I'm going to
continue to stand up for and protect students across the state of Illinois,
including students in the city of Chicago," the governor continued.
"But, at the local level, every school is
going to have to do whatever is required in order to protect those students,
and I will stand with them in that endeavor. But there is not extra money
laying around in Springfield, mainly in part because of what Donald Trump has
done at the federal level."
CTU President Gates issued a blistering
response: “Logic would tell you that if the Republican despot in the White
House is defunding public education, then a state with a Democratic
supermajority should take the opposite approach by fully funding schools in its
largest district. There was no delay in giving $10 billion in tax breaks to the
wealthiest businesses and individuals in our state, so why do Black and brown
children have to wait?”
The CTU has mentioned these “$10 billion in
tax breaks” quite often, so I reached out and asked what that was all about.
For the most part, these aren’t actually “tax
breaks.” Instead, almost $6 billion, according to CTU spokesperson B. Loewe,
comes from the Illinois Revenue Alliance’s list of potential tax hikes on
corporations (although a very small part of that is from closing corporate tax
loopholes). Another $4.5 billion is from not imposing a state surcharge on
annual income over $1 million, which would require a constitutional amendment
and couldn’t be implemented until after the 2026 election, if voters approved
it.
Loewe also pointed to several state incentives
criticized by a group called Good Jobs First, including tax breaks for electric
vehicles, data centers and TV and film production.
But it’s not like state leaders can snap their
collective fingers and suddenly produce $10 billion in new revenues. Lots of
labor unions, particularly the trades, would strenuously object to some of
these ideas.
What the CTU really wants is an immense expansion
of the state tax base.
“Why do students at Carver Elementary have to
go without their flag football team?” Gates asked about state underfunding.
“Why are educators being told to conserve toilet tissue and paper towels? Why
does everyone have to subsidize the foot-dragging of our governor and
Democratic General Assembly.”
From the first Mayor Daley to the present,
some things never change.
