Mayor Richard M. Daley has never had less control over the City Council.
Heightening the tension is the municipal election in February. This time around, thanks to federal investigators and a court-appointed monitor over city hiring, the mayor won’t have as many jobs to give out or as many patronage workers to do campaign work. This means aldermen no longer need to fear as many repercussions for crossing Daley, but it also leaves those with weak political organizations trying to figure out how to fend off challengers on their own. “I’m sure many aldermen are vulnerable, including myself–I have three opponents already,” said the 50th Ward’s Berny Stone, who’s been in office since 1973. “I don’t think I’ll be beaten, but it’s a pain having to face opponents.”
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Daley agreed. “Wait to do it until after the election,” he said.
Aldermen may take the mayor’s advice on this, but they won’t on plenty of other issues. The big-box fight convinced most of the council that, politically at least, he’s not the man they thought they married.
Business leaders, meanwhile, increased their pressure on the mayor to use his veto power. Wal-Mart and Target announced they were suspending plans to add more stores in the city, while the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce contacted Daley’s chief City Council lobbyist and “let him know the business community was coming together and was willing to educate aldermen,” said chamber president Jerry Roper.
Still, by the September council meeting it was clear that ordinance supporters wouldn’t be able to muster the 34 votes needed to override the veto. One of the original aye voters, the First Ward’s Manny Flores, was conveniently out of the country, in China meeting with business leaders. Solis, 12th Ward alderman George Cardenas, and 16th Ward alderman Shirley Coleman announced their intentions to switch sides. And during the meeting, 46th Ward alderman Helen Shiller, the onetime independent who’d skipped out on the first vote, said she planned to side with the mayor this time.
Cardenas spoke next, though he had almost nothing to say about the ordinance itself. Elected in 2003 with help from Daley’s Hispanic Democratic Organization, Cardenas let everyone know that he thought the mayor deserved credit for getting Chicago looking so good. “The city’s skyline is beautiful,” he proclaimed. “Over the last 17 years there has been tens of billions of dollars of reinvestment in our communities. The mayor’s judgment has been sound, and I have chosen to trust in that judgment.”
