March 21, 2007
ATTRITION RATE HIGH FOR BLACK ALDERMEN

ANALYSIS & OPINION BY RUSS STEWART

In Chicago's predominantly black wards, it's deja vu all over. In 1983, when Harold Washington swept into City Hall, six of 16 incumbent black aldermen were defeated. Black voters ousted those aldermen perceived to be allied with Mayor Jane Byrne.

Now, 24 years later, with 19 black incumbents running in 20 black-majority wards, two have already been defeated and seven more are at risk in the April 17 runoff. At least four are expected to lose: Madeline Haithcock (2nd), Dorothy Tillman (3rd), Shirley Coleman (16th) and Michael Chandler (24th). Howard Brookins (21st) is in a tough race. A total of seven could be ousted.

Aldermanic turnover is twice as high in black wards as it is in white wards. As of 2007, the 19 black aldermen had served a cumulative total of 196 years, or 49 terms, and the 21 white aldermen had served 392 years, or 98 terms.

As in 1983, there is some black hostility toward Chicago's white mayor, Rich Daley. That's augmented by incumbent fatigue, scandal and the intervention of unions. The City Council's so-called Wal-Mart vote, which required a "living wage" for employees of big-box stores, divided the black community, as nine black aldermen sided with Daley and opposed the ordinance.

In analyzing the runoffs, the "Iron Runoff Rule" must be remembered: Any incumbent who get less than 50 percent of the vote in the February election is in jeopardy, as those who oppose the incumbent usually support the challenger in the April runoff. But a lot depends on how far below 50 percent the incumbent finishes. If they're in the 44 to 48 percent range, they can win; if they're under 40 percent, they lose.

In the 70 runoffs since 1983, 50 involved an incumbent, and the incumbent has won 29, or 58 percent, of the elections. Every incumbent who finished under 40 percent in February has lost the runoff. That means Haithcock, Coleman and Chandler are toast.

Here's an analysis of those runoffs:

2nd Ward (South Loop: Dearborn Park, North Bronzeville, Taylor Street, South Lawndale): Haithcock, first elected in 1995, got just 2,130 votes (20 percent of the votes cast) on Feb. 27, in a turnout of 10,427. That's a dismal vote for an incumbent. Bob Fioretti, a white civil rights attorney, had 2,927 votes (28 percent), finishing first. Three other black candidates -- David Askew, Kenny Johnson and Wallace Davis Jr. -- drew a combined 4,202 votes, while another white candidate, Larry Doody, got 1,168 votes. Johnson was endorsed by U.S. Representative Jesse Jackson Jr., who will back Fioretti in the runoff.

Whites comprise about 45 percent of the ward's population and a majority of the voters. Haithcock's backers note that the total vote for black candidates (6,332) exceeded the vote for white candidates (4,095), that she has the backing of U.S. Representative Bobby Rush, the ward's Democratic committeeman and a onetime enemy, and that she won the 1995 runoff against Rush's sister by a vote of 5,495-4,669.

But Haithcock's inept, all-things-to-all-people approach has alienated all segments of the ward. She proposed naming a street after slain Black Panther Fred Hampton but then refused to call it for a vote, irritating blacks. She is a solid Daley backer in the City Council and she opposed the big-box living wage, irritating organized labor. She is a big booster of development, irritating whites who want it to stop now that they're there and blacks who fear being pushed out. She has a notoriously lackadaisical staff and she delivers shoddy services, irritating all.

The mayor lives in the ward, which takes in Soldier Field and McCormick Place and which would be the site of the $1.1 billion Olympic Village. New condominiums are being sold for $400,000 and up, bought by both whites and blacks; some, in Dearborn Park, go for $1 million.

Fioretti will spend more than $300,000, and he has deluged the ward with mail and has run an astute campaign. The mayor will offer only tepid support to Haithcock, whose vote has collapsed from 6,491 in 1999 to 4,190 in 2003 to 2,130 in 2007. New residents want a competent, articulate alderman. In a turnout of 7,200, Fioretti will win with 60 percent of the vote.

3rd Ward (Near South Side: Bronzeville): The ward has a growing white population in the north end, with new condos and rehabs along the Ryan Expressway south to Pershing. Tillman, first elected in 1985 and re-elected five times, has evolved from a champion of black empowerment, ever eager to blast opponents as "racist," to a champion of development and a Daley loyalist. Her outspoken advocacy of slave reparations is simply a tactic to pacify her black base, which fears the gentrification which is occurring.

Tillman, who professes to be the voice of the poor and downtrodden, opposed the big-box living wage. That enraged organized labor, which pumped money (nearly $150,000) and manpower into the campaign of Pat Dowell, a black city planner who lost to Tillman 3,986-2,728 in 2003. On Feb. 27 Tillman got 3,383 votes (43 percent of the total), to 3,020 for Dowell and 1,325 for Mell Monroe, another Tillman critic. Tillman's base has been solid: She got 4,259 votes in 1983, losing her first bid, she won a special election in 1985, and she got 13,339 votes in 1987. That dropped to 3,388 votes (51 percent) in 1991, 3,333 votes (47 percent) and then 6,420 votes (66 percent) in the runoff against ex-gang leader Gator Bradley in 1995, 4,414 votes (57 percent) in 1999 and 3,986 votes (52 percent) in 2003.

The difference in 2007 is that Dowell is a credible, well funded alternative, not a former gang member, and that she will get most of the white vote. Unlike 1995, when the Daley-Burris mayoral election spurred voter turnout, there will be no other ballot race on April 17. Daley won't make a major effort to rescue Tillman. In a turnout of 7,000, Dowell will win with 55 percent of the vote.

16th Ward (South Side: Englewood, Hamilton Park): Coleman, first elected in 1991 and a vociferous advocate of minority participation in city contracts, is the target of a federal investigation into her ties with a real estate developer and is one of the defendants in a $6 million federal racketeering lawsuit. Coleman backed the living wage ordinance but then switched to back Daley's veto, thereby enraging labor. A Wal-Mart is planned for 61st and Halsted streets in the 16th Ward.

But Coleman has a knack for winning runoffs. She won narrowly in 2003, getting 3,079 votes (53 percent of the total), to 1,369 for Joann Thompson (24 percent) and 1,201 for Hal Baskin (21 percent), avoiding a runoff. Coleman beat Baskin 3,299-1,590 (67 percent) in a runoff in 1999, beat Baskin 5,035-2,515 (67 percent) in a runoff in 1995, and won 4,600-4,072 (53 percent) in a runoff in 1991.

Coleman got only 2,023 votes (36 percent of the total) in February, finishing second to Thompson, who was backed by labor and who got 2,328 votes (42 percent). Baskin, running again, got 707 votes (13 percent). Coleman's base clearly is evaporating. An incumbent who gets just 36 percent of the vote after four terms is a goner. Thompson will win.

21st Ward (Far South Side: Brainerd, Longwood Manor, Washington Heights, Ford City): Brookins is the epitome of persistence and a political scion. His father, Howard Sr., was a state senator from 1987 to 1992. Brookins first ran for alderman in 1999, getting 1,789 votes (14 percent of the total) and finishing third. Brookins got 4,839 votes (38 percent) in 2003, forcing pro-Daley Alderman Leonard DeVille, who got 6,262 votes (49 percent), into a runoff. Brookins won the runoff 6,015-5,887 (51 percent).

Brookins is a periodic Daley critic, but he did back the mayor on the big-box issue. Infuriated, the unions fielded LeRoy Jones, a Service Employees International Union organizer, in February. Brookins finished with 6,361 votes (46 percent), to 4,745 (34 percent) for Jones. Daley might like to rid the council of Brookins, but a win by Jones would be construed as a defeat for Daley. Brookins will win with 54 percent of the vote.

24th Ward (Lawndale, Garfield Park, West Humboldt Park): This West Side ward, which straddles the Eisenhower Expressway, is undergoing demographic change, with a spike in the white population. Stretching from Jackson Boulevard to Cermak Road, from California Avenue west to the city limits, the 24th Ward has had a black alderman since 1958. New development and rehabbing in the 10 blocks north and south of the Eisenhower has attracted whites, and the Hispanic population is growing south of 16th Street.

Chandler, first elected in 1995, has crusaded against street gangs; he also supported the living wage. Surprisingly, he got caught in a runoff with Sharon Dixon, topping her 2,881-1,620 and getting just 36 percent of the vote in a turnout of 7,996. Chandler had 3,930 votes (53 percent of the total) in 2003, 6,903 votes (77 percent) in 1999, and he beat the incumbent by 3,897-2,071 (56 percent) in 1995. Chandler's hold on the ward is crumbling.

Dixon is backed by Jackson and, more importantly, by state Senator James Meeks, who is the pastor of the state's largest church. Dixon will win.