February 9, 2011
"BAILOUTS" ABOUND IN "TALE OF THREE WARDS" -- THE 36TH, 38TH, AND 47TH

ANALYSIS & OPINION BY RUSS STEWART

This week's column is a "Tale of Three Wards," the 47th, the 38th and the 36th. I will attempt to analyze a Machiavellian jumble of bailouts, dropouts, handoffs, payoffs, pass-overs and cop-outs.

The wards' current or recently departed aldermen have a combined 79 years of City Council service.

In the 47th Ward (Ravenswood, Lincoln Square), 36-year incumbent Gene Schulter showed extraordinary dexterity, performing both a bailout and handoff. The popular Schulter first announced for reelection, thereby clearing the field of any significant opponent. He filed, then quickly arranged for his Democratic captains to pass petitions for his erstwhile antagonist, Tom O'Donnell, who filed for alderman on the last day. Schulter then withdrew his candidacy. Facing three unknown and underfunded foes, O'Donnell's election is a fait accompli.

Unquestionably, 36 years in a 24/7 job takes a toll, and maxing out his pension is an incentive to retire. But Schulter's antics were deceptive and mendacious. The people, not Schulter, deserve the right to pick their alderman. Schulter has besmirched his legacy.

In the 38th Ward (Portage Park west of Laramie Avenue, Old Irving Park, Belmont-Central and Dunning around Merrimac Park), the demographics have changed. The Hispanic population is growing, many Polish-American immigrants have departed, and seniors are nearly a third of the ward's population. But the genealogy hasn't changed. A member of the "Cullerton Clan" was first elected a Chicago alderman in 1871. Since the ward was created in 1933, a member of the clan, by either birth or marriage, has been alderman for 76 of 78 years.

Seventeen-year incumbent Tom Allen became a judge in December and performed a deft dropout and handoff. Allen, who is the brother-in-law of newly appointed Alderman Tim Cullerton, has been itching to blow the coop for years. He ran for state's attorney in 2008, and he toyed with an Illinois Senate bid in 2010. The state's new pension law took effect on Jan. 1, meaning Allen's years in the Public Defender's Office would not be credited toward maximizing his judicial pension unless he got on the bench before Dec. 31. The latest Alderman Cullerton faces seven foes on Feb. 22.

In the 36th Ward (Montclare, Galewood, the Cumberland Avenue corridor, the area south of Harlem-Irving), 26-year incumbent Bill Banks resigned in October of 2009, adeptly performing a copout, a handoff and a dropout. Banks was the chairman of the City Council Zoning Committee for 20 years. The U.S. Attorney's Office's "Operation Crooked Code" probe into bribes of city zoning inspectors and other zoning chicanery has not concluded. Banks was not implicated, but there was "heat." Banks had $837,349 on hand as of Jan. 1, 2010, and he raised $302,371 in the prior 24 months. The feds were curious, but they seem to have lost interest since Banks' copout, as he has virtually shut down his fund-raising.

After he resigned, Banks prevailed on the mayor to appoint John Rice, his chief of staff and driver, as his successor. Rice got his payoff, and now he is facing five foes.

Here's an analysis:

47th Ward: For O'Donnell, a lifelong precinct captain who is a top aide to Sheriff Tom Dart, it's finally payoff time. For more than a decade, O'Donnell has beseeched Schulter, the Democratic committeeman, to support him for state senator, state representative, county commissioner and Metropolitan Water Reclamation District commissioner - and has been rebuffed repeatedly. Not surprisingly, O'Donnell, who is the president of both the Ravenswood Community Council and the Wells Park Advisory Council, was mightily angry about his pass-overs. The two definitely were estranged.

"They've mended their differences," said one 47th Ward precinct captain. No kidding. It's sort of like the king welcoming back the banished knight and giving him the kingdom.

O'Donnell's opponents are Ameya Pawar, Tom Jacks and Matt Reichel, who ran for Congress in 2009 as the Green Party nominee. "None is getting any traction," the captain said. "They're all twenty-somethings. They're all renters. None has been involved in the community." My prediction: O'Donnell wins his first and probably only term with 60 percent of the vote. In 2015 he will face a plethora of deep-pocketed, credible opponents.

38th Ward: It's "ABC" -- "Anybody But Cullerton." All of his opponents are trying to finish second and make a runoff against Cullerton. "They believe it's theirs," fumed Tom Caravette of the "Cullerton Clan's" grip on the aldermanic job. "It's not a family heirloom. One hundred and seven years of Cullertons is enough. I'm the primary alternative."

"There's crime, drug dealers, gang-bangers," said Ed Quartullo. "Our ward is not safe. That will not begin to change until we change our alderman."

"People are tired of the Cullerton regime," Sheryl Morabito asserted. "It's time for a new person."

"We need leadership and new ideas in the City Council," argued Bart Goldberg. "The budget deficit is at a crisis level, net revenues are plummeting, and police are understaffed. We can't have a caretaker."

"The job should not be given to him because of his family name," Mahmoud Bambouyani said. "He has not earned it."

"All they care about is keeping the job in the family," said Carmen Hernandez. Videckis said that Cullerton "does not and will not reflect the needs of the people."

Cullerton, age 62, retired in 2003 after 33 years with the city, lastly as the first deputy commissioner of the Department of Buildings. He and his sister, Patti Jo Cullerton, the Democratic ward committeeman, are children of the late Alderman Tom Cullerton, who served from 1973 to 1993 and who was the son and nephew of former aldermen. "I will oppose any tax hikes," Cullerton pledged. "I will seek to eliminate overpaid, top-level positions and effect pension reform."

The ward has 28,335 registered voters, of whom 12 to 15 percent are Hispanic. The Cullerton base is around Portage Park, west of Laramie Avenue between Irving Park Road and Montrose Avenue. In the November race for Cook County assessor, machine Democrat Joe Berrios got 4,500 votes in the ward, to 5,233 for Forrest Claypool in a turnout of 12,291. "We don't have captains in every precinct," acknowledged Cullerton campaign manager Kurt Gonska, who said that Cullerton expects to spend $50,000 on the campaign.

My prediction: In a turnout of 14,000, Cullerton will barely exceed 35 percent of the vote, finishing first. The remaining 9,100 votes will be fragmented, with Caravette, of Portage Park, a longtime area real estate agent who entered the race in June of 2010, and Goldberg, a well informed attorney from the Old Irving Park area, east of Cicero Avenue, leading the "ABC" field. Caravette's family founded BBC realty in 1979. Caravette, who is endorsed by the Sun-Times, has 13 siblings in the area and is active in Saint Pascal Parish. Interestingly, he is a close friend of Rice, the 36th Ward alderman.

In the second tier of candidates are Quartullo, a 22-year real estate broker with a base around Merrimac Park in the west end of the ward, Hernandez, a cop and a former Cullerton precinct captain, Bambouyani, who has operated a martial arts studio for 30 years, training thousands of area youngsters, Videckis, who runs a window repair business, and Morabito, the only woman in the race, who worked as an aide to Alderman Ted Matlak for 7 years and who works for the Chicago Public Library.

It will be 4,800 votes for Cullerton, 2,950 for Caravette, 2,500 for Goldberg, 1,000 for Morabito, 950 for Quartullo, 900 for Bambouyani, 500 for Videckis and 400 for Hernandez. In the runoff, Caravette will beat Cullerton.

36th Ward: It's said that you can't beat somebody with nobody. There's an apt variation in the 36th Ward: You can't beat nobody with nobody if the first nobody is backed by somebody. Rice is backed by the "Banks/DeLeo Machine," which is run by the former alderman and Jim DeLeo.

Forty of the ward's 55 precincts are in the 10th Illinois Senate district, a seat held by DeLeo from 1992 until his retirement in 2010. Last November the machine delivered for DeLeo's replacement, Democrat John Mulroe, who beat Republican Brian Doherty in the ward by 5,547-4,032. They produced for Mulroe, and they're going to produce for Rice.

Rice's foes are Chicago firefighter Nick Sposato, who got 2,572 votes in 2007, 28-year cop Tom Motzny, schoolteacher Jodi Biancalana, who won the ward 6,336-6,112 in 2006 for county commissioner against Republican Pete Silvestri, who was backed by Banks and DeLeo, city worker and "whistle blower" Bruce Randazzo and carpenter Brian Murphy.

"This is the most corrupt ward in America's most corrupt city," Randazzo said. "I'll be a corruption fighter."

"He's been alderman for barely a year," Motzny said of Rice. "He's not accessible. He's not delivering services. He's arrogant."

Sposato claims that Rice "lies and misrepresents his record and claims credit for Banks' accomplishments." Biancalana stressed that "it's time for a change."

Rice has raised only $32,750, but money from Banks, with $706,889 on hand, and DeLeo, with $503,734, is greasing the election. Huge Rice signs have proliferated in the ward. "I don't understand it," Sposato said. "I see these city guys working for Rice. I tell them Banks and Rice can't do anything for them, but they're everywhere."

"They're trying to intimidate us, and the voters," Biancalana said.

My prediction: Berrios beat Claypool 6,120-4,890 in the ward, in a turnout of 13,915. On Feb. 22 the machine will exert a Herculean effort. Banks got 8,094 votes in 2007. Rice is assured of 6,000 to 6,500 votes, and he will win with 53 percent of the vote.