State Sen. Kwame Raoul (D-Chicago) introduced SB 2607 on Jan. 21.It would allow offenders who either plead guilty or are found guilty of a non-violent felony the option of probation without having a judgment entered against them as long as  there is an agreement with the prosecution. If they comply with the terms of probation, the charges would be dismissed.

Felonies eligible for probation would include theft, burglary, possession of a stolen vehicle, drug possession and drug dealing.

Rob Baker, spokesman for Illinois Probation and Court Services, said state lawmakers have already passed a law, the Illinois Controlled Substances Act, for first-time offenders who have substance abuse issues. The Act gives offenders charged with simple possession of drugs the opportunity to enter into a “410 or 710 Probation,” whereby the case can be dismissed without a conviction.

This new bill would expand the law, which Baker said could be an issue for prosecutors because the bill doesn’t limit eligible crimes to only drug-related offenses.

Baker said he sees how this could add to probation officer’s caseload, because a greater number of offenders could be eligible for this option. The probation system is already overloaded, he said, and this would add further stress and strain.

There were 33,354 offenders on probation in 2009, according to Illinois Department of Corrections statistics. This number is 7 percent higher than the national average, according to the National Institute of Corrections.

The bill has not been assigned a committee in the Senate, but Raoul’s Chief of Staff Brandon Thorne said it would likely be assigned the week of Feb. 8. Even though no hearing date has yet been scheduled, there is one group willing to testify in support of the measure.

Laura Brookes, director of policy at Treatment Alternatives for Safe Communities (TASC), said the measure is a good alternative to incarceration because prison is often inappropriate for defendants who have committed non-violent offenses. She said it is also more cost effective than prison and can have a life-changing, positive impact for their clients. TASC is a statewide, non-profit treatment center that has been around for over 30 years and receives many clients from court referrals.

“If they have felony convictions, people can’t get a job and can’t have full citizenship,” Brookes said.

It costs $23,394 to house one inmate for one year, according to the Illinois Department of Corrections; the average cost of treatment as a condition of probation is $4,425 per treatment episode, which varies with each individual’s recovery, said Brookes.

George Williams, spokesman for Treatment Alternatives for Safe Center, said the organization is dedicated to finding ways to keep men and women out of jail while focusing on promoting public safety. He said he applauds Raoul for his efforts in helping defendants earn a second chance and become active members of society.

By allowing offenders to have the charges dismissed and a clean record, Williams said, clients can work to overcome two types of stigma. First, there is the social stigma and challenge to integrate into the community because of rejection they might have to face.

“When a person is convicted of felony, there are all levels of consequences and public rebuke,” said Williams. “But there’s also an internal stigma where you think about the challenges and bear that burden.

“It’s hard to visualize being successful,” he said. “It’s the ex-offender phobia that stops them from attempting to do anything.”

Florida passed a similar law in 2009, but there is an exception that prohibits probation if it’s determined the offender poses a risk to the public.

Jan Leone, chief adult probation officer at the Drug Court in Rock Island County, shared concern that the bill would make defendants charged with drug delivery offenses eligible. While probation would benefit substance abusers, Leone said it wouldn’t help other offenders.

“We would not take these clients into our drug court, as we want ‘users’ not ‘dealers,’” Leone said.

Jennifer Bishop Jenkins, founder of Illinois Victims.org and a candidate for Cook County Commissioner, said she supports diversion programs for non-violent offenders but is concerned that the bill might be too far-reaching in including crimes such as felony burglary.

“The hardest thing is to draw that line between violent and non-violent, and this bill is pushing the line,” said Jenkins.

It is most important that the violent offenders remain in prison and not be released due to lack of resources and space, but the resources for probation officers should be increased, said Jenkins. She also supports sealing records but not expunging them.

“I would want to work with Sen. Raoul on the details,” said Jenkins. “We don’t want to overreach on who we are letting off completely scott-free.”

Saline County prosecutor Jeff Thompson said there will always be a record of a felony charge, so prosecuting re-offenders won’t be as difficult as some might think. The court system might not be relieved of any pressure if the bill passes, Thompson said.

“I do not foresee a great deal of unclogging the court system with this proposed change,” said Thompson. “Any person charged with a criminal offense is entitled to appear in court under the law.”

Thompson said if this bill expands the types of cases heard in drug courts in Illinois, that would be an added benefit. He said in his experience, drug courts work but shouldn’t be seen as a cure-all to the problems plaguing the criminal justice system.

“In my mind, the biggest factor in determining the success of this or any other model is to get the court system to buy into it,” said Thompson. “While options can be available, if the players do not buy into the options, there will be no real change.”

The 164 members of the Illinois General Assembly who participate in the program doled out 1,571 scholarships in the 2008-2009 school year. That’s up $1 million from the previous year, when lawmakers awarded 1,509 scholarships. Although lawmakers select students, it’s the 12 Illinois state schools that cover the costs.

A ChicagoTalks investigation of the controversial program published late last year found repeated instances of scholarships being awarded to campaign donors, politically connected families and, in at least one instance, a lawmaker’s relative.

The journalists, working in collaboration with Illinois Statehouse News, also identified five legislators who require scholarship applicants to register to vote, a practice one constitutional lawyer called illegal.

There’s virtually no regulation of the scholarship program; it’s left up to each of the lawmakers who choose to participate to police themselves. The odds of winning a scholarship vary widely, depending on which district a student lives in and whether a lawmaker chooses to publicize the lucrative awards, worth an average of $8,300 in 2007-2008. The average value of a scholarship increased to about $8,600 in 2008-2009.

That means students who have the hardest time paying for college too often get left out, critics say. Supporters say it’s helped thousands of students attend college over the decades. And they note that legislators take pains to ensure the selection process is as fair as possible, requiring students to fill out applications and using special committees in many cases to choose the winners.

Although lawmakers handed out 62 more scholarships last year over the previous year, an official speaking for the three University of Illinois campuses said the bigger sum came from increased tuition.

The cost shifting is one reason some lawmakers don’t participate.

Rep. Bill Black (R-Danville), one of 14 state lawmakers ChicagoTalks identified last fall as not participating in the century-old program, is hoping this will be the year the legislature does away with the scholarships. Sixteen lawmakers have signed on to Bill HB4633, which Black introduced in the fall. An aide for Illinois Senate President John Cullerton (D-Chicago) said late last year the senator wants to either reform the program or abolish it altogether.

Randy Kangas, the associate vice president of planning and budgeting for the University of Illinois system, has his doubts.

“These bills are put in every year,” he said, “I don’t know how much umph it has in the General Assembly.”

Kangas said the state owes the University of Illinois schools $439 million, and that employees will be taking furlough days to conserve cash. The three schools – University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of Illinois at Chicago and University of Illinois at Springfield – waived $9.3 million in tuition for the 2008-2009 year.

Related Stories:

One Scholarship, 163 Ways to Dole It Out

Evasive State Legislators Dodge Questions About Scholarships

Clout or Coincidence? Some Legislators Keep General Assembly Scholarships All in the Family

Scholarships for Some Grad Students a Big Burden for State and Schools

Some Lawmakers Turn a Right into a Requirement

Nobody’s Watching: Illinois Lawmakers Alone Decide How to Give Millions

No Method to the Madness: State Scholarships Award Some Students More than Others

Students’ Free Ride Proves Costly to Their Classmates

State Legislative Scholarships Could Be Eliminated

For Richer or Poorer? Legislative Scholarships Should Target the Needy

Experts Suggest Changes to Legislative Scholarships

On Thursday, Feb. 11, Access Living will host a Historic Six-City Listening Tour organized by the U.S. Dept. of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP).  U.S. Labor Department Assistant Secretary Kathleen Martinez will participate in the Chicago event. ODEP wants to hear from you and the rest of the interested public, including people with disabilities,  on these three areas of interest:

Access Living is a unique place, inside and out.

• Effective ways to increase employment of women, veterans and minorities with disabilities
• Identification of federal and state systems that are effectively collaborating to achieve successful employment outcomes for people with disabilities
• Top issues on which the federal government should focus to support an increase in labor force participation of people with disabilities

Employment is higher among people with disabilities than it is among the rest of the population.

Martinez will be joined by officials from key federal agencies, including the:

• Veteran’s Employment and Training Service, U.S .Dept. of Labor,
• The Employment and Training administration
• Woman’s Bureau and Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs of the U.S. Dept of Labor and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services of the U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services
• Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services of the U.S. Dept of Education
• U.S. Office of Personnel Management
• U.S. Social Security Administration

The Chicago stop of the Listening Tour  will be held on Thursday, Feb. 11, 2010,  from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Access Living, 115 W. Chicago Ave., 4th Floor, Chicago. This is an accessible location.

For registration information, contact (703) 684-0029 or visit www.disabilitylisteningtour.com. For information about Access Living, contact Gary Arnold at (312) 640-2199 or garnold@accessliving.org.

The incumbent received 69 percent of votes, giving him an overwhelming majority against his challenger, Adolfo Mondragon.

Munoz, who was not available for comment during the week leading up to the Feb. 2 primary, was a difficult candidate to beat, said Kent Redfield, a political science professor who specializes in campaign finance at the University of Illinois, Springfield.

“The short time of the election is something that worked well for the incumbent,” said Redfield, referring to Illinois’ early Feb. 2 elections — the first primary in the nation since its move from April two years ago, which gave then-presidential candidate Barack Obama an early win.

Redfield said that January is the time to push campaigns, which left Mondragon just one month to work against Munoz’s money and organizational support. Since January 2009, the veteran politician was able to raise around $200,000 in campaign contributions, compared to Mondragon’s $29,000, reports the Illinois State Board of Elections.

Both the Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune endorsed Mondragon, citing his virgin politics as a plus against Munoz’s longstanding membership with the Democratic machine. The papers specifically mentioned Munoz’s relationship with the now-defunct Hispanic Democratic Organization, most notably his close political ties to Angelo Torres, who was convicted of running the city’s Hired Truck Program.

“He’s been mediocre at best. He has really not worked with the people who are on the ground,” said Mondragon on Election Day.

Mondragon, who currently works as a public interest attorney, criticized Munoz for ignoring his community’s complaints about two controversial coal-fired power plants on the Southwest Side.

Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization (PERRO) has asked Munoz to get involved with the Fisk and Crawford plants, which it calls environmental hazards. Instead, Munoz has accepted over $10,000 in campaign contributions over the past decade from Midwest Generation, owner of the two plants, according to the Illinois State Board of Elections.

“Unfortunately, we see a lot of old die-hard habits when it comes to voting for Democratic candidates. And when in doubt, people will vote for the name they recognize,” said Dorian Breuer, member of PERRO and assistant secretary for Chicago Southwest Side Greens, a local Green Party affiliate.

While Munoz isn’t known for his environmental initiatives, it’s likely he’ll continue to push legislation related to crime and to address the district’s high Hispanic population.

As for a change in leadership in the 1st District, that will have to wait.

“Electorally, with how to beat the machine candidates, it’s not enough to have a good background. It really requires the old school method of having your army on the ground,” said Breuer.

Whether that played a role in Tuesday’s election, one thing is for certain: low voter turnout didn’t help.

devin.katayama@loop.colum.edu

Steans, who is currently serving her first senate term, tallied more than 13,900 votes, or 65 percent of her district, according to the unofficial election results. Madigan, an attorney from Buena Park who ran on a platform of reform, carried 35 percent. About one in four registered voters city-wide went to the polls.

Steans will now face Republican Adam Robinson in the Nov. 2 general election in the race to represent a diverse swath of the North Side encompassing Uptown, Lincoln Square, Andersonville and Rogers Park. But in the overwhelmingly Democratic city of Chicago, that party’s primary elections tend to be a good indication of who will inevitably win the seat.

Madigan, who would have been the first openly gay state senator in Illinois history, positioned himself as a reform candidate in a campaign season abuzz with anti-corruption rhetoric. Still, Steans’ win did not come as a surprise to most political insiders.

“(Steans) is the incumbent, she has a good bit of money, she had robo-calls,” said Dick Simpson, a political science professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. “And she has the support of the Democratic committee.”

Campaign contribution records show Steans raised more than $220,000 in 2009; Madigan raised half that amount.

Steans kept a low public profile during her campaign, much to the chagrin of her challengers.

Robinson, whose campaign is focusing on lower taxes, school choice and – perhaps surprisingly – marriage equality, said Tuesday that he “applauded” Madigan for joining him in two candidate forums during the campaign. He added that “it was unfortunate that Sen. Steans declined both of those opportunities to address the issues.”

Steans declined requests for an interview.

Among the more controversial elements of the 7th District race, Madigan sent out a series of mailers criticizing the senator for giving more than $200,000 to the campaign of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich between the years of 2002 and 2007.

“If it had been television ads or maybe even radio ads with Blagojevich’s voice that had a more emotional impact, it might (have swayed the election),” Simpson said.

Andrew Hughes, a 27-year-old beer deliveryman from Ravenswood, said he voted for Steans despite the fact that he knew little about her. Instead, he went along with a flier listing Ald. Gene Schulter’s (47th) recommendations that he carried with him in his jacket pocket.

“I try to vote, because it’s all I can do. I’m a working person,” Hughes said. “But I couldn’t find any information … on most things, (politicians) are too vague.”

Steans, a graduate of Princeton and Harvard Universities, has worked for government agencies in Wisconsin and Illinois, serves as trustee of the Steans Family Foundation and formerly headed the board of WBEZ.

She won her senate seat in 2008 with the endorsement of former Sen. Carol Ronen, who abruptly resigned from the seat mid-term in October 2007.

It was the first time Burke had faced a challenge in a primary in nearly two decades of representing the 23rd House District in Southwest Chicago. Lozano, son of a slain Hispanic political activist, garnered nearly 45 percent of the vote to the lawmaker’s 50 percent, according to unofficial results.

Dick Simpson, head of the political science department at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said Tuesday before the polls closed that if the race was close, it would be a major statement indicating the machine’s strength weakening.

“If (Rudy) Lozano gets more than 40 percent of the vote, it would mean that (Dan) Burke can be defeated in a future election, if not the next election,” Simpson said. “It will mean the reform candidate can take back districts from the machine candidates. I see this race as a battle over the future of Latino politics.”

Lozano came close, willing 3,980 votes, while Burke had 4,414.

“The Latino population is growing at a rapid rate and is almost a third of the population in Chicago,” Simpson said. “This race will be a good indication about what the future of Chicago politics will look like and a tight race would be serious change in the future for machine candidates.”

Simpson said the 23rd District, a majority of which is in the 14th Ward, is over 70 percent Hispanic.

Burke hails from a powerful Irish family. His father, Joseph Burke, and brother, Edward, have served the 14th Ward in the Chicago City Council for a combined 55 years. Ald. Ed Burke is the longtime chair of the powerful Finance Committee and is married to Illinois Supreme Court 1st District Justice Anne Burke.

“This race has been entirely different for me,” Burke said in an interview just a day before Tuesday’s win. “In the past, if I voted I was elected. This is a new experience. I have ran a more than fair campaign. It has been a very positive experience, but I think I got what I anticipated.”

In addition to Lozano, there were two other Hispanic candidates in the race: Martin Meza-Zevala and Rene Diaz. These candidates kept a low profile, but may have taken some key votes away from Lozano. Meza-Zevala and Diaz combined received 5 percent of the vote.

Kelsey.Duckett@loop.colum.edu

Illinois has reduced funding for early childhood education, including before- and after-school programs, by 10 percent, said a spokesman for state Sen. Heather Steans (D-Chicago), who is the vice chairwoman of the Senate Education Committee. This could result in as many as 15,000 Chicago children losing eligibility for these programs.

The state’s budget deficit is up to $12.8 billion, forcing lawmakers to cut state funding. It’s these cuts that are destroying before-and-after school programs in Chicago, said Harry Wells, president of Chicago Youth Centers.

David Sinski, executive director for After School Matters in Chicago, said the cuts have significantly affected all nonprofit programs, and it doesn’t appear that the problem will be fixed any time soon.

“Given the current economic climate, After School Matters, like many nonprofit organizations, has experienced difficulty relying on continuous funding from all sources,” he said in an e-mail. “At the same time, challenging financial circumstances have escalated demand for and reinforced the need to expand out-of-school program opportunities for Chicago teens.”

After School Matters is a nonprofit organization that offers 25,000 program opportunities to Chicago teens. Sinski said the long-term goal is to double the capacity to 50,000 programs, which would be enough to accommodate about one-half of all Chicago public high school teens, specifically on the South and West Sides.

Wells said in the past year, his nonprofit organization has lost over $1 million in financial support.

“We have seven centers in Chicago that are for early childhood through teen education programs,” he said. “We lost $400,000 in state funding thus far, and it looks like that will double next year.

“That would be devastating to our program.”

Chicago Youth Centers serve eight neighborhoods: Altgeld Gardens, Riverdale, Roseland, South Shore, Grand Boulevard, Bridgeport, Humboldt Park and North Lawndale.

“Our goal was to expand our centers throughout Chicago, but right now we have to focus on finding funding to keep the doors open,” he said. “This program and others like it are vital in Chicago. The young people that come to us would otherwise be on the street after school and would be subject to drug and gang violence on the streets or they would drop out of school entirely.”

Ralph Martire, director at the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, said the problem is just going to get worse unless state taxes are raised.

“All these elected officials seem to think they can solve the program without raising taxes, but they can’t say how,” he said. “The numbers are pretty simple, and they are staggering. It is impossible to solve this without a tax increase.”

Martire said the state’s financial situation is grave at best, and it’s just the start. Next year, he warned, these education programs are going to take a serious hit, receiving significantly less money, if any at all.

“This year, these programs can expect that they will get anywhere from 10 to 50 percent less than they thought they would get,” he said. “The following year, all bets are off. If you don’t have money, you don’t have programs.”

Jack Kaplan, director of public policy for the United Way, said his organization sent a survey to over 1,000 nonprofit organizations in Chicago. Of the 500-plus that have responded, 59 percent report they’re waiting on back payments from the state.

“These organizations were reporting over $80 million in back pay that is due to them,” he said. “The state has been slow paying any service they think they can do away with. The state feels these agencies can be a lower priority, when in fact they are necessity in Chicago.”

Kaplan said he doesn’t even want to think about what next year could bring.

“This is not a scare tactic or a ‘chicken little the sky’s falling’ thing,” he said. “The state needs a wake-up call. These before- and after-school programs, along with early childhood education, are absolutely critical for Chicago. If the state does away with the funding for these programs, the impact will be unspeakable.”

Kelsey.Duckett@loop.colum.edu

Joyce Brown is no stranger to people in need. As the project coordinator for the Englewood Food Network, she’s been organizing food pantries and serving up meals to hungry clients for a long time.

But during the past year, she’s seen a pronounced difference in the people who patronize the pantry run by Beautiful Zion Church, 1406 W. 64^th St., where she volunteers at one of 32 food pantries in the Englewood network.

“There has always been seniors coming to get food,” Brown said. “But now there are more seniors and more families – especially single mothers with children. Everybody is in need.”

In this economy when people run out of food stamps, they’re turning to the food pantries to help them with meals, said Doris Jones, NCP director for Teamwork Englewood, which assists 15 food pantries through its partnership with the Englewood Food Network.

“We’re helping with the food needs and want to make sure people have a variety of produce and money to keep going,” she said.

Clients of the network food pantries receive a bag of groceries containing canned goods, cereal, bread, meat and – if available – fresh produce. The bags contain enough food for a family of four for two to three days. But the network is spending more to stock the pantries because of increased demand.

Teamwork Englewood and New Faith Baptist Church in south suburban Matteson are helping support the food pantries. Last year, New Faith Baptist donated $12,000 for the purchase of food for Englewood residents. And 40 trained volunteers from the Matteson church are on hand to help with cooking and bookkeeping, and to provide workshops to the food pantries.

Another goal of the Teamwork Englewood/New Faith Baptist Church partnership, said Jones, is working with the NCP Health, Food & Fitness Task Force to make sure a variety of healthy produce is available. Fresh produce trucks go to the food pantries on different days and times.

Teamwork Englewood also arranged for the pantries to purchase fresh produce and other goods from the Englewood Farmers’ Market during the season.

This task force is part of Teamwork Englewood’s Quality-of-Life plan to promote healthy lifestyles that include physical fitness, good nutrition and better use of health care resources.

Englewood, said Jones, is a food desert, noting that the only national grocery chains in the neighborhood are one Food 4 Less, at 72^nd Street and Ashland Avenue; and two Aldi’s, at 63^rd and Halsted streets and at 79^th Street and Ashland Avenue.

Because of the lack of nutritious food in the black community, Jones said, many residents are plagued with obesity, high blood pressure and cholesterol.

“Food is an issue,” she said. “We look at having well-balanced and nutritious meals. Adults need to know how to prepare soul food in a healthy way. Once you get a community eating healthy and exercising, the residents start to participate in other civic activities.”

Healthy Cooking

Offering healthier food choices to the Englewood community is the key to bringing the neighborhood the best quality of life it can have, Jones said. A healthy cooking class at Beautiful Zion Church, started by volunteers from the New Faith Baptist Church in July, is providing another means of providing healthier food choices and education.

Chef consultant Kocoa Scott-Winbush, taught the classes this past summer to food pantry volunteers and neighborhood residents. In the classes, Scott-Winbush emphasized incorporating fresh vegetables into meals.

Sandra Wilcoxon remembers the first time the New Mt. Calvary Baptist Church food pantry, a network member, distributed fresh blueberries. “People refused to take the blueberries,” said Wilcoxon, a volunteer at the church’s food pantry, at 1859 W. Marquette Road. “They didn’t want to waste them. They didn’t know what to do with them.”

But through the healthy cooking classes, pantry volunteers came up with a solution the next time blueberries were available – blueberry pancakes. They were a huge hit.

The cooking classes have helped open up clients to food they would not ordinarily purchase, Wilcoxon said, adding that now, when clients line up for assistance, they often share recipes for items in the food bags.

The classes, added Brown, the food network coordinator, help participants “see there are other things to do with that same food. It gives them creative ideas to eat healthy.”

Linda Saunders, a Teamwork Englewood volunteer, has received assistance from a network food pantry and attended the cooking classes. She enjoyed the classes and the way Scott-Winbush expanded her palate.

“This class helped me with various ways to prepare food with healthy benefits,” she said. “They have turned out wonderful.”

Saunders, for example, had never prepared eggplant. But her 13-year-old son was so taken with a recipe that she learned in class that he later attended a cooking class with her.

“You learn not only the methods about how to prepare a dish, but also get cultural information and experience as well,” she said.

Dennis Ware, president and executive director of the Englewood Food Network, said that people in the Englewood community are among the poorest of the poor. They sometimes have to choose whether to spend their money on medication, housing or food.

“The Englewood Food Network strives to make sure they don’t have to make those choices,” Ware said.

Chicago Public Radio’s City Room reports on the increased demand at Cook County food pantries.

You can figure out which candidates have views that match your own — even among that daunting list of judges running for election. There are no perfect choices, but voting based on facts is betterthan voting blind or not voting at all.

Here is ChicagoTalks’ guide to the primary election on Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2010 in Chicago and Cook County. You can vote (if you haven’t done early voting) on Feb. 2 between 6 a.m. -  7 p.m., if you are registered voter.

If you have problems or see something that looks fishy, tell the election judge at your polling place and report it to your election authority for Chicago or Cook County. Then call ChicagoTalks. Here’s how:

• City of Chicago voters should call the Election Hotline at (312) 269-7870.

• County voters should call the Vote Fraud Hotline (Cook County, but not City of Chicago) at (312) 603-0909.

• Call ChicagoTalks at (312) 436-1820. We are working with reporters from Lake Effect News, Center Square Ledger and The Columbia Chronicle to report problems and voting irregularities.

Voting for judges doesn’t have to be hard or take long. First, go to http://voteforjudges.org/, a nonprofit site that explains the details of these elections and provides guides to help you gauge who is qualified and who is not. Print these guides and take them with you when you vote. Whether you are interested in justice and gender, justice and race, or justice and fairness, these guides are better than voting blind or not voting at all. Find more judicial recommendations you can use here.

• If you are voting in one of the 120-plus towns and villages in suburban Cook County, your election authority is the Cook County Clerk’s office. Here are resources for you:

• Find your polling place
• See a sample ballot
  
• What if I’m not listed as being registered?
• What options do voters with disabilities have?
• What will happen at the polling place?
• What kind of voting equipment will I use?
• How do I vote?
• What if I make a mistake?
• What if I need help on Election Day?

• If you are voting in the city of Chicago, your election information is at www.chicagoelections.com.
  • Chicago voter F.A.Q.
  • Check your registration and see a sample ballot

• The e-voter site is a non-partisan voting information site.

• From Lake Effect, former Ald. Dick Simpson on The Cook County Wars provides a quick review of how Cook County commissioners voted since the last election.

• Ben Joravsky and Mick Dumke tell all in Election Follies : Age-old feuds, nepotism, logrolling, and Moonies—it must be primary season in Chicago.

Remember, this is a PRIMARY election, so most candidates are running to be the official party candidate in the November election. If you don’t feel comfortable asking for a Democratic, Republican or Green Party ballot, you have the right to request a non-partisan one.

You can register now for Bike the Drive 2010

This signal event allows bike riders to pedal up and down the entire length of Lake Shore Drive, from the Museum of Science and Industry to Hollywood, while the Drive is closed to auto traffic.

Bike the Drive benefits the Active Transportation Alliance’s work to improve biking, walking and transit in Chicagoland. There are rest stops with refreshments along the way, first-aid and emergency care if there are accidents, and a host of friendly photographers will snap a picture of you in action as you pedal along. This year, you can attend without having to drive downtown. Stay at The Fairmont Hotel Chicago, Bike the Drive’s official hotel, located less than a mile from the start/finish area. Pay just $149 for a room at this luxurious hotel that offers valet bike service!

Learn more about this deal and other great opportunities when visiting Chicago for Bike the Drive. Bike the Drive 2010 merchandise like jerseys, shorts and more are available when you register, if you want to remember your ride with a t-shirt or something.

Sign up for Bike the Drive or for more information, contact Margo O’Hara, director of communications for the Active Transportation Alliance, at (312) 427-3325, ext., 224.

Drew believes that art and creativity can be a pro-social path to economic self-sufficiency for economically disadvantaged youth. His t-shirt art site features work by a variety of artists, including Carlos Cortez, Lee Groban, Diane Berek and others. The fabric art images range from folk-art to political, like Cortez’s well-known image of labor martyr Joe Hill. This is art that aims to engage you. These shirts aren’t meant to be mass-produced and sold at Wal-Mart, but diversity is the spice of life.

Drew sells his work at music festivals, in parks, at public meetings, and around the city. As a proponent of net-neutrality, he’s sold patches and shirts at FCC hearings around town.

Over time, the restrictions on artists’ rights to sell work in public places has been grating on Drew. In a post from July 2006, he captured his exchange with a Segway-riding Chicago policewoman (at left) about peddling licenses and just where licensed peddlers could vend their wares.

Flash forward to 2009, and Chris Drew decided to challenge one law requiring artists to get their art work cleared through City Hall, and a second that makes it a crime to record police in action — as evidenced by the charges against Drew, who attempted to document his own arrest.

Drew will appear in court at 9 a.m. on Friday, Jan. 29 at the Cook County Criminal Court at 26th Street and California Avenue.  Curtis Black, of Community Media Workshop, reports that Drew and his artist allies will be giving away art patches outside downtown colleges in the afternoon.

Chicagotalks will update this story.

Chris Drew's blog

Monday, February 1
5 – 8 pm
Columbia College College, Film Row
1104 S. Wabash, 8th Floor

Woolworth's Lunch Counter

This event is free and open to the public. Reservations are required and can be made by sending an email to rsvp@chicagofreedomschool.com or by calling 312.435.1201.

Following the screening, we invite you to participate in a community dialogue which will be centered on how the history of that moment is relevant to the issues of today.

More about this event

This event is presented by The Chicago Freedom School and the Ellen Stone Belic Institute for the Study of Women and Gender in the Arts and Media at Columbia College, in partnership with The Public Square and the Chicago SNCC History Project.

It’s not often that elected county officials visit the West Ridge and Rogers Park backwater, but visit they did, arriving with an entourage of TV news cameras and a prominent TV newscaster to a Democratic candidates’ forum for the Cook County Board President’s seat.

Sunday’s forum was organized by a new neighborhood group called the Rogers Park Organization, whose mission is to support and elect candidates who will represent the interests of Rogers Park and West Ridge residents. One of the organization’s goals is to organize candidates forums so that voters can ask questions and get candidates’ opinions on issues directly affecting them.

More than 100 residents filled the pews at Temple Menorah, 7360 N. California Ave., on Sunday afternoon to watch incumbent Todd Stroger defend his beleaguered term as Cook County Board President against challengers Ald. Toni Preckwinkle (4^th) and Cook County Circuit Court Clerk Dorothy Brown.

West Ridge resident and Metropolitan Water Reclamation District President Terry O’Brien, who is also challenging Stroger, arrived 45 minutes into the forum, apologizing profusely to his neighbors saying he had been held up at another campaign event.

Chicago Sun-Times political columnist, WTTW “Chicago Tonight” co-host and Channel 5 political editor Carol Marin moderated the forum, feeding audience questions to the candidates on topics ranging from property taxes, the county health care system, stabilizing the county budget, and patronage.

“People here in Rogers Park feel they don’t see too many Cook County elected officials in this part of their world,” Marin said. “What exactly does the county government do for them and how does it impact their lives in ways they may not see?”

Stroger, Preckwinkle and Brown each spoke of how county residents pay sales and property taxes, and use other services, including the county health care and criminal justice systems, and small business administration.

“Then there are many services like the Botanic Garden and Brookfield Zoo,” Brown said. “Even though they’re not here, you can go to them. The forest preserves are available as well. There are a lot of things that Cook County government can do for you and of course, you have to pay the various taxes in order to make those happen.”

Preckwinkle said the county government has two main missions, health care and the fair and equitable operation of the criminal justice system.

“About one-third of our felony resources and one-third of our budget goes to the health care system,” Preckwinkle said. “Our public health system is the safety net that provides for people who are uninsured or underinsured. The other big portion of the county’s budget and its focus is criminal justice. Likewise, it’s in all of our interest that the criminal justice system operates well and fairly to all who come in contact with it.”

Stroger spoke of the Cook County Sheriff’s Department’s interaction with Chicago police and other municipal police departments on drug, gang and bomb squad missions. He also mentioned the county’s vital records and highways departments, and help for small businesses.

“What people don’t think about is the highways,” Stroger said. “The county goes out and repairs the road and gives it back to the city and the city will take care of its maintenance … We’re planning a $200 million bond program where you’re giving money back to small businesses.”

Other audience questions were ripped right out of recent news headlines. Marin tossed a question to Stroger, asking how many of his relatives were on the county payroll and what jobs and salaries were they receiving.

“I believe my sister works for the chief judge. I never asked her what she makes and she doesn’t offer it up so I can’t really tell you,” Stroger said. “My brother-in-law works in facilities management. I suspect both have been there somewhere between 16 and 20 years. There you go.”

Preckwinkle was queried about the $40,000 in campaign contributions she received from convicted felon Tony Rezko in exchange for bringing business to the city’s 4^th Ward, where Preckwinkle has been alderman since 1991.

The alderman explained how her relationship with Rezko dissolved in the late 1990s, when she confronted him about affordable housing properties that he owned in the 4^th Ward after receiving complaints from the community and her staff about substandard conditions and criminal activity.

“Tony Rezko hasn’t given me a dime in decade since I called him,” Preckwinkle said.

Brown was asked how a supervisor could objectively receive cash gifts from employees or charge them to wear jeans to work. Brown said receiving and giving cash gifts to or from county employees was legally allowed, according to the Cook County ethics ordinance.

“The thing we do at the clerk of the court, we’re like a family. I give gifts and they give gifts. There’s been a lot of misreporting,” Brown said.

Regarding the infamous “jeans days,” in which circuit employees pay $2 to wear jeans to work on certain days which goes into coffers to be later given to charity or used for employee morale boosting events, Brown said the practice was started by her predecessor. She mentioned other county departments, such as the Cook County Recorder of Deeds, as well as various city agencies that had instituted “jeans days.”

“My employees wanted to continue because they wanted to be able to give to charitable causes …” Brown said. “The [Chicago] Department of Revenue just issued a memo they’re going to do jeans day every Thursday for Haiti. Some employees said to give $2 to wear jeans and have fun yet give to a good cause is a good thing for them.”

All of the candidates, including O’Brien, who by then had showed up to the forum, said they would lobby the Illinois General Assembly to extend the 7 percent property tax cap. Preckwinkle said the county needed to be more proactive on home foreclosures, adding that she would institute a mandatory foreclosure mediation process in the county’s circuit courts that would allow more homeowners to save their homes.

O’Brien supported seeking federal grants to reduce the county’s dependence on property taxes. Stroger said the county has not raised its portion of property taxes in 13 years, and that the county government saved 25,000 homes from foreclosure under his watch by helping homeowners readjust their mortgages.

Candidates were also asked whether they thought the county had a patronage or corruption problem. All of the candidates, with the exception of Stroger, agreed that county government had padded its payroll with patronage jobs.

Stroger said that unless patronage was going on “behind my back,” new hires made by the county during his term were made with a Shakman monitor in the room.

“I signed the Shakman decree before I came in … I talk to the Shakman monitor about every quarter,” Stroger added. “There is not one of us up here who doesn’t have a patronage employee. That’s the person you trust to look at your paperwork to make sure it gets done. That is part of being an elected official and I don’t think there is an office of any size that doesn’t have what they call patronage reports.”

Regarding budget cuts each candidate would make to stabilize the county budget, Brown said she would lobby the Illinois General Assembly for an early retirement program for county employees to bring in new hires at lower salaries.

Stroger supported a program that would allow retired county judges to review non-violent offenders eligible for electronic monitoring and home confinement to relieve the financial burden of housing prisoners in the county jail.

Preckwinkle said she would immediately take a 10-percent salary reduction.

O’Brien’s first order of business would be to eliminate one of the boards of elections.

“There’s two, the city and the county; it’s just duplication that’s not needed,” O’Brien said. “The second thing would be to consolidate all the purchasing aspects of the county. Why does every department need a purchasing department, when it should be just falling under one umbrella in which all the departments can feed from that one department.”

O’Brien added he was glad to hear the alderman’s offer of accepting a 10-percent salary cut if elected county board president, “considering that the alderman has voted four times to increase her own pay.”

“That’s true,” Preckwinkle replied.

By Lauren Rozyla, Morgan McDevitt and Sam Roe, Chicago Tribune

On a summer night in 2004, two Chicago police officers chased an alleged gunman up to the front door of a West Side two-flat.

The 2000 census counted 117,527 people living inside the city-defined borders of Austin, representing 4.1 percent of Chicagoans. Community activist Malcolm Crawford says this number is inaccurate, and estimates Austin’s true population to be as much as 20 percent higher because the population is wary of being counted.

“[There is] a lack of information, a lack of understanding of what the census is,” said Crawford, whose nonprofit Sankofa Cultural Arts and Business Center is involved in promoting census awareness in Austin. “A lot of our people are in precarious situations” and don’t like to talk to outsiders or the government, he said.

Crawford and the Sankofa Center are among a plethora of nonprofit and public-private organizations trying to convince Chicagoans to cooperate with the 2010 census. The federal census occurs once every 10 years.

Crawford said the Sankofa Center is involved in an alliance of “churches, block clubs and politicians” to mobilize Austin. He has attended several meetings, and he shares information with guests at Sankofa.

Among the benefits they hope Chicago communities will reap from participating are increased political representation, a greater share of federal funds, and temporary but lucrative census jobs ($18.25/hour on the West Side).

One of the organizations participating in the drive is the Westside NAACP, the chapter of the national NAACP that includes Austin, East and West Garfield Park, North Lawndale and Humboldt Park.

Westside NAACP Vice President Ray Easley estimates the 2000 census missed 20,000 people in Austin. He said whether Austin is properly counted in the census has far-reaching effects on the neighborhood’s local economy.

“The census is very important … from a point of view of political structure,” Easley said. “But entities like grocery stores look at the census as well” when choosing where to open new stores.

Scott Allard is an associate professor of social services administration at the University of Chicago. Allard, who is doing fieldwork on the census, said concerns about the census in Austin are valid.

“Austin is definitely one of the neighborhoods where they have an undercount and where [the census] is targeting residents,” he said.

Allard said Austin fits the profile of an undercounted neighborhood, with higher than average rates of poverty, illiteracy and homelessness, as well as one of the city’s largest ex-prisoner populations.

Thomas Jones, an assistant commissioner with the Chicago Department of Family and Support Services who does work at the Austin Satellite Senior Center, agrees the West Side neighborhood was “woefully undercounted” in the last census, blaming it on fluid living situations.

“We have a lot of people who don’t reside where they say they reside and don’t want to be counted,” Jones said. “You might have 10 people living where there are supposed to be four people … they don’t want people to know they have people who aren’t on their lease.”

“A lot of people just don’t trust the government, and thus don’t send [census] papers in,” he said.

And that, Jones said, hurts Austin.

“Population determines the amount of federal dollars that go to a given area,” he said, and not responding to the census costs the Austin community badly needed aid. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, $400 billion in federal funds is at stake.

Jones said he’s helping run an awareness campaign out of the senior center by distributing fliers and encouraging people to cooperate.

“People just don’t send their papers in,” he said, and he believes more Austin residents would participate in the census if they were better informed.

Allard said although the census is sometimes adjusted to offset the undercount, the adjustments are largely academic. He said the original, low set of numbers is still used for redistricting and apportioning federal funds.

Chicago sued the Census Bureau in 1990 because it lost so many federal dollars from undercounting, Allard said.

Allard will host a conference Feb. 26 at the University of Chicago. The event will bring academics, community groups and officials together to discuss how to get the most accurate count, especially with the recent spike in foreclosures and evictions causing migrations and more unorthodox living situations.

Allard also credits the Census Bureau with reforms undertaken since the 1990 lawsuit was filed, including the Complete Count Committee initiative. He said the 2000 census went better than in 1990, and he has high hopes for outreach this year.

“The Census Bureau can do a good job following up in neighborhoods where response rates are low,” he said.

The Census Bureau was not available for comment.

The Census Bureau Web site offers a press kit for organizations interested in working as partners. It also displays an online sample of the census form, which it calls “one of the shortest forms in history – 10 Questions in 10 Minutes.”

mjhert@hotmail.com

Located on the city’s West Side, Austin’s population is nearing 130,000, and as the population rises in what community activists call Chicago’s “forgotten child,” so do the number of fast food restaurants in a neighborhood that already lacks grocery stores and healthy sit-down options.

Elce Redmond, assistant director of the South Austin Coalition, said business owners, specifically fast food restaurant owners, decided Austin wasn’t a community that wanted or would support anything but fast food.

“For some reason, people have this idea that Austin can only sustain fast food restaurants,” he said. “I mean, no matter where you are in Austin, all you see are fast food joints. In this community, all we have are horrible fast food restaurants with their greasy, fried and deeper fried foods.”

Redmond estimates that there are well over 100 fast food restaurants in Austin and less than five family dining options.

Lavern Herron, co-owner of Caramel Café, a sandwich shop that opened at 5941 W. Madison St. just over a year ago, said Austin can sustain restaurants with healthy options and hers is one of them.

“We don’t offer the standard deep fried everything and fries,” she said. “Instead, we offer healthy options like soup and salad and sandwiches. We offer a sit-down restaurant in a warm, clean environment, and that’s something the community really needs more of.”

Woodrow Taylor, a 35-year resident of Austin, said the number of fast food restaurants has grown every year and the number of grocery stores has decreased.

“One of the biggest problems in Austin is we have no grocery stores and that is the main reason for all the fast food restaurants,” he said. “The owners of the fast food restaurants have taken advantage of the fact that it is easier for people to walk over and grab a burger and fries than it is to travel and try to find a grocery store.”

It’s not just Austin, as journalist Eric Schlosser points out in his 2001 best-seller, “Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal.” He wrote that every city across the United States is being taken over by fast food chains.

“A generation ago, three-quarters of the money used to buy food in the U.S. was spent to prepare meals at home,” Schlosser said in his book. “Today, about half of that same money is spent in restaurants – mainly fast food restaurants. In 1968, McDonald’s had 1,000 restaurants – today it has about 30,000, and 2,000 new ones are opening each year. The number of fast food restaurants that are taking over cities everywhere is alarming.”

Camille Lilly, president of the Austin Chamber of Commerce, said Austin has more than 900 businesses, but it’s been difficult to bring in family-style dining and chain restaurants like Applebee’s and TGIF.

“It is difficult to change the culture of a community,” she said. “Austin is landlocked, so it is difficult to build in Austin. That, coupled with the idea or stereotype that family dining options won’t succeed in Austin, are the biggest problems.”

One family-style option, open since 1997, MacArthur’s, located at 5412 W. Madison St., has done very well with the concept of homestyle cooking and a sit-down, family environment.

“This is a family-style restaurant that has reasonable prices and offers the food that people in the community want,” MacArthur’s Manager Sharon McKennie said. “Austin has a lot of fast food restaurants, and we offer the alternative. We offer good, everyday, full-course meals at a reasonable price.”

Malcolm Crawford, president of the Austin African American Business Networking Association, said there is a strong need for healthy options in the community, but with all the other problems, it is difficult to force the issue.

“There has been some discussion about focusing on bringing in more family restaurants,” he said. “But let’s face it, there are so many other serious issues in Austin that I don’t really think people see the lack of sit-down restaurants, and the overabundance of fast food restaurants, as a pressing issue.”

Kelsey.Duckett@loop.colum.edu

No one would assume that Mabouc was separated from his family when he was five years old in Sudan as people were dying all around him, or that he spent three years walking from war-torn Ethiopia to Kenya or that he was educated in a refugee camp, but that is how this well-dressed man spent his formative years.

Quiet, calm and slightly reserved, the handsome, dark-skinned Mabouc was very composed as he talked about the long journey that led him to Chicago.

Running for their lives

He was playing in a field with other kids from the Sudanese village of Kongor when his life was forever changed. Sudan has been ravaged by civil war more than once, and as Mabouc played with other village children, the war exploded into his life and separated his family. Tanks rolled into the area as shots were fired randomly and homes were set on fire.

“People were running in different directions,” Mabouc said. “Some of the children like myself were out playing in the field. We ran away from the fights in another direction.”

That group of people would keep running — running for safety, running for their lives. “We walked for several months,” Mabouc said, before the group ended up in a refugee camp in Ethiopia.

“In the camps, a lot of people had no parents,” including Mabouc. “We were put in groups,” he said. “Kids whose parents were unaccounted for were taken care of by the U.N. We were in camp for three years until war broke out in Ethiopia. We [then] walked for three years to Kenya.”

Mabouc said the group walked mostly at night, often setting up day camps in the forest, hiding for their own safety, as the various military groups who destroyed their village and many others would look for people in the daylight.

“Food was whatever we could find… leaves, anything,” said Mabouc. When asked about the availability of water, he said there was “not very much. If there were no rivers around, people would go without or drink whatever we could find — ponds, rain.”

Mabouc and the survivors among his group eventually arrived in northern Kenya, at a United Nations refugee camp in Kakuma. Mabouc said supplies were nearly always low, as the camp was built for a limited number of people, but continually received an influx of refugees, from Rwanda, the Congo and Somalia, as well as other refugees who had been forced to flee from Sudan.

Mabouc spent more than a decade in the camp. He said the camps had schooling set up for kids in kindergarten through high school. While Mabouc was educated in the camp, he got the chance to participate in drama.

“We did a bunch of plays,” he said. “We had professional writers who would write stuff, and we would perform them. We participated in national competitions in Kenyan schools.”

In the camp Mabouc learned English, which is taught in Kenyan schools. His native language is Dinka.

Throughout the long journeys to Ethiopia and then Kenya, and for much of his childhood, Mabouc did not know what happened to his family or even if they were alive. He left his parents and two older siblings behind when his village was raided.

Finally, in 1996, still not yet a teenager, Mabouc learned about their whereabouts. His family ended up in a camp in northern Uganda. The Red Cross had a system in which representatives went from camp to camp in an attempt to document the location of refugees in order to reunite families. Though he was not able to rejoin his family, Mabouc was able to see pictures of them.

Mabouc had some contacts with uncles and cousins who had been together since their arrival in Ethiopia, but through the efforts of the Red Cross, he learned that he now had four younger siblings. For the most part, the refugees in the camps and the people who had made the journey from Sudan to Kenya had become Mabouc’s family.

“I was able to connect with some family members — uncles and cousins. But mostly [it was] the guys. We were together since Ethiopian camp — we were together; we got to know each other — we were the family,” Mabouc said.

Brought to America, receiving little government help

In 2001 as part of a special program set up by the United Nations and the U.S. State Department, Mabouc was brought to America. He was 17 years old when he arrived in Syracuse, N.Y., that August. The group of refugees was settled in various locations in the U.S. and Canada and became known as “The Lost Boys of Sudan.” The group has since been documented in books and films.

Through the program that brought Mabouc to the U.S., he was set up in an apartment in Syracuse for three months. After that, it was up to him to pay rent and support himself.

The refugees received very little government support. They were assisted by some case workers, volunteers and community organizations. Syracuse doesn’t have a strong public transit system, so refugees like Mabouc were very dependent on the community organizations for rides to stores for groceries and basic supplies.

“Especially in the winter, it was very hard to get around,” Mabouc said. “I worked very hard to get my license,” which he received in 2002.

Mabouc’s struggles and the minimal amount of government support he received upon arriving in America are typical of what all refugees must deal with, though Mabouc at least knew English, something many refugees do not, according to Vanessa Parra, a spokeswoman for Refugees International.

“[Refugees] don’t have a lot of resources,” Parra said. “Each situation is very unique. It is very hard for people when they come here. It’s every kind of culture shock you can imagine.”

Mabouc was eventually able to speak with his mother on the telephone. At first, she didn’t believe it was really her son. He was also able to speak with his younger siblings for the first time.

“It’s very hard to establish that relationship on the phone with someone you’ve never met,” said Mabouc. “It’s hard to put your mind around a sibling you’ve never physically met.”

Moving to Chicago, making a difference

Mabouc moved to Bourbonnais, Ill., to study sociology at Olivet Nazarene University. Mabouc and other refugees face the same difficulties in paying for college as American citizens, including having to fill out the dreaded FAFSA financial aid application forms and relying upon student loans.

Mabouc later moved to Chicago, where he worked at the Pan-African Association. His job there was to help refugees and other immigrants from all parts of Africa.

Organizations such as this are essential to refugees, as government help is very limited in its scope. Assistance often comes from faith-based organizations, such as Catholic Charities, whose spokeswoman Kristin Ortman said creating self-sufficiency among refugees is their most important goal.

“I think the number-one issue is employment,” Ortman said. “Many times our staff and our many volunteers are able to offer job training and assistance in finding a job. So often [refugees] have many talents and job skills that they learned in their country. Our goal is to help them achieve self-sufficiency as soon as possible.”

Catholic Charities’ Refugee Resettlement Program helps refugees with basic life skills, such as learning how to navigate the public transportation system and how to operate basic equipment in their apartments. Their organization receives some government funding, but relies heavily on donations and the work of volunteers.

“I worked as a tutor for a family from Sudan, and they were very grateful to receive assistance from a local parish who found them and had taken them under their wing,” said Ortman.

Mabouc is still adjusting and settling into American life, living in Albany Park with two roommates who are also from Africa. His time at the Pan-African Association helped him meet people from all parts of the African continent.

Mabouc enjoys basketball and football, having attended a Notre Dame football game last fall and Chicago Bulls games in the past. He likes to play dominoes at home and listen to reggae music in Chicago bars and music venues. He recently started a new job for an organization that provides assistance to people in need in Chicago, though he asked that his new employer not be named, as he was unsure of their media policy.

Sowing the seeds of hope

Mabouc has had the opportunity to speak to various groups about his life’s journey. It was through a speaking engagement to a continuing education class of teachers studying genocide that he first met Oak Park teacher Karen Tokarz.

Moved by what she’d heard, Tokarz invited Mabouc to speak to students at Gwendolyn Brooks Middle School in Oak Park, where he made quite an impression on students and teachers alike.

“We were all in tears,” Tokarz said of hearing Mabouc’s stories. “Watching friends get eaten by crocodiles or having worms in your feet because you have no shoes… it’s heart-wrenching… it’s an unbelievable story of inspiration, an unbelievable story of survival.”

Tokarz said part of what amazes her about Mabouc is how he has coped with “not having the nurturing of [his] parents.” She noted that as the Lost Boys were re-settled in different cities all over America and Canada, “it was sort of an abandonment all over again.”

Though Mabouc said he “likes Chicago as a city,” he is no fan of winter weather. And despite his success at becoming self-sufficient in this country, Mabouc still thinks about going home and helping the people of his village.

He is volunteering his time with the Oak Park school district and working with Tokarz on her school’s “Exchange of Hope” program, in which students from Gwendolyn Brooks Middle School participate in a cultural exchange with sometimes impoverished or underprivileged students in other countries. They recently started a program in which the students will connect and share ideas with new friends in Southern Sudan.

Tokarz also said each of the ten schools in the Oak Park school district will be raising money to help Mabouc fly to meet his family in Uganda and then check out the conditions in his homeland in Southern Sudan. (Donations can be made to the Gwendolyn Brooks Middle School Service Learning Club.)

Mabouc hopes to raise awareness of the situation in Southern Sudan. The people in his home village have farmlands to return to, as property rights are ancestral-based and very important to the people of his region, but right now they lack the equipment and tools to work the land, leaving them financially unable to leave refugee camps and move back home.

“What I can really emphasize is to support the programs and to get to know the situation,” said Mabouc. “Any sort of small help can make a big difference. Getting a hoe or a rake to clear your land is a big deal and can save lives. People don’t have money to buy these things.”

In addition to the Exchange of Hope program, Mabouc is helping to develop a non-profit group called “Tools of Hope” to help families such as his be able to return to their homes and farm their land. He said he hopes Tools of Hope’s website will be live soon.

“He’s such a peaceful person,” Tokarz said of Mabouc. “He’s always just happy that he has another day. He’s not living with any kind of wealth. He’s dying to get back there and see his family and help Southern Sudan.”

For now Mabouc works hard at his new job, while dedicating what time he has to helping his native village. For the most part, he is too busy to dwell on the journey that brought him to Chicago, but he does recognize the struggles he has endured and survived.

“It’s tough, but I’m still alive. That’s the most important part.”

See also: Lost Boys of Sudan in Chicago, Exchange of Hope: Southern Sudan

travis.truitt@gmail.com

The forum, Violence Against Women, held at Loyola University, is one of the first chances the candidates have had to delve deep into issues of rape, domestic violence, discrimination against people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered and queer (LGBTQ), and sex trafficking in Chicago.

With the primary 11 days away, the candidates in attendance took every opportunity to steal time from one another and bring their platforms into the discussion.

All seven candidates running for Cook County Board president confirmed their attendance, but only four actually were present: Cook County Board President Todd Stroger, Ald. Toni Preckwinkle (4th), Cook County Clerk of the Circuit Court Dorothy Brown and Green Party candidate Tom Tresser.

Tresser came out swinging in his opening statement, addressing corruption in Chicago politics and calling out each candidate on issues he said are “unacceptable.”

“I don’t have as much experience as the other candidates up here,” Tresser said. “But I also don’t have the experience in hiring my cousins, getting cash from my workers for events and parties or making money from businesses I am supposed to regulate.”

Not one candidate responded to his claims, causing Tresser to smile and the audience to whisper amongst themselves.

Tresser was on a roll from the get-go, throwing punches in his opening statement and jabbing at each of his opponents throughout debate.

“Issues of violence against women and sexual assault are a big problem, but worthless spending and behind closed door meetings and corruption prevent the attention these programs need,” he said.

Tresser said these forums are necessary now more than ever.

“We have had years and years of Democratic rule in Cook County,” he said. “And we have nothing to show for it; nothing got done.”

As Tresser was stuck on the issue of corruption, Preckwinkle stayed on point, appearing confident and well-prepared to discuss the issue at hand.

“When I think about violence against women, I begin with rape,” she said. “In 2007, there were 5,600 reported rapes in Illinois, but only 30 percent result in arrests, and less than half that end in convictions. We need to focus our resources on these types of programs and bring these people to justice.”

Stroger offered unfocused, off-topic answers to some questions related to the forum’s theme.

When asked, “In your first 90 days how would you address violence against women, girls and LGBTQ?”

He answered: “What I have done in the three years I have been president; I have tried to reach out to everyone in all parts of the county. I have asked them how can we help. I recently had a meeting with the LGBTQ community, I asked what the county can do, and I hope to solidify what the county can do.”

Moderator Kimbriell Kelly asked Stroger the same question in the next round of questioning to try to get a more “clear and concise answer.”

Stroger again didn’t answer the question; instead he said: “We have 29 departments, and in 16 of those, we have women as deputies. We have helped open 35 businesses that are run by minorities, and 10 percent that are run by women. I have voted for pay equity for women and fought for human rights, but more work needs to be done.”

Tresser also didn’t answer the question. Instead he held up the front page of the Chicago Tribune and pointed to the headline: Madigan Rules.

“Until we get the corruption out of our government we will not be able to give you the true programs that the the citizens of Cook County need,” he said. “If you want to know you elected someone who is unbossed and unbought, you have to look to a new source of government.”

Preckwinkle stayed focused and on point as she answered questions, as if reading off a teleprompter.

“We need to create an environment where people feel safe so they can come forward and report crimes,” she said. “Then we need to make sure we get those offenders prosecuted. We need to focus our resources on violent offenders, sexual offenders, and we have to start to focus on the predators.”

When asked about the pending lawsuits against Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart for keeping pregnant inmates shackled while giving birth, Stroger was caught off guard and had no idea of the charges.

“I had no idea. I am surprised the sheriff would do anything that is against the law,” Stroger said, and when asked if he would look into the situation, he said, “Oh, yeah, I am the president.”

Brown, the clerk of the Cook County Circuit Court, also seemed to be shocked by the news of the pending lawsuits.

“I really cannot believe Sheriff Dart knew this was going on,” she said. When asked what she would do about the situation if she were president, Brown said, “I would send a strong letter to the sheriff letting him know under no circumstances should the practice be occurring. And as far as the pending litigation, I would recommend immediate settlement.”

At the end of the night it was Tresser who challenged the audience and challenged the “old ways of doing business.”

“The best predictor of the future is a person’s history,” he said. “You know they say the definition on insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

Lee remembers her first day of work last September, being nervous as she took the elevator to the 22nd floor of a Chicago high-rise. Her nerves soon settled, and now she completes daily office tasks with ease and confidence.

This is her second year participating in the corporate work-study program at Christ the King College Preparatory High School, which just moved classes to a new $28 million facility in Austin.

“I think it’s a great experience. It’s teaching me what my mom and other adults go through. I’m working to pay a part of my tuition, and I’m learning a lot of new things,” Lee said.

Lee, who — like many of the students attending Christ the King — lives in Austin, hopes to become a lawyer.

All of the 162 students at Christ the King participate in the work-study program once a week at over 160 participating employers around the city. Lee, along with the three other students in her “work-team,” alternates workdays throughout the week to provide the manpower for one full-time, entry-level position at Community Investment Corp. located in the Near West Side community.

“We saw that it was a great opportunity for students who are just coming out of grade school to know what it is to work. Even though the kids are young, they’ve done a great job,” said Monica Kirby, office manager at Community Investment Corp.

Fran Thompson, communications director for Christ the King, said the program creates an opportunity that students wouldn’t normally get from a traditional classroom setting.

“For some students, working these jobs gives them their first visit to the Loop, and there they are going up an elevator in a skyscraper to work in a financial office,” Thompson said.

Christ the King is part of a national group of 24 Jesuit schools operated by the Cristo Rey Network. Although this is the school’s second year in Austin, it moved into the new 100,000-square-foot, three story building earlier this month. The school is located at 5088 W. Jackson Blvd., on the site of the former Resurrection Parish.

Each one of the 24 Cristo Rey Network nationwide schools, including one in Pilsen, employs the work-study program.

“The premise began as a solution,” said Preston Kendall, vice-president of the corporate work-study program. “We wanted to open a college prep high school what would serve families with limited resources, and we wanted a model where we wouldn’t need to raise tuition.”

The work done by students in local businesses funds 65 percent of each student’s tuition, said Kendall. The other 35 percent is made up of family contribution and scholarships.

“It started out as a solution to a financial problem, but we soon discovered very quickly that this is a multi-faceted program. It gives students ownership of earning their education,” said Kendall.

Studies done by the Cristo Rey Network showed a need for schools in Austin, a community of more than 100,000 with high unemployment and no neighborhood public high school, said Thompson, communication director for Christ the King. It found that Austin needs 14,000 seats for students, yet only offers 7,000.

“There is a humongous shortage in this area,” Thompson said.

When at full capacity, the new school should hold around 600 students. The school, which currently has 162 students, will add a new class each year, Thompson said. It is currently running with only a freshman and sophomore class.

“We are not trying to only pull the cream of the crop students here, we are also looking for the average and above-average, hard-working students who otherwise may have fallen through the crack,” she said.

Kendall said the admissions office at Christ the King looks at academic and financial history, yet concentrates mostly on past behavior and attendance reports.

Currently, the majority of Christ the King students are coming from a few key areas, said Kendall, including: East and West Garfield Park, Lawndale, Humboldt Park and Austin.

A proposal to “Adopt the Public Way”

The Rogers Park Garden Group (RPGG) is delighted to make available a limited number of public gardening grants up to $1,000 for the improvement of spaces in our neighborhood’s public way. From Juneway Terrace on the north, south to Devon Avenue and from the lake west to Ridge Avenue, spaces in the public way such as parkways, parks, playlots, sidewalk gardens and building frontage potentially qualify.

In addition to funding, the RPGG can also make available garden advice and resources. For more information and a grant application, visit http://www.rogersparkgardengroup.org. The deadline for applications is Feb. 15. The applications can be downloaded from The Rogers Park Garden Group.

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Pauline Lipman, policy studies professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said the elimination of local school councils are negatively affecting South Side and West Side communities by taking away their involvement in public education.

“In the Austin neighborhood particularly, this is a major issue,” she said. “The charter schools in Austin are public schools; the people who live in Austin are the public, and they no longer have any say of what happens in the community, and this is happening all over Chicago.”

In June 2004, Mayor Richard M. Daley launched Renaissance 2010 with the goal of increasing the number of high quality educational options in communities across Chicago by 2010 by opening 100 new schools. In order to open these turnaround schools, CPS would have to shut the doors on schools with low performance.

To date, Chicago has 94 Renaissance schools, with plans to open seven more in the Fall of 2010, said Malon Edwards, spokesman for CPS. He said each of the Renaissance schools works hard to achieve community involvement.

Edwards said Renaissance 2010 schools are still required by law to have governing boards that include parental and community involvement.

Austin High School was one of those schools. It closed four years ago, and in its place are two charter schools: Austin Business and Entrepreneurship Academy and VOISE Academy High School, and one performance school, Austin Polytechnical School. These are three examples of schools in a community that do not have local school councils, Lipman said.

In 1988, the Illinois General Assembly created Chicago’s local school councils, which are elected, decision-making councils that have significant power over each of Chicago’s schools, such as the ability to hire and fire principals, plan the schools curriculum and oversee all activities for the school, similar to what the school board does.

At the high school level, the local school council consists of 12 voting members, including the principal, six parent representatives, two community representatives, two teacher representatives and one student representative.

However, Chicago Public Schools officials, who are hand-selected by Mayor Daley, have never been supporters of the councils, Lipman said. In an October 2007 speech, Rufus Williams, then-CPS board president, said it was one of his administration’s main goals to eliminate local school councils.

“Not all local school councils are bad, but this is a flawed system,” Williams said in the speech. “There are many examples of adults getting in the way of the progress of children. Those of us who are responsible for the schools simply ask that we have the authority because we have the accountability for them.”

Williams said CPS is known for its leading reform.

“But this is one of the reform efforts that not one group, system or area has bothered to replicate,” he said. “We are the only system in the world that has this kind of governing structure; it must be fixed; it must be changed so that we can best operate our system for the benefit of our children.”

Rosemaria Genova, press secretary for Marilyn Stewart, president of Chicago Teachers Union, said it is these sentiments and non-transparent ideas that are hurting community involvement in public education.

“We are losing the public in Chicago Public Schools,” she said. “We have too much privatization going on in Chicago, and it is taking away any and all parent and community involvement.”

Julie Woestehoff, executive director of Parents United for Responsible Education said CPS is not fighting for community involvement, and they never have.

“Taking away local school councils drives a stake right through the heart of community involvement,” she said. “As a parent organization, we will continue to stand up against CPS’s total disregard for community and parent involvement. These are our children; we should have a say in their education.”

Woestehoff noted that most of the schools which have closed due to Renaissance 2010 are on the city’s South and West Sides.

“They are closing schools in neighborhoods and communities that are already struggling with being heard and finding their voice,” she said. “This is disempowering people who are historically disempowered anyway.”

Mike Klonsky, director of Small School Workshops, a non-profit organization, said in a community like Austin, the district’s complete disregard for the community has been devastating.

Klonsky, a professor in the College of Education at DePaul University, said in a community like Austin where parent involvement is limited, the loss of a local school council is immense.

“These new schools for the most part are run by private boards that are usually made up by business people,” he said. “There is little to no input from the community, and that must change.”

“The governing boards serve as local school councils, to ensure community involvement,” he said.

But Klonsky disagreed. He said Renaissance 2010 was originally created to open 100 new schools in Chicago and take a “serious stance on the value of our education.”

“But what Renaissance 2010 has turned into is basically a school-closing initiative,” he said. “The closing of schools means the end of local school councils, which means a lack of community voice and community power over how schools and education should operate.”

Check out these related stories from Chicago Public Radio WBEZ: Daley Says School Closings Are Necessary and Education Reporter Linda Lutton Talks School Closings with Host Melba Lara.

Roger Ehmen, director of Westside Health Authority’s Prisoner Re-Entry Center, said a recent jump in numbers shows the dire need for the program in Austin.

Ehmen said the center saw an increase of 104 percent more clients over the last two years. In 2008, the office helped just over 5,000 clients, while last year the program assisted close to 11,000.

The biggest concern now is that the numbers will continue to rise, and many more ex-offenders in need will be left without services.

“The problem is we don’t have the capacity to see more. There isn’t enough staff or room in our facility,” Ehmen said. The current facility is a one-story, seven office space that makes use of cubicles in its open areas.

Ehmen said the center never turns clients away, with an average of 28 new clients coming in the door each day and 600 each month.

“And here’s the problem: the waiting list for even 28 new clients a day can take up to two or three weeks. People who don’t want to wait either give up or go somewhere else. And they may not get the attention they need,” Ehmen said.

Nine full-time employees — including job placement coaches, case workers and aides — work at the center.

The Westside Health Authority’s Prisoner Re-Entry Center has been operating in the Austin neighborhood for nearly 10 years. Austin has the one of the highest number of ex-offenders in the state of Illinois, said Ehmen, and according to the Westside Health Authority, there are over 300 individuals returning to Austin from prison each month.

The program, funded by the city, is faith-based and offers assistance in re-entry, such as: job placement, training, mentorship, GED and ACT classes, and counseling. The program is 100 percent free to clients and also includes assistance with food, clothing and shelter.

Ald. Emma Mitts (37th) said programs like the center are crucial in areas such as Austin.

“In our kind of community, we have to meet the needs of these people because they represent us. We can’t run from it,” Mitts said. “We must work hard to ensure that adequate resources are available in the returning communities to assist those most at risk for recidivism.”

Micheal Tidmore, who works with new clients at the Teamwork Englewood Community Re-Entry Resource Center, said its program has also seen a rise in new clients.

Tidmore was unable to give specific numbers but said the last few months have shown a substantial increase in released prisoners needing assistance.

Ehmen said he believes the rise in numbers can be attributed to multiple causes, including an increase in released prisoners due to state budget cuts, along with people being more aware of the services offered to ex-offenders.

“In some ways, we are a product of our own success,” Ehmen said. He said the center has proven successful because of its faith-based nature, where the center couples traditional training with spiritual learning.

“Most of the ones who really make it, who have been very successful, have also taken on the spiritual side of this,” Ehmen said.

The Westside Health Authority has secured land with hopes of building a larger, more comprehensive prisoner re-entry center once funding is secured, said Ehmen, “but that doesn’t help us in the short term.”

Ehmen said the center has no plans for when they will break ground on the project.

Check out Chicago Talks’ related story: West Side Program Helps Ex-Offenders Get a Second Chance

In a bustling office in Austin, Ezzard sits, while snow falls outside on a brisk winter afternoon. Inside this well-kept space, half a dozen men sit at computers placed against one wall searching on-line job postings, while others work on resumes and speak to caseworkers.

The one thing that makes this office different from many others, though, is that its clients, including Ezzard, have one thing in common: they are newly released prisoners. They’ve come to the Westside Health Authorities Prisoner Re-Entry Center to get a second chance at life.

Ezzard, 47, who was born and raised in Austin, has been a client of the program for two years now, after being released from an Illinois prison after serving 19 months. He was convicted of sexual assault with a deadly weapon, a Class X Felony.

The Westside Health Authorities Prisoner Re-Entry Center assisted over 10,000 clients last year and has been working in the Austin neighborhood for nearly 10 years. The far West Side community has the highest number of ex-offenders in the state of Illinois, and according to the Westside Health Authority, there are over 300 individuals returning to Austin from prison each month.

“There are so many ex-offenders out there that are just so frustrated with the system, and they’ve lost hope. They don’t even know a second chance is available to them,” Ezzard said.

Ald. Ed Smith (28th) said it is often hard for released prisoners to turn their lives around because they don’t know where to start.

“It’s sad, they can’t find work, no one will take a chance on them because the state says they are criminals for the rest of their lives, and that’s not fair,” Smith said.

Ezzard said the label of being an ex-offender, in many cases, affects the way a person is seen for a lifetime.

“It makes it really hard to sit down and have a conversation with another person because you are wondering: ‘How do they see me?’” he said. “Do they visualize me only as this deviant person?”

Ezzard has been volunteering with Ald. Emma Mitts (37th) for just over a year now, assisting her with community outreach programs for at-risk residents in Austin.

Mitts said she believes everyone should have the opportunity for a second chance.

“In our kind of community we have to meet the needs of these people because they represent us. We can’t run from it,” she said.

“He is a great person that understood that he wanted to turn his life around. He just needs to make sure to surround himself with people who are doing the same,” Mitts said.

Ezzard said a second chance was given to him through the help of the center, where he is now working toward lifelong goals. He is currently enrolled in Harold Washington College and expects to graduate with his bachelor’s degree in 2012. After graduation he plans to attend law school in hopes of working to help other ex-offenders. Prior to incarceration, Ezzard drove semi-trucks cross country for a living.

“I want to roll up my sleeves,” he said. “I want all the pressure, and I want to whine about classes like other students because I want to earn this degree.”

The program, funded by the city of Chicago, is run by a faith-based organization that offers assistance in all areas of re-entry such as: job placement, training, mentorship, GED and ACT classes and counseling.

Ezzard, who received mentoring and job placement assistance over the last two years, will continue to work with the center and said without its help he would most likely have given up.

“Had I not been here, I probably would have gotten frustrated and said screw it, just take me back,” Ezzard said. “Everyone has the right, if you’re going to be a law abiding citizen, to start again—and that’s what I’m doing.”

Check out Chicago Talks’ related story: Program to Help Ex-Offenders Nearly Overwhelmed by Growing Demand for Services

“You don’t often see a high school production that features a world premiere play directed and produced by the professional staff of a local theatre company,” says Polarity Artistic Director Richard Engling. “We’d been working with Chuck on developing his play, and when the Josephinum asked us to help them with a student production, I saw a great opportunity. Producing new work is part of our mission.”

The Society of Adventurous Women takes us to a bar in the Netherworld where only adventurous women can enter. They may not buy drinks, but instead must earn them by telling the stories of their heroic endeavors. Bartender Joseph, the only male, sends Grace O’Malley into history to recruit young women with an appetite for adventure to join their ranks, and she returns with a mysterious Young Woman who is pivotal in the lives of young women everywhere.

Playwright Chuck Palia, a retired high school drama teacher, says he was inspired not only by the novel, The Captain’s Table, in which great fictional captains from history gather to tell their stories, but also by the abundance of female talent in schools and the ironic lack of meaty roles for women. This play certainly embodies that theme.

Palia says, “I could have chosen the ‘usual suspects’ like Joan of Arc, Cleopatra, Amelia Earhart, and others, but I chose to go with a few of the many adventurous women throughout the ages… I recently read an article about Amelia Earhart and the author stated that if not for the fact that Amelia mysteriously disappeared over Japanese held islands supposedly on a secret spy mission for President Roosevelt that she would have been relegated to the ranks of Hannah Reisch and Jackie Cochran.”

School president Michael Dougherty stresses the importance of opportunities for women to make themselves heard and feels that drama is one of the best ways to do that. Perhaps Josephinum alum Sandra Cisneros, author of The House on Mango Street would agree. Dougherty describes the partnership with resident troupe Polarity Ensemble as mutually beneficial.

Polarity Ensemble Theatre was named “Best Emerging Theater Company” for 2008 by the Chicago Reader. At the Josephinum, Polarity has produced The White Airplane, The Rivals, A Streetcar Named Desire and their annual Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays. The winner of last year’s festival, The Good Harvest by Lisa Rosenthal, will be presented in March at Josephinum for Polarity’s second world premiere of 2010.

The Society of Adventurous Women performs at the Josephinum Academy (Theater – second floor), 1501 N. Oakley Boulevard, Chicago, IL 60622. All performances are at 7:30pm. Previews: Friday, Jan. 15 and Saturday, Jan. 16. Regular performances: Thursday, Jan. 21and Saturday, Jan. 23. There will be a Special Performance Friday, Jan. 22 with a wine and cheese reception and a discussion with the cast and playwright after the show. Tickets for the special performance are $10. Tickets for all other performances are $5 in advance or $10 at the door. For advance tickets call the Josephinum front office at (773) 276-1261.

Established in 1890 in Chicago’s Wicker Park, Josephinum Academy serves 150 junior high and high school girls that hail from over 36 zip codes. The mission of Josephinum Academy is to empower young women to become confident, faith-filled leaders. The academy teaches its students to overcome economic disadvantages (more than 75% come from poverty) by preparing for success in college (100% college acceptance rate for graduates over the last 3 years). Tuition paid by students is approximately 10-15% of the actual cost of their education. Josephinum is in formation to become the 22nd member of the network of Sacred Heart Schools.

COOK COUNTY BOARD PRESIDENT CANDIDATE FORUM:

FOCUSING ON VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN AND GIRLS

Thurs. Jan. 21st
6 p.m. (Doors open at 5:30)
Loyola University of Chicago, Water Tower Campus
111 E. Pearson St.
Beane Hall, 13th floor of Lewis Towers
Chicago

RSVP: No RSVP necessary. Free and open to the public.

Why focus on violence against women and girls?

The Cook County Board president oversees the country’s largest public health care system as well as the Sheriff’s Office and the county jail and detention centers. These systems intersect daily with survivors and perpetrators of violence against women and girls.

About the Forum:
After each candidate has spoken, audience members will have an opportunity to ask their own questions on topics such as domestic violence, sexual assault, trafficking, prostitution and other forms of violence. The Candidate Forum is a nonpartisan event.

All candidates have been confirmed: Dorothy Brown (D), John Garrido (R), Roger Keats (R), Terrence O’Brien (D), Toni Preckwinkle (D), Todd Stroger (D) and Tom Tresser (Green).

Accessibility:
Lewis Towers and the room, Beane Hall, are wheelchair accessible. If you have accessibility questions or requests, please contact Sharmili Majmudar at ccforum2010@gmail.com.

Check out Chicago Talks’ recent coverage of the County Board president race:

Chicago Talks Exclusive: Interview with Todd Stroger

Stroger, O’Brien on the Defensive at Forum as Cook County Board President Candidates Debate

O’Brien: Keeping Lake Michigan Clean?

Auburn Gresham’s “food desert” got a bit less empty, as international grocery retail store ALDI opened a new 18,000 square foot store on the South Side of Chicago at 7627 S. Ashland Ave. Read the newsletter to see how this is bringing jobs as well as food into the neighborhood.

Mayor Richard M. Daley accompanied Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Julius Genachowski and a host of other civic and community leaders at the recent announcement of the Smart Communities Digital Excellence Initiative. This initiative is a collaboration of the City of Chicago, MacArthur Foundation, Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC/Chicago) and “Smart Communities” Chicago neighborhoods: Auburn Gresham, Chicago Lawn, Englewood, Humboldt Park and Pilsen.

Get all the details in the newsletter. Keep up the great work, GADC organizers. You can contact GADC’s Ernest Sanders at 773.483.3696 or via email at esanders@gagdc.org or gadc.e.sanders@sbcglobal.net. The GADC offices are at 1159 West 79th Street, Chicago, IL 60620.

With the application deadline for Chicago’s best college and career academies quickly approaching on Jan. 20, Morgan reassures herself that her students will be equipped with all the necessary tools to apply.

Morgan is the director of Community Outreach and Graduate Support at Austin’s Catalyst School-Circle Rock, one of Austin’s newest college preparatory K-8th charter schools. Catalyst School-Circle Rock opened in September of last year and operates under Renaissance 2010, a Chicago initiative to close down failing schools and open 100 high-performance schools in needed communities.

“Renaissance 2010 schools give parents choice,” said Morgan.

Catalyst School-Circle Rock works hard to ensure that students and their parents are prepared for the transitional challenges of high school including equipping students with practical life skills and teaching them how to complete high school applications.

Since the majority of these students live in Austin, many of them will apply to high schools in and around the Austin community.

Since the closing of Austin High School in 2006, Renaissance 2010 has opened three smaller high schools in its former location. Each of the three smaller schools — Austin Business and Entrepreneur Academy, Austin Polytechnical Academy and Austin VOISE Academy: Virtual Opportunities Inside a School Environment Academy — feature specialized curriculums.

Renaissance 2010 supporters say these smaller schools will better prepare students for college and the workforce than traditional general education high schools. Each school accommodates between 560 to 600 students with hopes of having a higher graduation rate than regular Chicago high schools.

“Renaissance 2010 provides high quality education in a community like Austin. Students attending the smaller high schools are receiving a different education to get them to the next level,” said Chicago Public Schools’ spokesman Malon Edwards.

However, some argue high schools in Austin under Renaissance 2010 do not fully prepare students for college or today’s workforce.

State Rep. La Shawn K. Ford (D-Chicago) believes Renaissance 2010 does not benefit a community like Austin. Ford has been instrumental in the fight for Austin to have its own neighborhood high school.

He and other community leaders, including Ald. Emma Mitts (37^th) and Ald. Ed Smith (28^th), believe Austin needs one high school as a way to accommodate all youth in the community. Ford has been fighting to have a high school placed at the former Brach’s candy site located at 410 N. Cicero. He believes that students in Austin needs an option of a general education high school.

“Renaissance 2010 does not address the educational issue in Austin,” said Ford. “It just closes down failing schools without providing any support for the schools to remain open.”

Julie Woestehoff, executive director of Parents United for Responsible Education (PURE), said that although CPS claims that students in Austin’s three smaller high schools receive everything required under the CPS graduation policy, “it’s doubtful that students actually receive the basic all-around education they will need to qualify for college or for many jobs or careers.”

“These small, narrowly focused schools don’t have the staff to offer a full range of subjects,” said Woestehoff. “CPS has decided it will no longer try to offer a quality general high school experience like students in Chicago used to have, and students in the suburbs still receive.”

However, Principal Todd Yarch of VOISE Academy said that VOISE combines the use of technology, best distance learning practices and quality online curriculum to better prepare students for today’s technology-based society.

“We prepare our students to be better competitors for today’s labor force,” said Yarch. “Teaching our students online learning and technology helps them qualify for the best colleges and jobs in the city.”

Check out our related story: Austin Lacking the Schools Needed to Educate Its Students

Austin High School, the only public school in the community, shut its doors four years ago. Its successor, Austin Community Academy, which was open for one year, was shut down by Mayor Richard M. Daley and converted into three small high schools with an attendance of 1,038 students, compared to the 6,000 students the academy held.

Austin officials worry that rising crime rates will climb even higher if CPS officials don’t take action to bring back Austin High School.

About 14,000 high school-age kids live in Austin, which has a population of 117,000, making it the largest community in Chicago. But less than half the 14,000 students can attend a high school in their neighborhood. Austin has no public option for high school, forcing students to travel long distances, apply for selective magnet schools to which they have little chance of acceptance, or their final option – drop out of school entirely.

Ald. Emma Mitts (37th) and Ald. Ed Smith (28th) have said their community needs one high school to accommodate students who live in Austin. Mitts said youth on the West Side have no high school, forcing too many of them to spend their days on the street.

On the contrary, says Kathryn McCabe, director of the Cluster Tutoring Program in Austin, a non-profit group that works with about 100 Austin students in after-school programs. She said the former Austin High School was a “horrible school” and provided “no real educational value for the students.”

“I am not sure there was much of a negative impact in shutting down a lousy school,” she said. “It was a bad school, and I am not sorry to see it go, but now we have a real problem in Austin because there aren’t enough seats for the students that live in the community.”

Malon Edwards, spokesman for Chicago Public Schools, said the district has no plans in the works for opening another school in Austin.

“Austin students have opportunities at several charter and magnet schools within the community,” he said. The public options are the three Renaissance 2010 high schools: Austin Business and Entrepreneurship Academy, VOISE Academy High School and Austin Polytechnical School.

“We have other neighborhoods that need schools as well – this is not just a problem within Austin, and we cannot approach it that way,” said Edwards.

But Mitts said there was money for a new school, noting that funding for a new school was secured through Mike Kelly, former president at Park National Bank. Since federal officials closed the bank late last year, the funds are in limbo, and Mitts isn’t sure US Bank, who took over, will honor the agreement made with Kelly.

Ald. Smith, however, said Park National Bank never committed any money for a new high school in Austin. He said the community bank was interested in funding a new YMCA on the same lot as the school.

“Park National Bank was never going to give any sum of money for a new school in Austin,” Smith said. “They wanted a collaboration with the city; basically, if the city built a new school they wanted to build a new YMCA on the same land.”

Mitts is clear on what she believes is the answer: She wants one high school open to all students in the community, and she wants it built at 1450 N. Cicero Ave.

“The answer is finding the funding and opening a school,” she said. “We need a new high school, and we need to get the process going now.”

Edwards said CPS officials have met with community members in search of a solution but said, “This is a problem that cannot be solved overnight.”

But McCabe feels differently. She said CPS’s agenda does not include building or adding schools in the Austin neighborhood, meaning they are not addressing the problem.

“There are no plans to open additional charter schools in the Renaissance 2010 plan,” she said. “There are no plans for a new high school. These kids have no where to go. It is pretty sad.”

McCabe doesn’t think one big high school is the solution; instead, she said there has been great success in charter schools.

“The emergence of these schools has been very positive,” she said. “I think the charter schools have worked well for this community because they are smaller and these students need extra help and support.”

Smith said the solution is one school for all students. He said the location is set, “the only problem now is money.”

Check out our related story: Renaissance 2010 High Schools in Austin Fight to Provide a More Quality Education for Students