Chicago Mayor Richard Daley:
Chicago is known for its beautiful
lakefront, its dramatic skyline, and
its outstanding architecture. But Chicago
is much more than that. It's a city
of neighborhoods. Much of my work
as mayor consists of using the tools of
government to create the conditions
that can lead to healthy, livable,
thriving communities.
So how does government help build stronger neighborhoods? You don't tear down the old one and build something new on top. That's been tried and it generally hasn't worked. You start by building what I call community anchors: schools, libraries, parks, and police and fire stations. The most important anchor, by far, is the school.
When I became mayor, I inherited a public school system that had been run by a separate branch of government, over which the mayor had relatively little control. The school system was underperforming and school buildings were literally falling apart, with broken windows, leaky roofs, peeling paint, inadequate heating systems, and crowded classrooms.
Those schools sent some very clear messages to the community. They told the children that we didn’t take education seriously. They told neighborhood residents, “The schools don’t maintain their property. Why should you maintain yours?”
So I got the law changed in 1995 to give the mayor personal responsibility for the Chicago Public Schools. We persuaded Chicagoans to raise their taxes to finance more than $4 billion of school construction and repair. In addition to building 118 new schools, additions, and annexes, we have torn out 100 asphalt playgrounds and turned them into campus parks for students and neighborhood residents. This has brought the residents closer to the schools, both literally and figuratively.
The object is to make our city a place where people live because they want to, not because they have to. If people want to live in your city, all sorts of good things happen. They take better care of their property, and encourage others to do so. They participate in public life. They brag about their city — and that, in turn, attracts tourists and prospective residents. They also attract new employers. In an economy based increasingly on providing information and services, rather than producing goods, employers can locate almost anywhere. They will be attracted to cities that provide an outstanding quality of life — and a well-educated workforce.
The public schools are central to my vision for Chicago because I firmly believe that a good quality education is the answer to all the social ills of big cities — crime, poverty, unemployment, economic decline, and middle-class flight. We’ve worked hard over the past several years to lift student’s expectations, to help them see high school graduation not as an end but as a first step toward a successful career in their chosen field. It’s not a glamorous endeavor: 85 percent of our public school students come from low-income families that struggle every day with drugs, crime, and, unfortunately, unemployment. You will not read about the strides of the public schools in U.S. Weekly or see it on CNN, or in the local daily newspaper, for that matter — at least not regularly. But I believe we should measure our success, at least in part, by the lives we’ve touched and the horizons we’ve widened.
Adapted from: “Delivering Sustainable Communities Summit Address”
For more: City of Chicago
