Mayor Washington, the man who broke the power of the DemocraticParty machine, is preparing to run for a second term.
What kind of a job has he done since taking office in May, 1983?Has he kept his promises to reform city government and make it workbetter?
How does his administration compare with that of hispredecessors? What shape is the city in?
To get the answers, the Sun-Times assembled a special team offive reporters, Jim Merriner, M. W. Newman, Susy Schultz, Lynn Sweetand Lillian Williams.
The team talked to hundreds of Chicagoans and spent four monthson the task under the direction of associate editor Bernard Judge.
This article, the sixth in a periodic series, deals with publicworks. Sixth in a series
It was during Harold Washington's third year in office thatChicago threw away the World's Fair of 1992.
You could say it wasn't his baby and that downtown andSpringfield botched it. But the fair did fall, and he drew thecurtains and said amen.
He also has been accused, justly or not, of fatal delays indealing for a downtown stadium to house the runaway White Sox. Therestill may be a small chance for that one, however.
He took the chains off Navy Pier and opened it for publicstrolling. It remains a wet elephant, anyway, in need of $100million or more.
Downtown, the $106 million central library plan is mired indispute. Washington inherited that deal from former Mayor Jane Byrneand is maneuvering to avoid being stuck with it if it goes bad.
When it comes to big-time public works with a glittery image,Mayor Washington's Chicago is not necessarily the city that works.
In a swaggering skyline town, he would be hard put to point tosomething big, bold and new, and say, "I did it."
He is, however, carrying through a $1.6 billion overhaul ofO'Hare Airport begun by Byrne. It's huge, a $1 million-a-day job.And in a political coup, he put across a $185 million bond issue tofix city streets, lights and other structures. Resurfacing work isgoing on citywide.
This report on the mayor's record in public works and cityplanning is sixth in a periodic Chicago Sun-Times series on theWashington years in Chicago. He has been gathering politicalstrength and will run for a second term in 1987.
So far he shows no signs of being a monument-builder in theimage of Richard J. Daley, six-term overlord of expressways, DaleyCenter, O'Hare Airport and the University of Illinois at Chicago.But then, it's not the same town anymore.
Daley in his prime ran a bursting smokestack city swathed inpolitical power and federal largesse. The smoke has gone, along withthe tax revenue it pumped into City Hall. Harold Washington doesn'thave the big dollars or Daley's clout. And the divisive Council Warshave narrowed his chances to build things that give him a chance tocut ribbons and pose for cameramen.
In city planning, he has a respected commissioner, ElizabethHollander. Her staff of about 100 is so skimpy, though, that itwould be more appropriate for St. Paul, Minn., according to AssistantCommissioner David R. Mosena.
St. Paul has one-eleventh the population of Chicago and aplanning team about half as big as Chicago's.
"The office here has been decimated," said Martin Murphy,Byrne's chief planner. "The staff has been overworked."
Replied Hollander: "Of course, the department is too small. Butwe haven't had disproportionate cuts - no more than any otherdepartment."
In public works, Washington has kept his word to spend inneighborhoods. His administration already has resurfaced 250 milesof streets, compared with less than 75 miles for Byrne, according toPublic Works Commissioner Paul A. Karas.
The work is the most extensive in many years but was approvedonly after Washington bucked City Council opposition and sold hisprogram to the public.
"I will wager that the city in the last two or three years hasdone more public construction than was done by any mayor in mylifetime," said Karas, a former corporate executive whose white hairbelies his 34 years.
"Employees are working six days a week, sometimes seven. We areflat out."
Chicago still is overrun, though, with 20 square miles ofneighborhood wastelands on the South and West sides, where little ornothing has been done. In Washington's time, as in Byrne's, themayor has struggled with a slumping tax base and red ink while tryingto keep the city in working shape.
That's rough, particularly on a Chicago mayor. They invariablywant to be known as builders. Washington surely does. He has turnedup at four press conferences for one project: the new United Airlinesterminal at O'Hare.
Byrne also dreams of building. During an interview with ChicagoSun-Times reporters, she began doodling her vision for Chicago: theWorld's Fair, a South Loop stadium, the $3 billion Cityfront Centerproject along the lakefront, a rejuvenated Navy Pier, a rebuilt NorthLoop.
All of them, she likes to think, would have proceeded but forher defeat by Washington in 1983. She expects to run against himagain in 1987.
Byrne generally is credited with working out the deal to expandO'Hare Airport and with construction of the $196 million O'Harerapid-transit line - finished two years late with $50 million in costoverruns.
Her administration also started work on the long-planned Colum bus Drive bridge and got funding for the huge "S-curve" revamping onLake Shore Drive.
"I see an administration that cuts ribbons on projects webegan," Byrne said.
Karas blamed the Council for the contract fight that delayedwork at O'Hare for months. "We took a real hit," he said.Washington's critics point to time lost at O'Hare while he putaffirmative-action programs in place.
Playing catchup is not the only construction headache at O'Hare.The cost overrun so far is 4 percent after inflation, Karas said.
And Byrne charges foot-dragging in commercial development on 400acres of city-owned vacant land next to the airport. She cut a dealwith the airlines to share revenues there, but roadways are not inplace yet.
"I know what she is saying," said Karas. "She is saying thisadministration can't cut deals. We have cut deals."
He listed several, among them the down-again, up-again "peoplemover" contract for O'Hare. James Montgomery, Washington'scorporation counsel at the time, got in hot water by opening bids forthat $100 million job in private.
Byrne in her term was accused of deal-botching, too. Opponentssaid that in dickering with Gov. Thompson, she gave away $1 billionof the pot left after the Crosstown Expy., a Daley project, was laidto rest. Her negotiators in that deal also surrendered a stateoperating subsidy for the CTA.
No deal at all was workable for the World's Fair, saidWashington, because public support wasn't there. The project cameout of the Byrne years.
"The downtown business people kept saying, `Mayor, mayor,mayor!' " he told the Sun-Times. "And I said, `The mayor can't sellthis one.' "
Said Miles Berger, Byrne's chairman of the Chicago PlanCommission: "The fair is one of the great things we've lost.
"Chicago is still perceived in much of the world as a backwater,Al Capone kind of community. It's shocking."
Berger, a wealthy developer, presided over a lame-duck PlanCommission for two years while Washington's nominees were stalled bythe Council majority.
When the mayor finally was able to pick a replacement, ErwinFrance, there were protests from within his own ranks. Thenomination was dropped.
The new chairman is E. Wayne Robinson, former acting corporationcounsel. He is a lawyer with zoning experience but no knownbackground in city planning.
The Plan Commission, a citizens board, has advisory powers overlarge public and private planned developments on their way from thePlanning Department to the City Council for final approval.
The department is supposed to act as the commission's staff, butthe relationship is clouded. In any case, big developments rarelyardiscouraged, although the number of negotiated ones is increasing.
Where City Hall has been involved, ambitious public projectshave bumped from mayor to mayor, often stalling. After due delays,the Washington team has: Closed the federal funding deal for the $349 million Southwest Siderapid-transit line initiated by Daley. It will be a big improvement,but the planning is "myopic," said Peter Beltemacchi, chairman of theregional and city planning department at Illinois Institute ofTechnology.
"They had an opportunity to create economic development in keyareas that the line could run through but have used it only toconnect the central area to Midway Airport," he said. Packaged $28 million in financing to save and renew the ChicagoTheater in the North Loop. Byrne took the first step by blockingrazing. Developed "tax-increment" funding for the city's portion of NorthLoop renewal. That languishing project was launched in the Daleydays as a way to eliminate blight put in its key piece, rebuildingof State Street shopping across from Marshall Field's.
Byrne flung tens of millions of dollars into the area whilequick-birth plans came with fanfare and left without carfare. Themoney ran out with the hoopla. Only the Loop Transportation Centerat 203 N. La Salle was built.
"Byrne spent more energy on central area function than wasnecessary and didn't get things done," Beltemacchi said.
"She liked the glamor projects. I wish she had focused onneighborhood concerns and the needs of people who don't have money orpower."
When Washington came in, he made it clear that the city had nomore folding money for the North Loop and that he was committed toneighborhoods.
Hollander, however, worked out a way to meet North Loop startupbills with "tax increments." The process draws on a project'santicipated tax proceeds to underpin a bond issue.
"We took a project that was an idea and made it concrete,"Hollander said. "That enabled us to concentrate revenues on theneighborhoods."
She foresees $325 million worth of offices, a hotel, stores,parking and housing under way in the North Loop by 1987, much of iton West Wacker Drive. If it happens, it will be an election-yearcoup for Washington. Ground recently was broken for an office towerat 35 W. Wacker. Meanwhile, other parts of downtown have swelled,thanks to billions of dollars in private investment.
Hollander plays a key role in city renewal. She deals anddickers with real estate operators and accepted a plaque from theChicago Office Leasing and Brokerage Association. It says, in sevenplain words: "You don't have to pay to play."
"People need to know what the ground rules are," she said.
Hollander began her term by looking dubiously at Byrne'sprojects - a fact noted unhappily by Byrne's planner, Murphy.
"There was a terrible sense of mistrust," he said. "Almostanything that had a plan or document was so suspect that nobody woulddeal with it. Time was wasted. Money was wasted."
Hollander has been hit with brickbats, as well, in quartersusually inclined to offer her bouquets. She nettled preservationistsby opposing landmark status for the stately Fourth PresbyterianChurch on North Michigan Avenue. It did not suit the boulevard's newcommercial status, she held.
She endorsed a proposed skyscraper pileup, next to the immenseSears Tower, that would be the city's most dense.
That project flashed to city approval in only three days."Through a subcommittee, the Plan Commission and the Council," saidLewis Manilow, lawyer and board member of the Metropolitan PlanningCouncil, a private civic group formerly directed by Hollander. "Onlyin Chicago."
The city's developer-happy zoning code, unchanged since 1957,"makes it possible to build such buildings," Hollander said.
The code is so generous with the amount of square footagepermitted on a lot that the city has no trading power to getsomething in return, said Manilow.
"Most cities are using their leverage from the office boom toget amenities, but not Chicago," he said.
"Manhattan gave extra density and in exchange got $11 millionfor dance and theater from developers."
San Francisco requires builders to contribute to a fund and hascreated 3,000 units of neighborhood housing that way. That city alsocontrols building height, bulk and even design, and protects hundredsof historic buildings.
Boston has a housing fund, too. Mayor Washington has beentrying to get something like it for Chicago, but downtown spokesmenargue that it would drive away development to suburbs where landcosts and taxes are lower.
Hollander did swing a deal on a skyscraper at 123 N. Wacker. Thejoint developers, Rubloff and Combined International, were awardedsome added space in the sky. In return, they agreed to do communitywork, including the organizing of a retail fair for neighborhoods.
Her department also set guidelines for the immense CityfrontCenter project on the riverside. This time, the developers, not thecity, will pay for basic structure - $70 million worth of streets,sewers and lighting.
Neither mayor has slowed crowding of the lakefront for expandedhighways, interchanges and buildings. "The lakefront by right belongsto the people," said planner Daniel Burnham, but Chicago has not hada comprehensive growth plan since his Burnham Plan of 1909.Washington has not done any more about that than mayors who precededhim.
Both he and Byrne have made a stab at revamping the zoning code- in their contrasting styles. She quickly named a task force butignored its report. He waited for nearly three years to choose apanel that is working on it.
"The real concern," said Jared Shlaes, a nationally known realestate consultant, "has been the damage done by the Council Wars.Some developers and investors avoided the city out of fear of beingcaught in the switches.
"Maybe that's coming to an end.
"What about a real downtown plan now that could promise anattractive pedestrian environment? You could accomplish that for afew million dollars.
"What about a plan to prevent the total choking of NorthMichigan Avenue?
"What about a real riverfront development plan with restaurantsand patios where people can enjoy them?
"What about the long list of things that could be made to happenin Chicago if Chicago gave a damn?
"Chicago is obsessed by politics. It's neurotic that way and itpays a fierce price."
WEDNESDAY: Washington's leadership style.
