Division Street

From Ald. Brendan Reilly’s latest e-mail newsletter.

Vote Today and Help Chicago 5th Grader Win National Sports Award
Please join Alderman Reilly, Alderman Sandi Jackson, Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. and Lt. Governor Pat Quinn in voting online for 5th-grader Nichyria Byrd for the first-ever Earn Your Stripes Youth Achievement Award as part of the 2008 ESPYs in Los Angeles, California.

“11-year-old Nichyria is a member of the after-school program Girls on the Run at Ariel Community Academy on Chicago’s Southside. She’s the only nominee from the Midwest. The winner will be selected based on online voting through this Sunday, June 15th, which is why your support is so important. Please take a moment to vote online here, and encourage your friends to do the same.

“Nichyria wasn’t nominated because she’s the fastest kid in the country. She was nominated becuase she embodies the spirit of amateur sports: team work, respecting others, doing your best, and competing for the love of the game.”

Alderman Reilly is a proud supporter of Girls on the Run Chicago, which focuses on the spirit of amateur sports and much more through its 12 week after-school program. Their volunteer coaches teach girls ages 8-12 self-esteem, leadership, community service, and healthy lifestyles all while training them to run their first 5K. Girls on the Run Chicago currently serves more than 2,000 young girls in 100 schools throughout the Chicago region. For more information on programs in your school or how you can help, visit www.gotrchicago.org.

“P.S. Nichyria is currently in 1st Place, but she needs your help to cross the finish line. Please take a moment to vote today!”

Ben and Mick at Clout City take a closer look at the strangest and most surprising votes cast on Wednesday in the Children’s Museum debacle.

Perhaps most surprising was Bob Fioretti, who, as the Chicago Journal reports, had at some point even advised Brendan Reilly on the issue.

And a constituent at Clout Street says that Fioretti’s office told him he was a No vote a mere two days before the meeting.

Fioretti’s explanation that the most recent draft of the museum’s design won him over sounds pretty thin, especially given his ridiculous assertion that aldermen weren’t lobbied by the administration. In fact, several aldermen have anonymously confirmed to the Tribune and the Reader that a whole lot of shakin’ was going on.

Fioretti has been an independent force in his rookie season as an aldermen, but he appears to have trod that well-worn path to the Dark Side.

Other surprises: Ricardo Munoz and Toni Foulkes supporting the mayor; Leslie Hairston not. And Helen Shiller isn’t even a shadow of her former self; she’s a shadow of her shadow.

Anyway, go read Mick and Ben’s piece.

P.S. I saw Billy Ocasio with one of those cheat sheets during an appearance on Chicago Tonight about the Olympics; he tried to argue that Millennium Park came in on-time and on-budget. Our mayor can control time and space!

“With an important vote a week away on a proposal to relocate the Chicago Children’s Museum from Navy Pier to Grant Park, an alderman opposed to the plan said Tuesday that he is picking up support in the City Council,” the Tribune reports this morning.

“Asked how many of his colleagues now oppose the project, Ald. Brendan Reilly (42nd) replied, ‘More than [those who] support it.’”

I’m not sure if that constitutes movement or not; Reilly has always disputed claims emanating from City Hall that the mayor had all the votes he needed. (The vote right now looks close enough that it could actually be decided by a single swing alderman; wonder what the mayor would offer to make him or her swing his way . . . )

“The Chicago Plan Commission is scheduled to take up the issue on May 15. The City Council is expected to vote in June. For many aldermen, Reilly said, the issue is not about previous court decisions that barred building in Grant Park, but ‘concern is about losing aldermanic prerogative.’”

I hope the plan is voted down, but I have no patience for “aldermanic prerogative,” an ancient folkway designed to allow aldermen to accrue power and build fiefdoms with no regard for how their actions impact the rest of the city.

What happens in one ward affects residents citywide, be it a horror like the new Soldier Field, the desecration of historic landmarks, or the depletion of low-income housing. An alderman is not only a representative of a ward, but the ward’s representative to issues facing the city.

Lois Wille’s Forever Open, Clear, and Free is considered such the definitive document on protecting the lakefront that Brendan Reilly bought 50 copies and gave them to his fellow aldermen when the Children’s Museum first proposed moving to a new building in Grant Park.

Wille’s support of the museum, then, is so seemingly incongruous that she was asked at a press conference on Monday if she had sold out.

“Sold out?” she responded. “I feel like I can lend my voice to adding something . . . I have never thought that the lakefront . . . should be absolutely pristine . . .

“No, I don’t think I’ve sold out. I’ve supported a lot of things . . . I hate the new Soldier Field, if that helps. I also hated Meigs Field when it was there, and I hated the original McCormick Place. If you want to talk about selling out the lakefront, that building should come down.”

[- as seen on Chicago Tonight]

The blogosphere reacts to the Children’s Museum fiasco.

* “10 More Things Brendan Reilly Should Stick In A Cave.”

* “Mayor Daley Loves Children - To Hide Behind.”

* “Any Chicago aldermen who vote to move the Chicago Children’s Museum better think about their own wards: are they sure Daley isn’t going to suddenly insist upon locating a mound of burning tires in their district?”

* “A lot of our political leaders have been busy playing cards. Earlier this week Mayor Daley played the Evil Unions Card, so you had to know it was only a matter of time before he returned to his old favorite: the Race Card.”