RAHM EMANUEL AND THE PARKING METERS: “GOT TO MAKE THE BEST OF…A BAD SITUATION”

4/30/13

Despite Mayor Emanuel’s latest exercise of his most salient talent, self-congratulation, the settlement he reached with Chicago Parking Meters LLC (“CPM”) was no great shakes for those who park and/or live in Chicago.

Under the settlement, the city still has to shell out $64 mm that it doesn’t have as compensation to CPM for meters used without charge by those with disabled parking placards and for revenue denied CPM due to street closings for police activities and the like, broken down as follows:

Disabled parking placards                     $55 mm

Police activity, etc.                                $ 9 mm

Total                                                    $64 mm

The Mayor, however, in only the latest manifestation of chutzpah bordering on shamelessness, says the deal will save the city “over $1 billion.”   How does he turn an outlay of $64mm into a saving of $1 billion?

CPM was asking for $50mm to compensate for parking revenue lost to police activity and the like.   CPM settled for the above $9mm and presumably agreed to the city’s formula for calculating such compensatable shortfalls in the future.  That is a savings of, using round numbers, $40mm.   The period in dispute was two years, so that works out to $20mm in “savings” per year for the city.   Since the contract runs another 71 years (Thanks, Richard I), by the Mayor’s arithmetic, 71 times $20mm works out to “over $1 billions.”   That the Mayor didn’t give himself credit for something like “almost a billion and a half dollars,” which would be closer to product derived from his political math, shows that even he lacks confidence in his numbers.

The more often mentioned part of the deal is that parking will be free outside the downtown area on Sunday.   In exchange, CPM will be able to charge for parking for an additional hour or three hours on the other six days of the week.  The three hour extension is limited to Streeterville and River North, the areas most likely to be frequented after the current 9:00 limit on evening parking charges for most of the city’s meters.  Whether the Sunday for late night trade-off turns out to be to the city’s or CPM’s advantage no one knows at this juncture, but, in any case, the difference will be slight.  

We do know, however, that extending the charged parking hours primarily, and for the longest period of time, in the city’s prime night life areas is yet another manifestation of Mayor Emanuel’s ongoing drive to impose taxes on those who don’t vote in the city.   Many, maybe most, of the people who will be in the entertainment districts after 9:00, and thus paying for more hours of parking, come from the suburbs.   As with the increase in fees for water, much of which finds its ways into suburban homes and businesses, by allowing CPM to extend parking hours in the city’s night life hotspots, the Mayor is politically wisely making suburbanites pay for city services.   One could argue legitimately that this is only fair; if suburbanites use the city’s services, they should pay for them.   One can argue indisputably that this is politically smart for the Mayor.

To his further credit, Mr. Emanuel is not arguing that the overall deal is great for Chicagoans; he is only arguing that he is making the best of a bad situation, that he is, as he put it, “making some lemonade out of a big lemon.”   

The interesting political story here is that the Mayor is getting closer to outright and unrestrained criticism of his predecessor who, among other bone-headed, or worse, moves in the latter years of his administration, stuck the people of Chicago with this turkey of deal.  But Mr. Emanuel still hasn’t crossed the line and slammed Mr. Daley personally.   Why do you suppose that Mr. Emanuel took no questions from the press after announcing the deal?   Surely some of those questions would have forced him to criticize himself or rip Mr. Daley.   Which would he have chosen?  To ask the question is to answer it, so Mr. Emanuel just dummied up after the announcement.

So why won’t Mr. Emanuel stop dancing around this issue and come right out and say, using the name, that Richard M. Daley left him a city that was broke, crumbling, and nearly out of options?

Part of the reason may be loyalty; without Mr. Daley’s help and encouragement, Mr. Emanuel would not be on the Fifth Floor today.   But we know how far loyalty goes with Mr. Emanuel.   A better answer might be that Mr. Emanuel knows that he will need the help of Mr. Daley and his associates in the future, for reelection or for a return to Mr. Emanuel’s real home, Washington, D.C.   Mr. Emanuel may not show much loyalty; when the tossing people over the side would benefit Mr. Emanuel, he shows no hesitation to do so.  But he knows how not to burn a bridge.

See my two books, The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics and The Chairman’s Challenge, A Continuing Novel of Big City Politics, for further illumination on how things work in Chicago and Illinois politics.