Chi-Town – America’s Third Most Miserable City | Chocolate City: The Best African American Blog

Chi-Town – America’s Third Most Miserable City

By: Charles Mombo

Chicago theater

Call it whatever nickname you want: My Kind of Town, Beirut by the Lake, Second City, Chicagoland, The Big Onion, The City That Works, The Chill or Chi Ill (Chill as in Chicago Illinois), Hog butcher for the world, Tool maker, Stacker of wheat, Player with railroads, The nation’s freight handler; Stormy, Husky, Brawling, City of the big shoulders, Da Chi (pronounced "duh shy"), or the "Windy City," as in reference to the false promises brought forth by Chicago area politicians during the early 19th Century – Some continue to believe that the name may indicate the wind from Lake Michigan.

Forbes’ Magazine have added another name to Chicago’s long list of nicknames – America’s Third Most Miserable City.

According to Forbes’ annual list of America’s Most Miserable Cities, Chicago shows up as the third worst city in the United States. What have Chicago done to received such a dubious honor or was this honor overdue?

Forbes considered several factors such as the living costs in the Second City which are not much higher than the national average, but the 10.3% sales tax (the highest sales tax rate in any city in the United States of America) is a killer. Other factors include lousy weather, long commutes, and rising unemployment are to blame for the Windy City being near the top of our list. High rates of corruption by public officials didn’t help either.

A Little Corruption Problem

According to the Forbes article, Chicago has a little corruption problem. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois, which includes Chicago, has been very busy in recent years. They convicted 385 public officials of crimes over the past decade, a per capita rate that puts it in the bottom third of big U.S. metros.

The Northern District office boasts of recent successful prosecutions, including "a corrupt former governor of Illinois, Chicago officials who rigged city hiring, individuals who lied about their support of foreign terrorism, corporate executives who cheated public shareholders and traditional organized-crime bosses who were responsible for notorious murders."

Illinois’ record of public corruption, particularly in the governor’s office, is staggering. Five of the past nine governors have been charged with crimes, and three, as of now, have served time in prison. Whether former Gov. Blagojevich will do any jail time is still to be determined.

The misery in Chicago runs much deeper than just corruption, though. Unemployment is expected to surge to 9.2% in 2009, up from 6.6%. The Tribune Co. is mired in bankruptcy, while big local employers like Midway Games, Motorola and the University of Chicago Medical Center have all announced big layoffs.

Residents have been showing their dissatisfaction with Chicago with their feet, perhaps fed up by the average low temperature of 17 degrees in January. There has been a net migration of people out of Chicago for seven straight years, a trend that is expected to continue. And for all of the recent success of the lovable Cubs, last year marked the 100th straight season without a World Series championship. The title drought is 40% longer than any other major professional sports team.

Pay to Play the Chicago Way

Pay to Play, or Pay to Play the Chicago Way, is a phrase which has been used in Chicago for situations in which money is exchange for influence in politics, while others can be contributing to an election campaign with the intent to win favor with the prospective candidate after he/she wins the election.

FBI agents arrested Illinois Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich and his chief of staff on conspiracy and bribery charges, including allegations that the governor was seeking to benefit financially from his appointment of a successor to the U.S. Senate seat that was vacated by President-elect Barack Obama. Federal agents are still investigating the Blagojevich’s administration for pay-to-play, acts of wrongdoing involving hiring, contracting, board appointments and fundraising.

The Illinois Senate unanimous, back-to-back voted to convict Blagojevich on a sweeping article of impeachment and disqualify him from future public office in Illinois represented a swift repudiation following his Dec. 9 arrest at his North Side home. Blagojevich continues to proclaim his innocence.

Chicago’s Political Hiring and Shakman Civil Decree

Shakman civil decree is an agreement between the city and Michael Shakman, a lawyer, to end Shakman’s long-running court battle against political hiring at Chicago’s City Hall.

The agreement required the city to set up a $12 million fund to pay as much as $100,000 each to employees and job-seekers who were denied jobs, promotions, transfers and overtime work because they did not have political connections. The court-appointed official who has monitored city hiring for the past years, said 1,451 people filed claims alleging that they were harmed by the city’s actions.

Under the decades-old Shakman civil decree, the city pledged to keep most hiring decisions free from politics. However, the court-appointed monitor and federal authorities investigating a criminal job-rigging scheme at City Hall found that administration officials routinely violated the court order.

According to a former and infamous resident of Chicago, whose business card described him as a used furniture dealer, "A crook is a crook, and there’s something healthy about his frankness in the matter. But any guy who pretends he is enforcing the law and steals on his authority is a swell snake. The worst type of these punks is the big Chicago politician. You can only get a little of his time because he spends so much time covering up that no one will know that he is a thief.” Alphonse Gabriel Capone, popularly known as Al "Scarface" Capone knew all too well what he was talking about.