April 2007

Pat Dowell - The New Alderman of Chicago's 3rd Ward

Pat Dowell used the following speech to graciously accept her new post of 3rd ward alderman:

"Giving thanks first to my Saviour and friend Jesus Christ who has been with me and in me each day during this long campaign. I am grateful for your victory this evening.

To the people of the 3rd ward, this victory is also yours. Savor the moment tonight, because we have a great deal of work ahead of us to make the 3rd ward the best ward in the city; from 14th and State to 59 and Union to 47 and Paulina. I want to thank Alderman Dorothy Tillman for her long service to the ward and I wish her the best in her future endeavors.

This campaign and my 2003 effort has always been about the residents of this great ward and addressing our needs for transparent government, aldermanic accountability, citizen involvement in decisions made about the ward, quality city services, good jobs and stores, decent schools, safe streets and affordable housing. My vision for the ward has been consistent. My vision is that we can meet our basic needs within the ward and that we respect and celebrate the diversity that makes the ward unique. We can move our ward forward together!!

Today we took the first step and over the course of the next four years we will take many steps forward in the various communities that make up our ward…Mo Town, South Loop, Bronzeville, Fuller Park, Hillard Homes, The Dodge, Wentworth Gardens, The Gap, Ickes, Washington Park and Dearborn Homes.

There are so many people I want to thank this evening who contributed greatly to this winning campaign.

Thanks to my mother, my son Justin and my soul mate, Mickey. Your understanding, patience, love and support sustained me through the campaign which began with my announcement in May 2006.

Thanks to Congressman Jesse Jackson, who went against the grain and supported someone like myself who is not a career politician and not one of the usual suspects. I appreciate his support of my ideas and his encouragement and I look forward to supporting the City Council ethics reform package he recently proposed.

Special thanks to State Representative Ken Dunkin, an early supporter who helped me in my efforts to deliver my message of change to the many seniors who live in the ward. Ken helped me gain access to many of the senior buildings and nursing homes that were closed to me.

Thanks to Alderman Ricardo Munoz for his support in the Back of the Yards community, State Rep. David Miller and Wil Davis, Commissioner Larry Rogers, Jr., and Commissioner Frank Avila who provided a forum for me on cable television to discuss my campaign platform.

Special recognition to Mell Monroe, third place candidate in the February election, my neighbor and colleague whose endorsement of my candidacy was a boost. And, thanks to former candidate Benjamin Harris who also endorsed me.

And while this race was not about the unions, there support of my candidacy was significant. Big thanks to SEIU and the CFL and their leadership, Dennis Gannon and Jerry Morrison. Jeanie, Beth, Jamal, Dino, Riccia, Anthony, Harold tremendous thanks to each of you.

I had a great team…my neighbor Phil Beckham who was my finance chair and who supported me in the 2003 and 2007 run. You and your wonderful wife Angie..don’t have to move now. Wanda Martin, the finance committee secretary and Diane Duffy her assistant….thank you for managing the money.

Audrey Wade, my campaign manager…what can I say. We made a good team and we made some good decisions throughout the campaign. Thank you for your strategic mind, loyalty, steady personality and encouragement.

Phil Laury, my field coordinator…I appreciate you being there for me when it wasn’t popular and for encouraging me to walk the ward on a daily basis to speak to residents on the streets, in their homes, in the stores, and at the train and bus stops. Your feel for the street is appreciated and acknowledged.

Walter Freeman, 3rd ward resident and owner of EF Design whose creativity and professionalism in graphic and website design delivered the campaign message in a straight forward and interesting fashion.

My walk team…thanks Maurice, Arty, Princess, Nicky, Sweetsie, Samantha, Danky, Bruce, Charles, Frank, Maurice, Huron, Brian, and Sonny. Through the rain, sleet, snow, and cold we marched all across this ward.

Thanks to Allison and Ice…my sounding boards…I appreciate you two. And to my Office Staff…Tina and Nicky, thank you for always being there.

Finally, I want to thank all the poll watchers and passers…thank you for protecting the vote. We won!!!"

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Tillman pins loss on new residents
'It's a lack of understanding' the alderman says

By Johnathon E. Briggs
Tribune staff reporter
Published April 18, 2007, 10:03 PM CDT

Sounding unbowed in the hours after she conceded defeat Wednesday, Ald. Dorothy Tillman looked back at the ward she served for 23 years, a onetime stronghold that had in recent years changed around her, and finally moved on without her.

While she acknowledged the much-discussed opposition from unions, the alderman best known for her civil rights credentials and her array of hats put more emphasis on the ways in which her core constituency had been whittled away, saying the people who replaced them did not understand her legacy.

A remapping in 2001 brought Hispanic voters from the Back of the Yards and whites in the trendy South Loop into Tillman's 3rd Ward.

Soon after, loyal Tillman supporters who lived in high-rise public housing disappeared from the ward's voter rolls when the buildings came down, displaced to neighborhoods from Roseland to Rogers Park. In their place came black middle-class homeowners, drawn to fast-gentrifying neighborhoods.

Wearing a gray felt hat like a crown, Tillman said Wednesday that the newcomers contributed to her defeat, adding that most of them never could have afforded to move in if it wasn't for her efforts to use her position to keep land values affordable.

"Most of them probably voted against me," she said. "It's interesting because some of the houses that we built, we were able to write down the land so we could bring them back . . . It's a lack of understanding."

In the end, Tillman, 59, was defeated by labor-backed challenger Pat Dowell by an unofficial margin of 666 votes.

"Ms. Dowell really ran a campaign of lies and deceit," Tillman said. "I wish her well. It's not easy being alderman."

Tillman had to fight to get onto City Council, even after Mayor Harold Washington nominated her to fill the 3rd Ward seat in 1983.

Touting her links to Washington and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Tillman spent her career advocating for African-Americans, whether it was passing a slave-reparations ordinance or fighting for city contracts.

But her critics said that while Tillman was long on civil rights, she grew out of touch with ward residents, failing to lure retail development or deliver nuts-and-bolts services expected of an alderman. Some compared her unfavorably to other South Side aldermen who presided over historic rebuilding efforts.

Even her cornerstone project, the Harold Washington Cultural Center at 47th Street and King Drive, was marred by controversy. One of Tillman's daughters runs the facility while also operating a catering service that supplies it. Critics said the center was underused and did little to attract businesses to the 47th Street "Blues District" promoted by Tillman.

Media and political consultant Delmarie Cobb said that Tuesday night's election result was not surprising.

When the 3rd Ward map was redrawn six years ago, she predicted it would dramatically change the mix of residents. In a 2001 editorial for the publication N'Digo, she predicted that Tillman would have to change her style of governing to reflect the influx of middle class homeowners into the heart of the historic Bronzeville neighborhood.

But Cobb, who worked on Dowell's 2003 campaign, said Tillman failed to change.

"Tillman never saw it as a good thing," she said. "She saw those people as interlopers."

Cobb said that even endorsement by U.S. Senator Barack Obama could not sway enough voters to Tillman because "it had nothing to do with their day-to-day lives, the fact that they don't have a grocery store."

Nor did late help from Mayor Richard Daley save Tillman, who styled herself a maverick.

On 47th Street—where a billboard for Dowell reads: "Real Change. Real Results. Right Now!"—news of the election buzzed in the Sweet Potatoes Cafe, near Tillman's ward office.

Shahari Moore, a 30-year-resident, said that she voted for Dowell because the ward needed a fresh start.

'It's a lack of understanding' the alderman says

"Tillman has been a figure in the community, but unfortunately a lot of times we look at the figure and not whether the issues are being addressed," said Moore, a writer. "I'm of the generation and mind-set of getting and wanting more."

Cafe owner Monica McCain, who grew up in the Robert Taylor Homes, said that she supported Dowell's campaign, though she doesn't live in the ward: She slipped campaign fliers in with orders of pork chops and turkey legs.

McCain said when she opened last July, she went to Tillman's office several times to introduce herself and express concerns about drug activity near her business. But she could never reach Tillman.

A friend called Dowell on McCain's behalf, and she said the candidate arrived at the cafe in 10 minutes, offering a remedy.

"I've come up on nearly a year and still have not seen Dorothy Tillman," McCain said.

For her part, Tillman countered that she has been responsive to the changing needs of her ward and said that she regrets she won't be in office long enough to finish development projects she's launched.

Tillman, an Alabama native, moved to Chicago in 1965 at 18, as part of an advance team for King.

Tillman hinted that though her council days are ending, she will not be a stranger to the political scene, and hopes to work on some of her favorite causes, such as slave reparations and the blues district she tried to incubate in Bronzeville.

"The best is yet to come," she said. "The office didn't make me. I made the office."

jebriggs@tribune.com

Tribune staff reporter Mickey Ciokajlo contributed to this report.

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Dowell beats out 'The Hat' in Third Ward
Challenger promises ‘change is coming’

By LAURA PUTRE AND HAYDN BUSH
Editor and Managing Editor

With 100 percent of the precincts in Wednesday morning, challenger Pat Dowell appears to have edged out incumbent Third Ward Alderman Dorothy Tillman. Dowell had 54 percent of the vote to Tillman's 46 percent.

"We're feeling good right now," said Dowell spokesman Kevin Lampe Tuesday night, in a phone interview from Dowell's campaign party at the Charles Hayes Center, 4859 S. Wabash. "People feel change is coming."

During the campaign, Dowell, an urban planner and former executive director of the Near West Development Corp., accused Tillman of being unresponsive to residents' concerns and development opportunities in the still blight-stricken ward. Dowell campaigned on a platform of improving services in the ward, beefing up police presence, and bringing in more businesses.

Tillman, for her part, had accused Dowell of being beholden to outside interests, particularly unions upset with Tillman's vote on the big box living wage ordinance last year.

Tillman was appointed by Mayor Harold Washington in 1983, and was perhaps best known citywide for her oft-colorful hats. She helped build the Harold Washington Cultural Center at 47th and King as part of a revitalization effort there, though critics pointed out she hired her daughter to run it.

Dowell also argued that Tillman had focused too narrowly on Bronzeville development-especially around 47th and King-while ignoring other neighborhoods in the far-flung ward, which stretches from 16th Street in the South Loop to 48th and Paulina in Back of the Yards.

This is the second time the pair have vied for the aldermanic seat. Dowell lost to Tillman in 2002, garnering 35 percent of the vote.

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Third Ward race splits black voters
Old school backed Tillman; new residents wanted Dowell

April 18, 2007
BY MARY MITCHELL Sun-Times Columnist
Tyrone Isaac, a bricklayer with Local 21, stood outside of the polling place at 18th and Wabash in the 3rd Ward, clutching a handful of palm cards and eyeing a black van across the street.

A Pat Dowell campaign worker, Isaac had no trouble getting rid of her palm cards. They were being snapped up by voters who live in the South Loop part of the ward. Still, this was a numbers game.

"There's been a lot of vans with senior citizens in them," he told Dowell, who was making the rounds of precincts Tuesday morning.

''We've seen quite a few Pat Dowell supporters, especially the younger crowd," he told me. ''But I've seen about 10 vans since 8 a.m.''

Indeed, vans were a problem for Dowell.

She had forced Dorothy Tillman into a runoff, but Tillman had the weight of the establishment politicians on her side, including Mayor Daley and a brigade of Nation of Islam followers who were ferrying senior and disabled voters to polling places.

Although Dowell had local union support and U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., Tillman's signs dominated the boulevards along 47th Street, her stronghold, and her face plastered many of the billboards.

Perhaps more than any other ward, the 3rd Ward race symbolizes the looming culture clash between African Americans who are returning to inner-city neighborhoods to reclaim their piece of the lakefront and those residents who hunkered down through the lean years.

Culture clash

Dowell acknowledged the challenges.
Earlier in the day, she talked about what she would face if elected. She would have to pull off "a sensitive balancing act," she said. "I have to have a White Castle to White House mentality."

That was clear at her election night celebration, where supporters reflected every region of the ward -- from the South Loop to west of the Dan Ryan Expy., from public housing residents to those who live in expensive greystones

On Tuesday, the battle for the ward came down to old school vs. new school -- old school being Tillman, a civil rights icon who shaped what was once a vast wasteland of dilapidated high-rises and neglected greystones into one of the hottest neighborhoods on the South Side -- while Dowell, a former city planner, represents emerging black leadership.

"A lot of single people in cars have been pulling up and coming up to the polls and voicing their opinion," Isaac said. "Many of them feel that Dorothy Tillman let them down.''

After all the speeches, coffees and fund-raisers, elections boil down to who can get their supporters out to the polls.

I tagged along as Dowell went from precinct to precinct checking on how things were going. There were concerns that her workers may have been targets for intimidation.

For her part, Tillman, if she were in the fight for her political career, was making a good showing -- at least when it came to outsiders. She scored a big coup when she got Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) to endorse her campaign since doing so appeared to contradict his own presidential theme of representing "change."

Old School Sundays

Old school voters were plentiful in nursing homes, senior citizen residences and the few standing public housing buildings at CHA's Dearborn and Ickes homes. Tillman used a tried and true method of getting them to the polls. She brought vans. She made promises.
At Dearborn Homes, a van with loudspeakers on top blasted old school jams in the middle of an empty parking lot.

"She came out here and promised to bring back Old School Sundays," said a young woman who lives in one of the buildings.

Old School Sundays was an impromptu music fest shut down by police after several people were shot. Maybe Tillman's promise was enough to bring out some voters, but many of the young people who cared about the issue were likely unable to cross gang turf to cast ballots.

Dowell knew the real battleground was in Bronzeville on 47th and King Drive.

When she arrived there about 4 p.m., her signs had disappeared. A supporter quickly came to the rescue. She spotted two boys playing on the sidewalk and offered them $5 apiece to put the signs back.

They skipped away to complete the task, unaware they were major players in a battle for the future of the South Side's mecca.

Late Tuesday, Zakiyyah S. Muhammad summed up the mood at Dowell's gathering: "It's a new day. Out with the old. All the king's men and all the king's horses couldn't save Dorothy and all of her forces.''

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Election sends message: Black officials have to deliver

Labor and Jackson Jr. threw a wrench in the Machine, and African Americans showed they want results

April 23, 2007
BY LAURA WASHINGTON

There is a puzzling disconnect in Chicago politics. In February, the mayor cruised to re-election. He did not lose one ward to an opponent. Latino, Asian, black and white -- majorities and minorities, all -- answered his call. Conventional wisdom would suggest that support would extend to his compliant minions in the Chicago City Council and that his coattails would carry the day in the April 17 aldermanic runoffs. Instead, Chicago's political world has been turned on its ear. I hear a genuine cry for new, more effective leadership. Three actors have turned Chicago politics on its ear: Labor, Junior and the New Black Vote.

Incumbency is synonymous with wealthy campaign donors. Big money is out of the reach of political neophytes. Enter Tom Balanoff, president of the Service Employees International Union. He and his labor cohorts plunked down $2.6 million in cold cash and dispatched hundreds of foot soldiers to push insurgent aldermanic hopefuls who supported their agenda -- i.e., the big-box ordinance. They leveled the playing field and opened the door to wins by the likes of Pat Dowell, Bob Fioretti and JoAnn Thompson.

In the February vote, Sandi Jackson swept the 7th Ward floor with Darcel Beavers. The architect of that win, her husband, Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., was feeling his oats. Chicago's biggest black boss, former 7th Ward Ald. Bill Beavers, is toast. Jackson knew that victory could ignite his own political blitzkrieg. He dispatched his arsenal of polling, billboards and troops into neighboring wards where political incumbents talk up a pro-black economic and social agenda but, whenever push comes to shove, side with the Machine.

Junior removed a key obstacle to his mayoral aspirations. He also endorsed a white insurgent over a longtime black alderman, a move bound to boost his bona fides with white voters who bitterly complain that black leaders are narrowly sectarian. The Black Nationalist crowd already despises Jackson; they'll never forgive him for backing a dyed-blond aldermanic wannabe over a "sistuh" in the 2nd Ward.

That brings us to the New Black Vote. Is it my imagination, or have black voters been poorly served by their elected officials? Remember, it was black voters who put the Toddster in charge of Cook County government. We voted him in, and now he's laying off nearly 500 doctors and nurses who care for the county's poor. We voted him in, and he's hiring more relatives and public relations flacks while shutting down the county's long-term care at Oak Forest Hospital.

This is the beginning of the end of the age-old argument in black politics that "you don't want to put a brother out of a j-o-b." Our elected officials have to deliver.

People in Madeline Haithcock's ward couldn't get her to respond to the simplest of complaints.

People in Dorothy Tillman's ward knew they paid for the edifice she built in honor of Harold Washington, but it is run by Tillman's daughter. They live near 47th Street and the L, where they're afraid to walk in the dark.

The people tired of listening to Shirley Coleman whine that her opponent was an ungrateful ex-alcoholic instead of doing her job.

It is a dangerous time to be a black hack in Chicago.