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Millennium City: Richard M. Daley & Global Chicago

Loss of Faith in City Government

By the late 1980s, many Chicagoans had lost faith in the city's ability to maintain its infrastructure, provide essential services, and ensure access to education and affordable housing.

Kelly Welsh, corporation counsel for Chicago (1989-1993), sums up some of the challenges the city faced.
[Welsh, 00.05.47 to 00.06.30]

Tim Samuelson of the Chicago Cultural Center (2002 - present) comments on the city's infrastructure at the time.
[Samuelson, 00.07.22 to 00.08.35]

The schools had a poor reputation nationally.

[United States Secretary of Education] William Bennett had called Chicago the worst public school system in the nation. Whether that was accurate or not, I don't know. But it wasn't a system that the city could be proud of.

--Arne Duncan, CEO of Chicago Public Schools (2001-2008).
 

The schools had always been a disaster really....And so, no one really thought that they could be fixed.

--Forrest Claypool, advisor to Mayor Richard M. Daley.

Chicago's public housing also faced a number of problems during the 1980s. Julia Stasch, housing commissioner under Mayor Daley (1997-1999), explains those problems and their persistence into the mid-1990s:
clip: [RMDOH_01_stasch_julia_20171005_002216_002301_PublicHousing].
 

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