Aldermen: City 'gypped' in privatization of parking meters :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: City Hall: "Five months after privatizing Chicago parking meters with only five dissenting votes, the City Council took the contractor to the woodshed today amid accusations that it botched the transition, concealed problems and 'stole' money from motorists who parked at improperly calibrated downtown meters.
The outrage was so great about a 75-year deal tied to a steep schedule of rate hikes that several aldermen believe there may be grounds to cancel the $1.15 billion lease with Chicago Parking Meters LLC."
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When they approved this, the word from the aldermen was that they didn't need to read it. Now I guess they want a Mulligan.
1 comment:
Only FIVE - FIVE - aldermen opposed the ordinance.
Oh, but they only had two days to read it!
Granted the actual deal looks like some type of ponzi scheme between the city and Morgan Stanely, but there were enough red flags in the modifications to the ordinance - which is 10 or 15 pages, tops, to give an intelligent person pause.
"Intelligent person" being the operative phrase there.
How about the shift in meter placement from the commissioner of transportation to the revenue office? Seems odd, doesn't it? Until you realize that it's the department of revenue by which Parking Meters LLC is directing meter placement and rates.
No. It's not that they didn't have time to review it or to think it through. It's that they got busted being a blatant rubber stamp council and now they are catching heat for it.
Usually when the council plays sit and stay for the mayor, it's only diffuse groups of Chicagoans who are hurt. This time they caught the attention of the entire city.
Hey, I don't even own a car and I'm outraged at this deal for the simple reason that it, like all long-term privatization deals, are inherently anti-democratic (because they omit future generations from the policy making) but more immediately, commoditizing transit infrastructure in this way, and for such a length of time, is not good policy for a city where transportation issues and resolutions are critical to over all quality of life.
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