Being a Democratic ward committeeperson in Chicago used to be like being a political prince.
Mayor Richard J. Daley was the kingmaker who chaired the Cook County Regular Democratic Organization. Patronage was in its heyday. Jobs at City Hall and other agencies of local government firmly under Daley’s control were funneled to Democratic ward bosses, who toed the line and delivered the highest vote totals for Daley’s handpicked candidates.
Committeemen who failed to deliver were punished by losing jobs.
But the Shakman decree that banned political hiring and firing put an end to that spoils system decades ago.
Now, a growing number of sitting alderpersons are either not running at all, or they have been forced to withdraw and perhaps run as write-in candidates after failing to gather the number of signatures needed to get on the ballot.
Ward bosses still participate in the process known as Democratic slate-making. They decide whom the party will endorse for statewide and countywide offices, with each ward committeeperson casting a weighted vote based on the number of ballots cast in that ward in the last election. But even that power has lost its luster.
It saddles ward bosses with responsibility to deliver for the party’s slated candidates and spend up to $20,000 per election cycle from their own political funds to recruit, pay, feed and transport election judges and do the same for campaign workers who get out the vote on Election Day.
They also have to find polling places. All while swimming against the tide of an angry electorate more inclined to stay away from the polls than show up and cast their ballots.
Gone are the days when slated candidates reimbursed even the handful of still strong ward organizations for out-of-pocket expenses. The party now requires its candidates to ante up $45,000 apiece to cover voter registration, signature gathering, direct mail, “walk pieces,” social media campaigns and get-out-the-vote efforts on Election Day.
All of that and more helps to explain a growing lack of interest in the job.
Ald. Anthony Beale (9th) withdrew as a candidate for the 9th Ward committeeperson’s post he has held since 2000 after a hearing officer for the Chicago Board of Elections ruled Beale had submitted only 485 valid signatures, 189 short of the 674 minimum needed to qualify for the March 19 ballot.
After telling the Sun-Times the job was powerless and “not worth the headache,” Beale ultimately decided to run as a write-in candidate. He had no immediate comment.
Ald. Daniel LaSpata (1st) is still deciding whether to run as a write-in candidate and declined comment until he does.
LaSpata told Politico he was on track to meet the signature requirement until he bought a new home within the 1st Ward and was told by his attorney the move required him to gather a whole new set of signatures.
Taking a pass on ward committeeman
Newly-elected Ald. William Hall (6th) took a pass on the ward committeeperson’s race to concentrate on his day job. He is not concerned that a potential challenger could use the party post as a springboard to an aldermanic race.
Now-convicted Ald. Edward Burke (14th) took over the Democratic ward committeeperson’s job after his father’s death in 1968 and used it to launch a City Council career that would last for a record 54 years.
“Another campaign is not what the ward wants to see,” Hall said. “They want to see the results that I promised while running … My focus is building trust and building respect amongst my constituents. (Becoming a) committeeman won’t do that at this time.
“Some search for clout. Others search to help people. Political clout is something that has led to dilapidated neighborhoods, a lack of investment in human life. It’s led to division in neighborhoods. And so, political clout is like cancer. It spreads nothing but bad news and bad results,” Hall added. “Our focus is making sure that we are building a political bridge that brings everybody with us … When the time is right, we will build that bridge politically and build more infrastructure and partners as the committeeman … But right now, I’ve got a lot of potholes to fill.”
Waguespack wages a write-in bid
Ald. Scott Waguespack (32nd) had planned to relinquish the party post but decided to run as a write-in candidate after his handpicked successor didn’t file and the only other candidate for the party post withdrew after being captured on video “tearing down posters” of Israeli hostages in New York.
“I didn’t even know about it until somebody sent it to me and said, `This guy that’s running just got fired.’ He withdrew. That left the slate open. So, I decided to continue on, but I have to do it as a write-in vote,” Waguespack said.
“I just have to get 1,000 votes on the ballot. And since I’m the alderman, I just have to get `em to write it in the right way.”
Cook County Democratic Chair Toni Preckwinkle acknowledged “a couple of people just didn’t have the signatures to get on the ballot.”
“There were, sort of, I wouldn’t say extraordinary circumstances, but there were circumstances this time that led to a number of people not pursuing their re-election as committeeperson,” Preckwinkle said.
“It takes a lot. You don’t get paid to be a committeeperson. You have to raise money to do the work — to get literature out, to get people to cover election day, provide lunches to your judges. Whatever you do, that takes resources,” Preckwinkle added. “And if you have a ward that doesn’t have a lot of resources in terms of potential contributors, that makes it a tremendous challenge. You have to have a passion for doing work that isn’t gonna pay you and takes a lot of your time and resources.”
The upside of ward committeeperson
Even though it’s the political version of a one-way street, Preckwinkle said it’s still worth it to be a member of the Cook County Regular Democratic Organization.
“We have a tremendous opportunity to put good people on the ballot. I’m really proud of the work we’ve done — not just in the last four years since I’ve been chair, but for the last decade or so under Joe Berrios’ leadership as well,” Preckwinkle added. “Joe basically said, ‘We have to have more women, more people of color on our tickets.’ I can’t say that about any of his predecessors frankly that I worked with. But it was under his tenure that we really made some strides toward diversifying.”
Waguespack agreed the ward committeeperson’s job is still “worth having.” But he recalled what former Democratic warhorses Dick Mell (33rd) and Bernie Stone (50th) once said while reminiscing about the good old days when Richard J. Daley was the political kingmaker who delivered John F. Kennedy to the White House.
“Man, was it enlightening talking to those two. They were like, `Yeah, we used to cut deals and we could get jobs out of every budget deal’ because they were acting as aldermen/committeemen. Both of them said the committeeman job was far more lucrative and more powerful” than being an alderperson, Waguespack recalled.
“They were like, you guys are — I think they even said `suckers. You guys are doing all this work. You’re paying all this money, and you get nothing out of it like we used to get.’ And I was like, those were different days.’”
Indicted former Ald. Carrie Austin (34th) decided to give up her City Council and party posts rather than fight the new ward map, making it easier for the Black Caucus to accommodate the loss of more than 85,000 African-Americans over the last decade.
Former Ald. Leslie Hairston (5th) retired from the City Council but bucked the recent trend by deciding to seek re-election as ward committeeperson.
