Rahm Takes Lumps at First Town Hall Meeting

By Chuck Sudo in News on Aug 30, 2011 1:30PM

Mayor Rahm Emanuel held the first of two town hall meetings on Chicago's 2012 city budget last night at Kennedy King College. WBEZ's Sam Hudzik reported it was tightly scripted affair until Emanuel opened the meeting up to questions from the floor.

People in attendance did not mince words with Emanuel, the theme of the Q&A seemingly being "what have you done for me lately." Emanuel answered the questions with his now familiar and vague calls for honesty and transparency in government and that he's beholden to the taxpayers of the city in having to make the tough decisions about the city budget, not the city payroll.

That probably wasn't the answer 71 laid off traffic aides wanted to hear. Or mental health experts who quizzed him on privatizing seven mental health clinics. Emanuel held firm amid a rising tide of anger from the crowd:

"The budget, while it’s obviously a set of numbers, is also about a set of choices we have to make for the city. We’ve been doing smoke and mirrors on the budget…Our moment of reckoning is here,” he added.

One big difference that will go a long way as to how residents will perceive Emanuel in the future is his actual answering questions, a marked contrast to his predecessor. With Emanuel, many of the questions were submitted in advance, but he replied to both those and the ones posed from the audience. Richard M. Daley never replied to the complaints of attendees at these meetings.

The second town hall meeting Emanuel will attend is from 6-8 p.m. tomorrow at Malcolm X. College. (1900 W. Van Buren Ave.)