Mayor Daley On Parking Meter Fiasco: Oops, My Bad

By Marcus Gilmer in News on Aug 25, 2009 2:40PM

We don't enjoy starting our mornings by having a downright hissy fit, but reading the Sun-Times story on Mayor Daley's planned speech in which he'll allegedly admit he made a mistake with the infamous parking meter deal is throwing us into a hulk-out rage. Know why? Well, for starters:

Because he doesn't fucking care!

But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

Tonight, Mayor Daley is giving a speech at the South Shore Cultural Center and the Sun-Times got a hold of his speech. In it, Daley says, "I'll be the first to admit that we totally screwed up the way it was implemented. I want us to do better -- and we will." Oh, really? Nine months later - after all the yelling back and forth with the City Council - most of whom certainly don't get a free pass in this** - NOW you come to us and shrug and say, "Oops, my bad?" After it's become so perfectly freaking clear that the whole thing has been one big failure on which we got screwed out of a lot of money? We know we should be thinking, "Aw, he didn't mean to hurt us. He really does love us. Other people just don't understand him." But we're not Meredith Baxter-Birney and this isn't a freaking Lifetime Movie.

Later in his speech, Daley addresses the 2016 Olympic bid, another source of ire for residents, saying:

"Still, I can understand why some believe that we've put too much time into pursuing the Olympics. To those who feel that way, I want you to know that nothing matters more to me than making Chicago a better city -- for every neighborhood and every person. Nothing troubles me more than the violence against our children that continues to needlessly take their lives."

So, hoping we'd forget about those TIFs and how much money we're (allegedly) gonna make, he asks, "Won't someone think of the children?" The mayor who tells us out of one side of his mouth there's no money to hire new police officers but then turns around and signs a deal to spend $60 million buying the CPD new SUVs and considers hiring private security guards instead.

Meigs Field. Hired Trucks. Chicago Skyway. Parking Meter Lease. Midway lease. O'Hare Expansion. The Nephew Vanecko. And those are just some of the examples of Daley's crooked shit we could think up off the top of our heads. Of course, this is the same man who - in 2005 - was named one of Time's "5 Best Big City Mayors" despite going through what both the NY Times and the Chicago Tribune referred to as one of his "toughest" stretches in his mayoral career. And then got promptly re-elected in 2007 with 71 percent of the vote.

So go ahead, Mayor. Posture all you want as you start biting your nails and gassing up the jet for that October trip to Copenhagen. Meanwhile, we'll be here in the city looking for anyone willing to take you down in 2011.

**Refresher: the aldermen who originally voted against the meter deal were Alds. Toni Preckwinkle (4th), Leslie Hairston (5th), Billy Ocasio (26th), Scott Waguespack (32nd) and Rey Colon (35th).