On February 28, when Mayor Emanuel’s school closing show stopped by the Armitage Baptist Church in Logan Square, dozens of parents, teachers, principals, and students turned out to beg officials to “save our schools.”
But, c’mon, Mayor Emanuel—there’s got to be a calmer, more logical way to do this than threatening to close a quarter of the elementary schools in town and sending thousands of people into a tizzy.
Meanwhile, officials from the United Neighborhood Organization, one of the largest charter operators in Chicago, quietly work the back rooms of the General Assembly to get legislators to give them roughly $35 million to build new schools. UNO wants to use some of that money to buy land for two new schools in suburban Bedford Park. UNO would then like to get Chicago to annex the land.
Translation: it’s not a great idea to close a school you’ll probably need in a few years.
Here’s the problem: the schools are situated in rival gang territories. Merging the schools would create a combustible mix, to say the least, as Alderman Walter Burnett Jr. passionately argued at the meeting.
As much as I’m tempted to blame our current mayor for the fix, it’s part of a pattern that precedes his tenure. In the last decade, since the Chicago Housing Authority began tearing down Cabrini-Green, CPS has been using vacant schools in the area as “hold ’em schools” until “other schools get their money right,” as Jenner teacher Tara Stamps puts it.
