Chicago - A message from the station manager

The [Thursday] Papers

By Steve Rhodes

“The city’s population fell by 3,000 residents, or 0.11 percent, during the 12-month period that ended June 30, 2015, Crain’s Greg Hinz reports.”
Name those 3,000 people! I mean, let’s find them and ask them why they left. Can we get grant funding for that?


“Mayor Rahm Emanuel has often taken pride in the growth in the city since his 2011 election, seeing it as an informal referendum on his performance,” Tom Corfman writes in the Crain’s morning newsletter. “He’s about to lose bragging rights to Houston.”
Not so fast.


So Rahm still has a couple terms before he’s driven everyone out.
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Here’s Richard M. Daley being a much better politician than the Current Occupant:
“The shrinking of Chicago isn’t over, according to Mayor Richard M. Daley. He predicts that the city’s population, once as high as 3.6 million people, will fall to 2.5 million before leveling off,” the Tribune reported in 1993.
We’re right on track!
“Houston currently has about 2.2 million residents, to Chicago’s 2.7 million,” Chicagoist notes.
“But within the next eight to ten years, Houston’s numbers are expected to continue growing, to about 2.54 million, while Chicago’s dip below 2.5 million.”
Back to Daley:

But that’s not a bad thing, he says.
“I don’t want to be a big city. I don’t care if I’m No. 2, 3 or 4,” Daley told Tribune reporters in a nearly hour-long interview in September to discuss the results of the newspaper’s extensive study of the reasons why Chicagoans move out of the city.
“I’m all for the city getting smaller. Then you can plan better quality of life and better parks, better schools, better health care. Planning is important. And then you’re reinventing cities.”

Yes – as suburbs.
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Yes, know I’m quoting other people’s summaries – in this case, Corfman’s – of the news. Now everybody is doing it. When I started 10 years ago, not so much. (And I proposed just such a summary to Chicago magazine two years before that.) Just sayin’.
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Of course, I don’t really do the same kind of roundups in this space that I used to do. This column has always taken on different shapes, and for a variety of reasons (energy, money, social media, boredom, frustration) it’s morphed into something . . . less. For awhile I wrote a lot about digital strategy and so on, and then I tried to write as many one-liners as I could every day. Now I simply try to cull something inspiring, amusing and/or fresh (or simply quickly do-able) from the hours of reading I do every day, though the most serious topics (and journalistic violations) often get put off because they require too much energy to get right every morning for free. I don’t know myself what I’m going to write every day! That’s part of what keeps it interesting.
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What do y’all wanna see in this space? Back to more intensive daily roundups, or strictly media news and criticism, maybe go national in scope, or status quo? I know I’ll regret asking, but let me know.
(Or should I bag it and work on other projects – a book or one of my ideas for a revenue-producing niche website or strictly Beachwood-style merch/novelties?)
Principal Hunting
“A retired Chicago Public Schools principal who was recently arrested on phone harassment charges had been formally warned by the district for “conduct unbecoming a principal” after letting two problematic coaches into his high school, one accused of sexually harassing a female student, the other who videotaped a locker room hazing incident, the Sun-Times has learned.
“The warning documents the newspaper obtained laying out Ken Hunter’s 30-day suspension raise questions about why two top CPS officials supported his campaign to run against a vocal mayoral critic for the job heading the city’s principals association.”
Because he’s not the award-winning Troy LaRaviere! Proving that merit only goes so far at CPS. (Go read the whole thing for the gruesome details.)
Cubs Callback
In 10 years, the Cubs’ excuse for cutting payroll will be that they have become a small-market team.
Sloganeering
The Second to the Second City.
Forewarned
If the Lucas museum is here in 10 years, the Fourth will really be with us.
Houston’s Problem

Comment from discussion Chicago losing population, could be overtaken by Houston as 3rd-largest.


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SPONSORED POST: Presidential Campaign Pub Quiz
From the fine folks at the Financial Times.
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IOC: Sochi Doping Allegations Could Show ‘Unprecedented Criminality’
“Russia is at the heart of the biggest doping scandal in sport, with its track-and-field athletes suspended as a result of a probe into accusations of widespread doping and their participation at this year’s Rio Olympics in doubt.”
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At The Art Institute | Invisible Man: Gordon Parks And Ralph Ellison In Harlem
Included: never-before-seen photographs by Parks and unpublished manuscripts by Ellison.
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BeachBook
Facebook’s newish embed code is killing me.
Woman In £1,000,000 Hat Tells Britain To ‘Live Within Its Means.’

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Rolls-Royce Faces Nigerian Corruption Probe.

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Theranos Voids Two Years Of Edison Blood Test Results.

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Mercenaries Are The Silent Majority Of Obama’s Military

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Special Report: In North Dakota’s Oil Patch, A Humbling Comedown.

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TweetWood
A sampling.


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The Beachwood Tip Line: Sliding scale.

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Posted on May 19, 2016