By Steve Rhodes
“Meanwhile, as invited guests celebrated the runway opening over lunch inside an O’Hare hangar, another problem in controlling the costs of the project came to light,” the Tribune reports.
“The price tag for building a taxiway that is a key component of the plan to expand and reconfigure the airport’s runways plan has more than doubled, according to documents the city recently filed with the Federal Aviation Administration.”
The mayor also announced that construction at O’Hare would begin soon of the Millennium Parking Lot, the Soldier Airfield, and Terminal 37.
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The plane used to inaugurate the new O’Hare runway was called United Runway 1. Look for it soon on eBay.
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Looks like we picked the wrong week to stop drinking the Kool-Aid.
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The mayor’s team reviews the O’Hare expansion budget.
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Airport officials will close the new runway today to practice for winter.
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Air traffic controllers are already reporting a near miss – between reality and fantasy.
The Big 3
* The smartest take I’ve heard yet on the auto industry crisis comes from Andrew Ross Sorkin of the New York Times on Charlie Rose.
* Michael Moore talks bailout with Larry King.
* “For starters, the carmakers should consider whether the Detroit Three should become a Two,” David Greising writes this morning.
Maybe that should have happened 29 years ago. Who knows how the auto industry may have been reshaped.
The Bigger 3
Maybe Barack Obama ought to announce – right now, before we go over the cliff before he’s even taken office – that he’s putting Warren Buffett and Al Gore in charge of the economic crisis. Throw in Steve Jobs, too. You could even call it the Trilateral Commission.
Budget Blues
“Sixth Ward alderman Freddrenna Lyle described it as a ‘bad-news budget’ but said the council had fought for and won important revisions since the mayor introduced it last month,” Mick Dumke reports. “‘We’ve done our homework,’ she said. But the Fourth Ward’s Toni Preckwinkle didn’t think she and her colleagues had done enough homework. She called for an additional week of budget hearings next year. ‘How can we run through 40 departments in two weeks?’ she asked. ‘I don’t think it leads to a very thoughtful process’.”
Ah, but that’s the point, Toni. Your thoughts aren’t welcome.
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“Ald. Billy Ocasio (26th) cast the only vote against the budget. He was one of the few aldermen who dared to speak out against the mayor’s budget,” the Sun-Times reports. “He argued that most of the layoffs affect not the desk jockeys, but ‘people who do the work and get paid the least.’
“‘We find millions of dollars in private and public funds when it comes to places like Millennium Park, the 2016 Olympics or Buckingham Fountain. But when it comes to finding . . . $75,000 for a woman’s homeless shelter, the city says it’s an ongoing process. We all know what that means. It means no,’ Ocasio said.
“‘For the reasons mentioned – the wrong people being laid off, my community being taken for granted, all of the false promises and the fact that this administration believes that everything and everyone is expendable – I vote no’.”
Jesus, Billy, where did that come from? Is there a spine implant discount sale in your ward?
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“I’m concerned about the revenue projections in this budget and whether they are realistic . . . What tricks do we have up our sleeve next year?” said Ald. Robert Fioretti (2nd).
Another new runway at O’Hare?
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“The bottom line is that the City Council took what downtown Ald. Brendan Reilly (42nd) has called a ‘leap of faith’ by approving the mayor’s $6 billion budget.”
A) I thought the Bush administration was over
B) Campaign mailer for his re-election bid will tout excellent record on leaps of faith
C) That’s not what the mayor meant when he told you to take a flying leap
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“Daley’s decision to lay off 635 employees and eliminate more than 1,600 vacancies means Chicago will wait longer to hire police officers, plow a side-street, fill a pothole, trim a tree, sweep a street and clean a vacant lot.
“And Ald. Ed Smith (28th) is afraid that some neighborhoods will wait longer than others.”
Well, we should retain some sense of normalcy, shouldn’t we?
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“The tax package includes higher parking and amusement taxes and a laundry list of fees. But it’s the mayor’s $9 million plan to license garbage Dumpsters – at an annual cost of $80 to $780 – that has drawn drew the most fire.
“It comes on top of hundreds of thousands of dollars of facade repair and critical examination costs the city has already imposed on condominium residents.
“‘They are being taxed up the yin-yang and it is bankrupting our taxpaying citizens. We cannot keep relying on the same population year after year after year,’ said Ald. Leslie Hairston (5th).”
After she voted in favor of the mayor’s budget, as she has done year after year after year.
Downey Out
“Mike Downey, who returned home to Chicago in 2003 as a Tribune sports columnist, is leaving the paper,” Phil Rosenthal reports.
“The Tribune was generous enough to make me one of the best-paid sportswriters in the history of this business,” Downey said.
That makes him one of the most overpaid in history too.
Ballot Bowl
Take a look at these ballots from Minnesota.
Foodie Fun
* 1 Metre of Licorice and other foreign treats.
The Beachwood Tip Line: The way and the light.
Posted on November 21, 2008