$60 Million?

But the city is broke? The CTA is foundering? The schools are penniless and reduced to begging for crumbs? Where do they find the money?

• The most dangerous stretches of streets around 12 Chicago public schools will be protected by the "eyes and ears" of paid citizen safety patrols under one phase of a $60 million anti-violence campaign unveiled Tuesday.

  Such groups also will be called upon to function as paid, pseudo "truancy officers," visiting the homes of truant kids at 38 of the system's most violent schools to find out why students are cutting school.

• Under the plan -- bankrolled with two consecutive years of $30 million in federal stimulus dollars -- this school year $18 million will be focused on the 38 high schools with the biggest violence problems and plans their administrators and other have written to create a "culture of calm" on their campuses, Huberman said.

Ah, federal money. That explains it - the Obama money is rolling in. How much more money can Obama create out of thin air?

Evidently, quite a lot.

By the way, Shaved points out that $60 million is more than eight-times the amount "saved" in furlough days handed out by Shortshanks.

$11 Million Too Late

Thank goodness they caught this before it cost the taxpayers some real money!

• A Northwest Side body shop could be banned permanently from doing business with the city after the Chicago Sun-Times revealed it had been paid more than $11 million for work on police cars and other city vehicles -- even after its owner pleaded guilty to ripping off the city.

• City officials have said repeatedly they were unaware of Szybkowski's conviction until the Sun-Times told them about it late last week. The Fleet Management Department, which oversaw the contract with Central Auto Body, stopped sending it city vehicles last week.

With everyone in Daley's administration, including Shortshanks himself, knowing nothing about anything all the time, it's amazing he kept control as long as he has.

What hold does Shortshanks have over everyone working for him? He isn't charismatic. He's obviously unstable. His people skills leave much to be desired. The staff turnover would embarrass everyone involved if it happened in a publicly held company. But he continues to captain a sinking ship, handing out increasingly stale pieces of a shrinking pie, and there's no shortage of fools willing to see what the underside of Daley's bus looks like as it runs them over. And no one, we mean no one, has ever dropped a dime.

Oh, Thank You Mayor!

Your generosity knows no bounds sir!!!

• One week after dumping the chief-of-staff responsible for Chicago’s parking meter fiasco, Mayor Daley is extending an olive branch to motorists — or is it a twig?

  At today’s City Council meeting, Daley introduced an ordinance authorizing his Revenue Department to void one parking ticket a year per vehicle.

  But, there’s a catch: Tickets will only be nullified if they’re issued within five minutes of the expiration time on the pay box receipt.

Well golly gee whiz Dick - thanks for that.

This Should Finish Quinn

Touting a tax hike? In the midst of a recession?

• Gov. Quinn used his State of the State speech Wednesday to push a 2010 tax increase, make a tearful argument for his leadership style heading into next month's primary and tout his role in the state's ongoing recovery from Rod Blagojevich's dizzying political collapse.

  "In taking the oath of office, I knew that we had a state in crisis, a state that needed stabilization, that needed an honest governor and an honest government," Quinn told a joint session of the General Assembly. "I think in the past year, we've worked together, night and day in some cases, to win the trust of the people."

"trust of the people"? Have you caught all those 1,800 early parolees yet governor? And we still see state government continuing on its corrupt path, asking everyone else to make sacrifices while spending like the well isn't dry.

You're out of touch along with most of your party.

Burke Sticks Up for Snitch?

Evidently, Burke is attempting to right old wrongs again. First, Mrs. O'Leary; next, Edward O'Hare:

• Chicago police today agreed to take a look at an unsolved 70-year-old murder of Edward J. O'Hare, a Chicago lawyer who allegedly cooperated with federal authorities against infamous mobster Al Capone.

  The unusual request to revisit the investigation came from Alderman Edward Burke, 14th, at a meeting of the council's Police and Fire Committee and in advance of the release of a new book on Capone.

  Burke made it clear he didn't want detectives to spend too much time on the case, saying his intention was simply to set the record straight that it wasn't Eliot Ness who brought Capone to justice.

Aside from being a complete waste of police resources for some bizarre game of one-upsmanship involving the Irish and Italians mafias, we're surprised Burke is condoning snitching. After all, if the people who know Ed Burke told everything they knew about him and the midget-on-five, Ed would be cooling his heels behind bars with a number of ex-governors and half the Bridgeport crew.

Tickets for Everyone

Reports are that the officer who shot the attacking German Shepherd Dog recently, was herself, the owner of an unlicensed dog. She was ticketed, same as the offending dog's owner.

In these days of anti-police sentiment, constant second guessing and bosses that "have your back," please make sure you are 100% legit all the time. Valid driver's license, FOID, proper plates, city stickers, no outstanding parking tickets or water bills, etc. Any and every rule violation is going to be revealed and you are going to get smacked for it.

We don't think they increased the size of the Auditing and Internal Control Division to hand out certificates for being in compliance.

Go Away Please

Seriously, we don't want you around:

• A Chicago police officer fired after a video camera captured him beating a female bartender is asking a judge to review his termination.

  In the petition filed Tuesday in Cook County Circuit Court, attorneys for Anthony Abbate said the Chicago Police Board made 12 errors in ordering his termination last month, including using the infamous videotape in deciding to fire him.

Really? Seriously?

Just go away. You're a disgrace, you're a millstone around our necks, you are a perfect example of someone who never should have been hired in the first place, but made it through the process via clout.

More Lightbars Stolen

On an unsecured lot of an outside vendor:

• Comment #1 - Hey SCC,
  
  Two more Chicago police light bars have been stolen from Trans-o-matic repair shop located @ 7200 w Irving park road on todays date. 11Jan10.
  
  
• Comment #2 - Heard another set of mar lights stolen from a squad car in the belmont heights neighborhood in 016. For units that take home there cars just be careful what you keep in your cars at night. There was a DEA agent down the street from me had ammunition and bullet proof vest taken.

Not sure if these are the same incidents. We know the City subcontracts out just about all squad car repairs nowadays. Windows, body damage, engine work, etc. But shouldn't there be standards of some sort? Secure lots and buildings? In today's post-9/11 world, shouldn't someone be thinking outside the box, looking at asymmetrical threats, trying to connect the dots to head off the next attack?

The Department has known about these light bar thefts for a while now. We were tipped off reading Shaved's blog. And now we're being told that 016 sent out a letter to make officers aware that take-home cars appeared to have been targeted.

How about making everyone else aware of this? What point is there to keeping fellow officers in the dark? And what point (if any) is served by keeping citizens in the dark when we're supposed to be relying on them to be our eyes and ears when we can't be everywhere at once? Oh wait...this is Chicago...we must be covering for some incompetent political hacks who spent federal money destined for anti-terror efforts on some crooked contract for printing pamphlets or paneling a den or some other crap.

A Little Too Odd

Anyone else smell a setup here?

• Female investigator from IPRA came into 001st yesterday. Apparently was being pretty evasive to the desk crew. Apparently after taking a statement from a citizen she decided to go work out in the building's gym. While doing so she left her IPRA issued radio and laptop on a chair. After finishing her workout (on company time!) she left for home. Realizing that she forgot the radio and laptop she returned to find that you know what! Also, she could provide almost no info on the radio and what was on the laptop. Hope nothing too sensitive.

Why would IPRA take a statement in 001 when they have their own office building at IIT? And we certainly hope no one would be stupid enough to steal a piece of equipment that probably has tracking software installed that calls the police for help the minute you plug it into a phone jack or try to surf the internet.

Something is rotten in Denmark.

Non Story...

...but guess who gets blamed? For over a dozen pages of comments? Yes, it's the police:

• As usual, Laura Bravo's kids let their German shepherd into their locked back yard before school this morning.

  Moments later, they heard several "pops" and looked out the window to see their 4-year-old pet, Malachi, lying in a bloody heap on the sidewalk across the street at 7:58 a.m.

This all happened way up north in Edison Park. And you have to read the nonsense in the comment sections to believe it. The headline reads "Family argues off-duty cop overreacted when fatally shot dog" but the article tells a different story. Hopefully, the cop is taking notes and acquires a few copies of the Sun Times for her attorney:

• Bravo thinks the dog may have escaped from a side gate. [admission of fault]
  
  
• "I understand [Malachi] is a big dog and can seem intimidating, but she overreacted," Bravo said. [admission of fault]

• To add insult to injury, Bravo said, the responding officers ticketed her for failing to have a dog license for Malachi.

  "Like killing my dog wasn't enough?" she said angrily, holding the ticket for a fine of up to $500. "I didn't know I had to renew it every year." [ignorance of the law is no excuse]
  

It's amazing how many people think the police have to be beaten, bitten, shot or otherwise abused, even off-duty, before we're allowed to take action to protect ourselves. Even where we live. And how depressing is it that this woman can be completely at fault for not securing her yard, not licensing her dog and she's still given a platform from which to spout her ignorance and infect more people with anti-police bias? All for merely being a cop audacious enough to walk your own dog in your own neighborhood and expect that you won't be confronted and attacked by a 125-pound animal that we've seen tear through people's arms like so much tinfoil.

017 Antics

Rumor has it, the antics of the 017 district commander are starting to raise a few eyebrows:

• 017- Looks like MIKE MEALERS temper tantrum in the 017 district has sparked someones attention at 35th and Michigan.. We are hearing that the station video of his temper tantrum has been requested by numerous high ranking police department officials.

Verbal abuse of subordinates? Destruction of Department property? Anger management issues? Behavior unbecoming? If the stories are to be believed, this clown is a walking, talking "Hostile Workplace" lawsuit waiting to happen.

Hey J-Fed? We hope you took pages and pages of notes when you were doing that wholesale replacement of district commanders. Maybe somewhere in that pile of paper you can see who mentioned certain brain trusts were worthy of command spots.

Hey, Look! Self Defense Works

Too bad he didn't have a gun:

• Five people face charges related to an attack and robbery of a Forest Park man early Saturday that started as he watched a movie on his iPod while riding on a CTA Green Line train on the West Side, authorities said.

  The 26-year-old Forest Park man was on a Lake Street "L" train near 5100 West Lake Street in the Austin neighborhood when he was robbed about 12:55 a.m. Saturday, police said.

• The 26-year-old man was watching a movie on his iPod when he was approached by the four men, Assistant State's Attorney Angel Essig told Ocasio. The men asked the victim for spare change and when he declined, demanded he turn over his iPod, Essig said.

  One of the four then punched the victim in the face, according to Essig. The victim pulled a knife and stabbed at least two of the alleged would-be robbers, she said.

Remember - When seconds count, the police are minutes away. Expect more of this as the police force dwindles.

More Like China?

What is this ass smoking?

• Mayor Richard Daley opened the new Fullerton “L” station on the Brown and Red lines Saturday and said the United States should follow China’s example on modernizing infrastructure.

  “If you travel to China, they do these things continually, on a daily basis,” Daley said. “They get the full cooperation at the federal, state, and local levels and their infrastructure projects are amazing. It doesn’t take them 10 or 20 or 30 years. It takes about four or five years.”

Does he really have no idea about communism? Slave labor? Nonexistent property and human rights? We mean, really? Due process? OSHA? Any of this right a bell Shortshanks?

The only idea worth importing from China is their method of dealing with political corruption - a bullet to the back of the head when local commissars are caught with their hands in the till. We'd be knee deep in blood here for a month or so, but a good rainstorm would clear that mess and we know some guys with dump trucks who could haul the bodies out to some Iowa farms.

UPDATE: On the upside, someone pointed out China has a "one child" policy that could pay extraordinary dividends down the line. And then there's the whole tank thing. Imagine if CPD had tanks in 1968 driving down Michigan Avenue. The Task Forces would have been hosing bits and pieces of Abby Hoffman out of the treads afterward.

And Again....

...a missing returns home under their own power:

• A fight with her mother caused a teen to run away from home this week, but she has been located safe, Chicago police said tonight.

  On Friday police released an alert asking the public's help in finding a 14-year-old girl missing from the South Side.

Family fight. Kid runs away. An alert is released, wasting valuable police resources, media air time and dulling the public's appetite to assist in legit cases.

Can we stop the overwrought overreactions yet?

Could This Work Here?

It might send a message:

• The body of 36-year-old Hugo Hernandez was left on the streets of Los Mochis in seven pieces as a chilling threat to members of the Juarez drug cartel. A note read: “Happy New Year, because this will be your last.”

  To drive home the point, the assailants skinned Hernandez’s face and stitched it onto a soccer ball.

  The gruesome find, confirmed Friday by Sinaloa state prosecutors, represents a new level of brutality in Mexico’s drug war, in which torture and beheadings are almost daily occurrences.

  [...] His torso was found in a plastic container in one location; elsewhere another box contained his arms, legs and skull, Robles said. Hernandez’s face, sewn onto a football, was left in a plastic bag near City Hall.

It would certainly spice up homicide investigations, that's for sure.

Welcome 4-and-2!

Today begins the 4-on-2-off schedule. Actually, it began almost three hours ago with the midnight crew starting early.

We're sure there will be kinks to work out, the car schedule is like something out of a Three Stooges episode and the start times will require some adjustment, but all in all, we'll be glad to see the end of the six-in-a-row schedule.

Open post in the meantime.

Kiss of Death?

Never let it be said Shortshanks couldn't read the direction the wind was blowing:

• Mayor Richard Daley said today he won't be endorsing anyone running in the Democratic Feb. 2 primary contests because he's too busy to worry about elections --- and besides, political endorsements don't matter much any more.
  

  "If I do endorse, you'll say 'Boss Daley does this,' you guys will spin that," Daley told reporters after a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the renovated CTA Brown Line station on Fullerton Avenue in Lincoln Park. "In this day and age it's completely different, it's a completely different environment in politics, I'll be very frank. Endorsements don't mean as much as they used to mean in the past."

Especially when your approval rating is hovering around 30%, right Richie?

Lover Boy Suspended

Shortshanks has to look like he's doing something in the face of continuing scandal and falling approval ratings:

• A high-ranking city commissioner was suspended today for three months without pay after the Chicago Sun-Times revealed his department paid more than $11 million to a business owner who had previously pleaded guilty to ripping off the city.

  Fleet Management Commissioner Michael Picardi was called on the carpet in a face-to-face meeting with Mayor Daley today.

But nobody was aware of the fraud conviction? Bullshit. Szybkowski got the contract for keeping his mouth shut, plain and simple. Any student of Chicago history could rattle off numerous instances of people getting caught doing wrong, serving their time in prison, getting a second or third chance to make amends in some city department or another, and being exposed at some point when the media discovered its balls. Daley has even gone on record defending these second chances when confronted - his old man did the same thing.

If you read the Sun Times article closely, it makes no mention of ending the contract. The Tribune only says the mayor will "try to cut ties" with Central Auto Body. we aren't holding our breath on that count - a contract is a contract after all and Szybkowski didn't violate any existing rules.

Hubie on the Hotseat

The teflon-boy in hot water again:

• In mid-October, Chicago Public Schools chief Ron Huberman made a special trip to Springfield to implore legislators to restore funding cuts that were aggravating an already painful budget season.
  
  What he didn't mention to legislators was how he got there, in the literal sense. The schools chief drove himself in a 2009 Ford Escape hybrid that costs taxpayers more than $800 a month. That vehicle is in addition to the Crown Victoria that Huberman rides around in while in Chicago; the school district leases it for about $1,000 a month, not including the driver's pay. Huberman, who was appointed a year ago, makes $230,000 a year.

We recall he pretended to use the CTA when he worked there. But once he got out of that hell hole, we guess all pretense of being a mere commoner went out the window. Monique defends Hubie vigorously:

• Huberman's car and driver can be used by his senior staff, spokeswoman Monique Bond said. His personal car is to get to and from work, weekend events and school-related trips to Springfield, she added. Bond said Huberman worked at least 36 weekend days in 2009 , and has taken a handful of trips to Springfield.

Try explaining that to the various employees taking layoffs and job cuts. Or even the exempts taking 24 unpaid days while this former patrol officer has two cars at his disposal. And as usual, Daley doesn't know shit. Amazing.

Officer Wounded

SWAT situation:

• A Chicago police officer was shot and wounded while responding to a hostage situation overnight at an apartment building in the West Side's Lawndale neighborhood that also was the scene of an extra-alarm fire, authorities said.

• After lengthy negotiations with the man, the woman, 42, tried to flee the apartment through the front door, at which time the man fired several shots, striking the woman, police said.

  As she ran out the front door, she collided with SWAT officers who were in the hallway, knocking them to the ground. That caused one of the officers to accidentally discharge his weapon, and shoot himself in the foot, police said.

  [...] The wounded officer, an 18-year veteran, was reported in fair condition at Mt. Sinai Hospital this morning, officials said.

Speedy recovery Officer.