Democrats have always stood to help the little guy in Chicago. We join unions and hope to get ahead with hard work. Many people get left behind as the political forces are corrupted by gambling, corruption and criminal enterprise. I think all Chicago city employees should undergo drug testing. I mean, all employees including the Mayor and Aldermen. Mayor Daley should help employees with gambling problems. If you look at the picture you will see nice condos and vacant lots, an eyesore even in this nicer section of Chicago. This picture was taken at 3100 West Peterson; the man pictured has fallen on bad luck and begs in a wheelchair. You would think in Chicago we address these issues making sure there are jobs that pay with some self-respect. Obama made his self rather rich in a short amount of time and McCain forgets how many houses he owns. Corruption in Chicago sucks the life out of the poor and we watch those in power vacation and travel the globe. Ms. Obama made over $300,000.00 a year screwing the poor. Life is good at the top in Chicago; ask this guy what it is like beg? Let’s fix Chicago, let us forget the Olympics, vacations, partying and, vice. Photo by Patrick McDonough.
9 Replies to “People Beg in the streets of Chicago, Homeless ranks swell”
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These are not Democrats in control of the Chicago machine. Jessie jr. and sr. are nothing anymore and I was ready with nominating petitions to help jr. get elected. It’s all over for this once great city of ours. Thanks to a very heartless mayor. nothing more can be said. I no longer trust Patrick Fitzgerald either. Why has he not indicted Daley’s kid for fraud and income tax evasion? It’s over for us taxpayers. The crooks won.
2 points I’ll make on this thread.
I’m afraid that “Tom Ryan” may be right about something — notwithstanding the fact we know gov’t moves slowly, where, for crying out loud, are the huge indictments to answer huge corruption?! Why is our illegally elected mayor not in handcuffs?!!!!!
As to Pat’s noble work to stick up for the poor, I must point out that the very 1st sentence ABOVE contains a HUGE PART OF OUR PROBLEM. Sadly, it’s been a lie.
The sentence reads as such: ” Democrats have always stood to help the little guy in Chicago. “
We all, except the extremely naive, know that democrats have NOT always stood to help the little guy!!!
Paraphrasing Harry Browne (for President): When you give the gov’t power, they will use it to help themselves, not to help you.
However, we know your general point and I know you are doing good for the good of the folks Pat. Thanks
kutgw
Carl Segvich
http://www.11thWard.US
August 27, 2008
FROM STNG WIRE REPORTS
A homeless couple was charged for a Monday night robbery and beating in the South Loop that reportedly left a woman in a drug-induced coma.
A man and woman in their 30s went inside a store on Roosevelt Road near Wabash Avenue to buy cigarettes about 10:30 p.m. Monday while celebrating the woman’s birthday. When they left, a homeless man and woman panhandling near the store confronted the two, according to a police source.
» Click to enlarge image
Derrick King (left) and Joyce Burgess (right) were charged late Tuesday with strong-armed robbery.
(Courtesy)
When the homeless woman asked the woman celebrating her birthday for a cigarette, she was told to “go get a job” by the woman or her companion, the source said.
A fight ensued and the homeless man allegedly grabbed the woman celebrating her birthday and threw her to the ground and beat her in the head, knocking out most of her upper teeth and leaving her critically inured. She was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital where she is in a reported drug-induced coma, the source said.
“We did have a pretty unfortunate incident involving a couple that were celebrating a birthday,” according to Central District police Lt. Richard Guerrero.
Derrick King, 46, of the Pacific Garden Mission in the 1400 block of South Canal Street, and Joyce Burgess, 38, also of the mission, were charged late Tuesday with strong-armed robbery, according to Guerrero, who said the two stole a Blackberry.
King was also charged with aggravated battery and the two are scheduled to appear in North Felony Court later Wednesday for a bond hearing, Guerrero said.
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My sympathy for the plight of the homeless is virtually non-existant after this vicious attack in the South Loop.
With all due respect Pat, there are many people who commented about this story and the overwhelming majority opined that they are tired of being shaken down by panhandlers.
What has exacerbated the problem of the homeless is funding that was cut, both at the federal and state level, for mental health and Veteran’s assistance programs. The safety net that many of these individuals depended on have been gutted.
The young woman in the story who was attacked is in the hospital and has no health insurance. This productive member of society may very well become bankrupted as well as being physically and emotionally scarred from this henious attack. Please pray for her and I want to thank the Chicago Police Department for apprehending these dangerous offenders.
(Response) I told you it is getting worse for the poor, now they are this desperate?
Officials Defend Rule That Cops Live In City
Report: Rule Is Rarely Enforced
CHICAGO (AP) ― Chicago city officials are defending regulations requiring police officers live in the city.
Tha is even though the rule appears to be rarely enforced.
In a story published Sunday, the Chicago Sun-Times reports only one police officer has been fired in the last five years for living outside the city limits.
City Law Department officials say residency cases are hard to prove because every case involves surveillance time.
Police officials say Chicago has a high cost of living that makes it difficult for officers to live in Chicago. Chicago’s Fraternal Order of Police is asking city officials to provide $3,000 a year stipend to compensate officers for living in Chicago.
But Mayor Richard M. Daley defends the rule. He says if Chicago is a good enough place to earn your salary, than it’s a good enough place to live.
City to cops: No place like home
August 31, 2008
BY FRANK MAIN AND ANNIE SWEENEY Staff Reporters
Chicago Police investigators secretly watched police Sgt. Michael Stiscak commute to work from his home in McHenry County about 20 times in 2006.
Officer Paul Bacarella commuted to his job from a DuPage County home more than a dozen times in 2004, investigators said.
» Click to enlarge image
Paul J. Bacarella, at his DuPage County home, was the only Chicago cop fired over the last five years for violating the residency rule.
(Frank Main/Sun-Times)
Stiscak kept his job. But Bacarella was fired for violating a rule requiring cops to live in the city.
The two cases show how time-consuming — and seemingly arbitrary — enforcement of the residency rule is.
Mayor Daley vigorously defends the rule. He once said, “If I’m mayor, should I live in Waukegan? If it’s good enough to work and earn your salary, it’s good enough to live.”
Yet residency cases are hard to prosecute, acknowledged Jennifer Hoyle of the city Law Department. The burden of proof is on the city, so every case involves surveillance to see how much time an employee is living outside the city, she said.
Other big cities like New York and Los Angeles don’t have such a rule. And Boston is phasing out its residency requirement.
Chicago’s Fraternal Order of Police is pushing for a compromise with the city, a $3,000 a year stipend to compensate officers for living in Chicago.
But attorney Robert Kuzas, who represented Stiscak, said the rule should be scrapped.
“I see no reason why dedicated employees are prevented from living where they want,” he said. “The rule is incapable of enforcement.”
1 officer fired in last 5 years
Bacarella was the only officer fired by the Chicago Police Board over the last five years for violating the rule. Stiscak and two others were found not guilty and two officers resigned. The department has appealed the Stiscak decision.
Bacarella, who knows other Chicago cops with homes outside the city, said he does not know why he was singled out for firing.
“If I am comparing apples to apples, I got the bad apple,” he said.
Many cops gripe about high property taxes and crime in the city. They also complain that they have to fork out extra money to send their kids to private schools because they’re leery of Chicago Public Schools.
Those issues weighed on Bacarella and his wife when they wed in 1998. At the time, his wife Linda, a widow, had two sons with her late husband — and one was still in high school. She lived in DuPage County and did not want to move to Chicago and put her son in a city school.
The Bacarellas said they decided Paul Bacarella would live with his parents in their Southwest Side home. She would keep living in her home and he would regularly visit. “We did look at houses and I just didn’t like the city, so I wasn’t going to move my kids to be in the city,” she testified in 2006.
Paul Bacarella said he visited the DuPage County home frequently to see his wife and a son they had in 2000, but continued to live with his parents, helping care for his chronically sick father, who died in 2006.
Yet more than two years of undercover surveillance convinced the Police Board, a civilian disciplinary panel, that Bacarella was living in DuPage and not with his parents. In July 2006, the board fired him. He now makes ends meet by working construction.
“This created a huge, huge financial burden for us,” Bacarella said.
‘Trying to keep family together’
A complex family situation also prompted Stiscak to travel back and forth between McHenry County and his job in the Albany Park District. Earlier this year, the Police Board found him not guilty of violating the residency rule, accepting his lawyer’s argument that “this is not a case of a man living outside of the city. This is the case of a man who is trying to keep his family together.”
In 2001, Stiscak took a 10-month leave of absence after becoming an attorney. He got a job with a McHenry County lawyer, but decided he did not like practicing law. He and his wife bought a house in McHenry County and his daughters started attending school there.
He wanted to return to his police job, but said his wife refused to move to Chicago and threatened divorce. Stiscak said he bought a studio condo in Chicago to satisfy the residency rule. He said he lived there when he was not in McHenry County.
“Mr. Stiscak is in no way trying to camouflage his residence,” his attorney, Kuzas, told the board.
The city put a Roman Catholic priest on the witness stand to testify that the priest’s North Side condo was next door to Stiscak’s, but for more than a year the priest never saw him or heard any activity in his condo. The priest said the first time he saw Stiscak was in 2007, after Stiscak was notified the city was trying to fire him.
Kuzas discounts the testimony, saying the priest’s sister admitted seeing Stiscak a few times.
Kuzas argued that state law does not prevent an officer from maintaining a second home outside the city and spending his days off and several nights a week there.
“We do not find the argument that someone is a 50/50 resident to be acceptable,” responded Hoyle, the Law Department spokeswoman.
The city is appealing the Police Board’s decision to reinstate Stiscak.
Bruce Rottner also has a tale of two cities, but the department never filed a residency case against him.
Rottner, the former Rogers Park District commander, was promoted this year to deputy chief of the Belmont Area.
Rottner said he and his wife gave her parents legal custody of their two daughters in 1987 so they could attend school in nearby Lincolnwood, where his wife’s parents lived.
He said he continued to live in West Rogers Park. But his wife split time between the two homes and the girls came to Chicago on weekends.
Schools a factor
Rottner said he and his wife, who are Jewish, were uncomfortable with Chicago’s public schools in the ’80s. They tried a private, non-denominational school, but it had limited classes and activities. They ruled out Jewish schools in the city.
“As parents, education was important to us and that was the only reason we did what we had to do. It was a hardship living separately from my children,” Rottner said. “Today with [Chicago Public Schools CEO] Arne Duncan, I’d feel very comfortable sending my kids or my grandkids, if I ever have any, to public school.”
The Rottners inherited the Lincolnwood home in 2003. Rottner said he continues to live in the city in an Edgewater condo. One adult daughter lives in the Lincolnwood home and his wife still splits her time, he said.
“We didn’t use a phony address,” Rottner said. “We had a legal way to set it up and do it. I always lived in the city. I never spent one night in that house.”
“I told you it is getting worse for the poor, now they are this desperate?”
It’s not desperation that motivates someone to kick the teeth out of a young woman’s face, it’s hate.
And it’s not desperation that inspires some ‘homeless’ to engage in strong arm robbery, it’s just that strong arm robbery is their chosen profession.
Strong arm robbery doesn’t require that you bath, dress neatly or show up for work on time.
Strong arm robbery doesn’t require any other skills than those already possessed by those who engage in it.
Strong arm robbery requires only the knowledge of recognizing who will, or will not, be intimidated by the threat of violence, or the actual infliction of same.
Many homeless panhandlers don’t resort to violent strong arm robbery.
Many are respectful and appreciate whatever the more fortunate citizens are willing to give.
Some, however, are not, nor ever will be, respectful of those they seek assistance from.
Some are just strong arm robbery criminals.
The victim in this case might have avoided being the recipient of actual violence, would she have responded to the implied threat of violence by giving what was ‘requested’ of her. She may, or may not, learn a few true things from her experience.
One thing is clear and undeniable, and that thing is that real life contains no guarantee of safety, not for anyone, anywhere or at any time.
How one responds to imminent danger, whether one is even aware of imminent danger, is the responsibility of each individual to bear.
The realization, of what life actually is, and what it is not, is what separates the intelligent from the ignorant.
Sometimes you live and learn, sometimes you don’t, either learn or live.
(Response) It takes a small event to get someone down the wrong path. A boyfriend could get his girl on drugs. A death in the family, A family member’s bad decisions, ect. You could get fired, you could get accused of a falsehood. You might make one bad turn. Problem is, once you are in that mess, it is hard to get out. Once you are in the street, getting bad is a major struggle. Patrick McDonough.
“It takes a small event to get someone down the wrong path. A boyfriend could get his girl on drugs. A death in the family, A family member’s bad decisions, ect. You could get fired, you could get accused of a falsehood. You might make one bad turn. Problem is, once you are in that mess, it is hard to get out. Once you are in the street, getting bad is a major struggle. Patrick McDonough.”
Sorry, Patrick, but you’re comparing two entirely different things.
One is the catastrophic misfortune that can strike practically anyone who hasn’t had the good fortune, and wisdom, to utilize their past and present good fortune to prepare for possible future misfortune, to ensure they will continue to have the ability to financially support themselves and their loved ones.
The other is the state of mind that inspires one to wrath, hate, animosity and malice.
Many people go through really tough times and don’t experience compelling feelings of hate, anger, malice or the desire to cause grievous harm to others, nor act on what hard or bitter feelings that their misfortunes may induce in their hearts and minds.
It takes a lot of hate to kick out a person’s teeth, especially when doing so not in a fear driven response to being attacked.
The victim did not attack her assailant, the victim did not threaten her assailant, the victim may have, naively, made some comment that set her assailant off, but, to use this event as an example of what you appear to suggest is a natural progression in human behavior, to be expected of most citizens who are caught in such financially dire conditions as experienced by our city’s homeless citizenry, is a disservice to not only this victim, but to the many unfortunate citizens who find themselves homeless and who would never think of committing such a heinous act as was committed by these two strong arm robbery practitioners.
Your point depends upon your believing that it is the nature of human beings to default to hate, malice, anger, wrath, animosity and malice, whenever their living conditions degrade to a level we typically describe as poverty, and that acts of desperation are no different than acts of hate.
Is that what you truly believe?
And, if so, why?
(Final Response) Most people will grow up with parents that love them, help them with homework, and give them respect and confidence. Then you hope the kids grow up and find a nice person to keep them in the right direction. Then you hope they respect God and family and do it all over again. It does not happen enough.
“(Final Response)”
You really don’t have much staying power, do you?
Especially when you find yourself engaged in an intelligent and honest conversation, and extra especially when you find yourself faced with thoughtful and challenging opposition to your stated point of view.
Didn’t your parents ever teach you that to realize, and admit, when you’re wrong is a character building experience?
Or were you always taught to never admit when you’re wrong, no matter how wrong you are?
These guys have been plying their trade at that intersection for years!! They take the money and go to the small shopping mall at that intersection and buy booze. They can stand there day in and day out and sometimes into the evening and pan handle but not take the trouble to get a job of ANY sort! I find what they do all day more work than if they had a job! THey are professional pan handlers and I can not find my self feeling sorry for them especailly when there are a few guys at the same intersection standing out all day selling news papers trying to make a honest living! They made their own life and have no ambitions to better it so the hell with them.