Chicago City Clerk Jim Laski may well be wondering what all the talk about governmental belt-tightening is about.
While other City Hall department heads may have been forced to slash their budgets, leave vacant positions unfilled or hold off on new equipment purchases, Laski, whose little-known name adorns city vehicle stickers and dog licenses, will be the beneficiary of one of the relatively few increases for city offices in Mayor Richard Daley’s proposed 1996 budget.
Not bad for an office that Daley once talked about abolishing. A department whose last elected head, Walter Kozubowski, is serving a prison term for running a ghost-payroll operation. And, perhaps most important, an office run by a man who brazenly spurred an aldermanic revolt against the mayor in 1993 for proposing a property-tax increase.
What did the clerk’s office do to deserve this? Collect revenue.
As city budget officials continue to search for ways to drum up extra dollars, instead of turning to publicly unpopular methods, such as the $19.5 million property-tax increase proposed last week by Daley, offices such as Laski’s will be more instrumental in the pursuit of money.
“We need as much revenue as possible,” said Budget Director Diane Aigotti, explaining Laski’s relatively large proposed budget hike of more than $850,000 to a recommended $5.3 million. “That’s what that is about-money.”
Indeed, toward that end, the city’s Revenue Department already has mailed out notices to 300,000 motorists who owe the city parking-ticket fines estimated to total in the neighborhood of $52 million. Moreover, city officials will seek court orders to garnishee wages, place liens on property and blemish people’s credit ratings to try to ensure that residents pay up.
Next week, city officials are expected to mail out several hundreds of thousands of letters to individuals who did not purchase the city’s $60 vehicle stickers during the 1994-95 sticker year, according to Revenue Department spokesman John Holden. If individuals do not make good on what they owe, the city, in conjunction with the secretary of state’s office, will invalidate their license plates, Holden said.
Laski, a politically ambitious individual trapped in what many consider to be a politically nowhere job, is more than happy to step up his office’s duties and ingratiate himself with the mayor. And Daley, from the face of things, seems to have forgiven Laski’s past political transgressions.
Earlier this year, Laski announced that the two-week grace period traditionally given to motorists to buy vehicle stickers would end July 15. It is a move that city officials acknowledge probably will result in more motorists having to pay a $30 late fee, and therefore provide the city more money. And he has proposed that city employees sign affidavits attesting to their purchase of stickers or else face disciplinary measures.
And on Friday, Laski launched his office’s newest fiscal volley. Under balmy blue skies, a trio of Laski’s employees took to the city’s Southwest Side to begin their hunt for and put $60 tickets on cars without current city vehicle stickers. The stickers were supposed to have been displayed by July 15.
Most of the motorists who will be cited for not displaying the stickers-the first time employees of the clerk’s office have been allowed to issue such citations-have not purchased them, Laski said. They are part of the 175,000 or so who yearly flout the law and cost taxpayers at least $10 million, according to Laski.
“It just isn’t fair,” Laski said. “I get tons of calls from people who complain that they’ve always bought their city stickers for years and their neighbors haven’t bought one since they’ve known them. It shouldn’t be like that. Everyone should pay.”
And pay they will. Laski hopes to generate at least another $3 million for the city’s coffers with this tactic.
It’s easy to see why. Instead of paying the $60 that it would have cost to buy the sticker, motorists also will pay the $30 late fee and a $60 ticket. That comes to a grand total of $150-or nearly 150 percent more money that it would have cost to buy the sticker on time in the first place.
Laski vowed that each of his employees would be able to hand out 100 tickets daily.
What is really attractive to Laski and other city officials-who already have a list of 9,100 purported vehicle-sticker scofflaws to hunt down provided by outraged citizens-is that if the motorists ignore the sticker ticket, the clerk’s employees can continue ticketing the vehicle.
Within a week, Laski said gleefully, such cars would be eligible to be booted.
“People will pay,” Laski said. “Believe me, people will pay.”
