If future archeologists studying the long-vanished civilization of Chicago should unearth and read a crumbling transcript of Wednesday’s City Council meeting, they could be excused for hypothesizing that police officers were our most exalted beings, perhaps qualifying for pyramids. The archeologists would certainly conclude Chicago police were jubilant about their new city contract, approved that day.
Unfortunately, the archeologists wouldn’t have the opportunity I did to stroll around the Loop after the council meeting and ask officers what they thought about the contract. As one veteran put it, “Mayor [Richard] Daley is a robber. He’s an outright thief.”
As for the council meeting, an archeologist would note that the ritualistic gathering always begins by honoring select police officers and firefighters. Ald. Edward Burke (14th) might be mistaken for a high priest, since he leads this ceremony. “Heroism is a rare virtue,” Burke observed Wednesday. “It permits all of us the opportunity to glimpse the most outstanding capacity of the human spirit. . . . Each day the routines of the profession of law enforcement challenge the capacity for sacrifice and courage . . . “
Lesser priests, known to us as the other aldermen, speak next, followed by the ruler presiding at a raised alter, called Mayor Daley. Daley praised that day’s heroes and assailed anyone for criticizing police officers or firefighters. “These recognitions are bigger than the Oscars,” he said. “When people … criticize the police all the time, they’re never out there with the police.”
Later the council conducted the rare rite of police contract approval, performed about every four years. The last contract expired in June 1999. A tentative agreement between the city and the Fraternal Order of Police was voted down resoundingly by union members. FOP vice president Bob Podgorny said the union asked the city to renegotiate the points most opposed by union members, but the city refused, sending the contract to arbitration. Last month, the arbitrator approved essentially the same contract offered by the city and trounced by union members.
At a council committee meeting last week, Lt. Jeffrey Wilson, president of the Chicago Police Lieutenants Association, told aldermen that “morale in the Chicago Police Department is at an all-time low,” largely because of the contract.
Wilson admitted that since the council can only approve or dismiss the contract, he couldn’t argue against it because police have been working without a raise for almost two years.
But at Wednesday’s full council meeting, no one even hinted that police were anything but ecstatic about the contract. The arbitration result, said Ald. Ike Carothers (29th), chairman of the Police and Fire Committee, is “a decision that we can all live with. I tell you, Chicago police are surely deserving of the best.”
“If you look at the overall package you will see,” said Ald. Burton Natarus (42nd), “the [city’s] negotiators … did an outstanding job in this instance, and have given the police department an outstanding financial package. . . . So I hope we can unanimously support this agreement. . . . It sends a message to the men and women of our Chicago Police Department, Chicago’s finest, that we truly appreciate all the work that they are doing on your behalf.”
I ran that past Lt. Wilson. “HAHAHAHAHA!” he answered. “My response would be something that would be unprintable.”
A police officer in the Loop had this take: “It stinks. There’s an overriding sense of victimization.” Officers who declined to talk still betrayed their opinions, unable to keep from sneering at the word “contract.”
Police are unhappy about several key issues, such as escalating health-care costs and a 4 percent annual raise for four years. Police salaries average about $55,000, and their retroactive paychecks won’t include interest. They don’t like a new rule keeping complaints in their files for seven years rather than five, and allowing unsustained charges to help establish the credibility of new complaints.
“You know, if you want the honest to God truth, I’ll just give you a bit of how I feel,” said one veteran. “Nobody likes us anymore. Nobody. … So, you go down an alley with a guy with a gun at the other end of the alley, how much money you think you should be paid?”
Still, aldermen I spoke with Wednesday denied a new contract rejected by the union might affect police morale. At his press conference, Mayor Daley mumbled, “I don’t know, that’s up to them.” Well, he should know. And when negotiations for the next contract start in just over a year, Daley’s negotiators should do something about it. The police aren’t asking for a human sacrifice, even though, as Ald. Ed Smith (28th) noted Wednesday, “every day the Chicago Police Department lay their lives on the line.”
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