Lightfoot urged to replace ‘patchwork planning by aldermanic prerogative’ that perpetuates racial segregation

A condominium complex under construction in Chicago. Affordable housing advocates say giving total zoning control to aldermen leads to racial segregation. | Associated Press

Mayor Lori Lightfoot was urged Wednesday to replace “patchwork planning by aldermanic prerogative”—derisively callled the “tool of the new Jim Crow”—and replace it with community-development decision-making driven by racial equity.

Last year, affordable housing advocates filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development claiming the unwritten rule giving Chicago aldermen iron-fisted control over zoning in their wards effectively keeps affordable housing and minority residents out of white neighborhoods.

The complaint filed by the Shriver Center on Poverty Law was based on a report that showed how aldermanic prerogative has served to “perpetuate” racial segregation in Chicago by keeping affordable housing out of predominantly white neighborhoods.

Now, those same housing advocates are back with a follow-up report, offering the new mayor a road map to resolve the housing discrimination complaint and chart a more equitable future for Chicago.

“It has been over 50 years since Dr. [Martin Luther] King marched through Chicago for open housing and since Congress passed the Fair Housing Act. Yet, Chicago remains profoundly separate and unequal,” Monica Dillon of Neighbors for Affordable Housing in Jefferson Park, told a City Hall news conference Wednesday.

“Chicago’s people are segregated. But, even worse, Chicago’s resources are segregated. That is where the harm lies and where the Lightfoot administration must focus its change.”

Monica Dillon of Neighbors for Affordable Housing in Jefferson Park, spoke at a City Hall news conference Wednesday.

Sweeping recommendations made by 11 community-based organizations include:

• Eliminate aldermanic prerogative over zoning and strip aldermen of their ability to indefinitely defer zoning approval of affordable housing.

“In white wards, aldermanic prerogative is often used as the tool of the new Jim Crow,” Dillon said.

“Prerogative has been used systematically in white and affluent wards as a tool to maintain segregation after previous tools of exclusion like racially-restricted covenants were outlawed by the [U.S.] Supreme Court.”

Shortly before Mayor Rahm Emanuel left office, he tried to impose a six-month deadline for City Council action on local zoning requests. He dropped the idea after running into a brick wall of aldermanic opposition.

Lightfoot has already stripped aldermen of their unbridled control over licensing and permitting in their wards. She has promised to do the same for their control over zoning, but that will require a City Council vote — no sure thing.

• Conduct a “Racial Equity Impact Assessment” to reverse Chicago’s “long history of racial segregation driven by discriminatory land use and housing policies.” The assessment would use “data- and community-driven research on racial inequities within all systems and structures” to eliminate the “gaps in opportunity,” the new report states.

• Use the racial equity assessment as the “foundation” to develop a “comprehensive, long-term plan” to guide “community development and land-use decisions” and overhaul how city and federal resources, including Low Income Housing Tax Credits, are spent.

The goal is to “shift the zero-sum game approach to planning that pits neighborhood against neighborhood by ... directing resources based on community need for the good of all Chicago. ... Strategic resource investment must be tied to actual on-the-ground need and not political placation.”

“The comprehensive plan must envision an equitable future at least 20 years out and identify the steps needed to get there, regardless of the political leadership now and then,” the report states.

• Establish elected “Community Development Action Councils” in all 50 wards to make development decisions in line with the comprehensive plan and recommend City Council action. The report also makes passing reference to “removing the Chicago Plan Commission and replacing” the Community Development Commission with representatives of the action councils.

• Empower Inspector General Joe Ferguson to conduct an annual review of affordable housing development policies and practices.

A complaint filed last year by the Shriver Center on Poverty Law was based on a report that showed how aldermanic prerogative has perpetuated racial segregation in Chicago by keeping affordable housing out of predominantly white neighborhoods.

Lightfoot has promised to deliver “transformative investments” in South and West Side neighborhoods that haven’t seen it in decades, starting with “high-priority commercial corridors.”

The mayor doubled-down on that promise Wednesday after celebrating another $3.6 million investment in a fund that provides small minority businesses and entrepreneurs more access to sorely-needed capital.

“The fact that 39 percent of African-Americans in this city live in poverty is a shameful statement about where we are. But that’s not where we have to remain,” the mayor said.

“We can and we must do better as a city and I’m committed to doing everything I can to make that happen. And if we do that, not only will we bring wealth to neighborhoods. … we will stop the exodus of people from our great city.”

Still, it’s not clear how big a fight Lightfoot is willing to pick with aldermen who covet their power over zoning, given that at the same time, she’ll be asking them to approve tax increases and budget cuts to eliminate the city’s $838 million budget shortfall.