Chicago marches against transit cuts

CHICAGO--Some 250 activists commemorated Martin Luther King Day by protesting budget cuts in transportation, education and social services. Protesters marched from the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) headquarters to Boeing's headquarters to demand "Money for jobs and education, not for Boeing Corporation."

On February 7, the CTA will lay off 1,100 employees and force furlough days as part of the budget proposal for 2010. This will translate into deep cuts in services that working-class students and workers depend on.

To add insult to injury, the CTA is planning, once again, to hike bus and rail fares to as high as $3 a ride and eliminate bus routes. These service cuts are part of the CTA's strategy to close a $300 million deficit--almost one-fourth of the CTA's $1.4 billion annual operating budget--which is a result of the continuing decline of public funding as a consequence of the economic crisis.

CTA President Richard Rodriguez is pressuring the CTA's unions to agree to more concessions. This would be a step backward for the unions, since they fought hard to win 3.5 percent annual salary increase per year for the next two years. Their union contracts are not up for negotiation until 2011.

Non-union CTA employees will be obligated to take up to 18 unpaid days in 2010 in addition to a four-year wage freeze, which translates into a 10 percent salary decrease. With layoffs and furloughs, the remaining transit workers will be forced to shoulder more work. The CTA has cut 30 percent of its mechanics in the last 13 years, which means that there are fewer now mechanics struggling to fix more buses.

The CTA is eliminating many of the express bus routes and reducing service, in large part in low-income minority areas. Six express routes are being cut on the South Side alone. According to Roger Smittle of the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, these service reductions will violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, since disabled people and seniors won't have regular daily bus service on the South Side.

When Mayor Richard Daley was fighting to host the 2016 Olympics this past summer, city officials announced that they planned on borrowing $85 million to buy Michael Reese Hospital on the South Side--in order to close it down and build an Olympic Village. This amount could pay for about a fourth of the CTA budget deficit.

This clearly demonstrates that there's always money for Daley's projects--but never enough money to maintain the CTA for working-class people.

Not long ago, Daley leased infrastructure assets, including the Chicago Skyway for 99 years for $1.8 billion, the citywide parking meter system to a Morgan Stanley subsidiary for 75 years for $1.15 billion, and the downtown parking garages for $563 million.

In the proposed 2010 budget, Daley says, "Without these agreements, we would likely have been forced to raise property taxes and other taxes and fees. We also would have been forced to eliminate key programs on which Chicagoans depend."

But what good is it to "protect taxpayers" from higher or additional taxes if public assets are being sold off to corporations that quickly hike up prices and decrease the quality of service? If any group should be taxed, it should be the top richest bracket of Chicago--not the poor, who were forced to sacrifice even before the economic crisis started.

The next public asset for sale is most likely Midway Airport, which was almost sold for $2.5 billion last year when the deal collapsed with the credit crisis. There has been talk about privatizing the water and sewer systems of the city, if the price is right.

Privatization compromises quality and safety, as shortcuts are taken, maintenance is skipped and infrastructure isn't properly maintained.

The CTA, along with the rest of the city of Chicago, can start to balance its budget by making cuts at the top levels of administration and redirecting some of the $497 million that the CTA received from the Regional Transportation Authority on January 1 to avert layoffs and the increase in fares.

Rodriguez said he plans to execute a new business model to solve the budget cuts, similar to what was implemented in the airline industry. The strategy centers on decimating union pensions, reducing salaries, raising fares and cutting service.

Erek Slater, a CTA bus driver who is scheduled to be laid off, said, "We need more public actions and more disciplined organizations." The opportunity exists for workers, alongside students and other community members, to come together to begin organizing against the attacks on all of our standard of living.