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How do you run a great city?

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A city which makes life good for all its citizens.

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A vital city that grows stronger, not weaker, with the passage of time.

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Majestic buildings and cultural resources are the landmarks of a great city.

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But they're not the mechanics.

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Skyscrapers and museums don't run a city.

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The muscles of a great city are built into its resources.

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The streets, the schools, and most of all, the neighborhoods.

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That's where the strengths of a great city are born.

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That's where the direction of a great city is plotted.

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Because you don't run a great city from up here.

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You run it from down here, in the streets.

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You run a great city by providing for the basic needs of the people.

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By providing responsive public services and modern facilities to ensure those needs are met.

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Today and in the years to come.

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Safeguard the future with schools that teach children to read and write.

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Schools that provide children with wage-earning skills.

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That's how you raise the general living standard.

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And that's how you secure democracy.

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Attract, maintain, and direct the broadest possible industrial and commercial base.

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Jobs, growth, and tax revenues are vital to running a vital city.

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Work hand-in-hand with mighty financial institutions.

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Provide initiatives to encourage loans to businesses, large and small.

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Capital for private enterprise.

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And capital for private dreams.

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Endow your city with a formidable tax base and accountable public officials to translate its wealth into quality services.

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Use that wealth to ensure that your city can grow with the fast-moving changes in our world.

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And not be overwhelmed by them.

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Then walk through the streets.

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How well is Chicago really being run?

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Any people, anywhere, have the right to rise up and shake off existing government and form a new one that suits them better.

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Abraham Lincoln.

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About a year ago I bought a house and I set it up in the basement for a little music studio.

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I fill it around with music and I've got some guitars and stereo equipment down there.

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And I've got to have that insured pretty heavily.

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And now we find out that from an insurance agent we're living in a high-risk area.

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And how would you feel?

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Well, I moved into this neighborhood about three years ago from Englewood, which is regarded as a very high-crime area.

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And after living here three years, I really don't feel any safer than in the old neighborhood.

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It's true. It's summertime and our children wish to play with their friends, go to the beaches, ride bicycles.

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But how can you let a 12-year-old go outside without someone there to help them?

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We had a mugging just about 50 feet away.

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A fellow jumped out of the bushes and grabbed a woman's purse, told her he had a gun.

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And she screamed. It was really frightening.

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We like to think of this as a very nice, safe neighborhood.

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And I guess this indicated to us that it's not.

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I don't think that you're safe anywhere in the city.

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And I think if Bill Singer were mayor, it would make a difference.

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The basis of our political system is the right of the people to make and alter their form of government.

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George Washington.

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I've been teaching in the Chicago public school system for four years now.

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And Singer is the only public official who's ever bothered to come down into the school to see what was actually going down.

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Not only is he an expert on schools, he's an expert on early childhood education.

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He knows the changes that we've got to make.

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And he's aware of the fact that the Board of Education won't make the changes and the mayor won't change the board.

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If we're going to do something about the schools, we're going to have to do something about the mayor.

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Today, when our government has so far passed into the hands of special interests,

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today must we remember that a people shall be saved by the power that sleeps within them or by none.

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Woodrow Wilson.

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The mayor wants to spend a billion dollars on the cross-border.

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So the people that live in the suburbs can get out of the city faster.

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What about us? We need buses and L's. What is being spent on transportation?

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Bill Singer understands the needs of Chicagoans, the people who live and work in this town.

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He's a major proponent of RTA, and he led the fight against the crosstown.

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Singer has a lot of support in this neighborhood.

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He has great rapport within the entire Latino community.

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Hell, he is the only one that knows we exist.

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As new discoveries are made, new truths disclose, and manners and opinions change,

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institutions must advance also and keep pace with the times.

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Thomas Jefferson.

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This street is part of the loop. It's intersected by Madison, Adams, Jackson, all centers of commerce.

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But the area started to decay, and nothing was done about it.

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So most of the businesses have fled to the suburbs, and the workers with them.

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I know. I'm president of a small company near here, one of the last.

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What's the present administration done to keep business in Chicago?

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Well, in the last ten years, 1,700 acres of zoned industrial land has been allowed to remain vacant and unproductive.

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During the same time, Chicago lost over 230,000 jobs.

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That's $2,000 million in income lost to the city.

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More millions of revenue dollars have been lost because certain big business interests have clout in the assessor's office.

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But my property taxes keep going up, and people keep leaving the city.

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That's why I'm working for Bill Singer.

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Because if I keep losing my customers, I'm going to lose my business.

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It takes creative and aggressive leadership to run a great city.

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Leadership to guide its growth and to shore up its foundation against the press of time and change.

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How have Chicago's present leaders responded to time and change?

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How have they chosen to run our city?

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Not a soul down on the corner, that's a pretty certain sign

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That prison cells are breaking up that old gang of mine

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All the boys are singing blues songs, they forgot sweet Adeline

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Those prison cells are breaking up that old gang of mine

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It's irrelevant, really, if the present administration is dishonest or just incompetent or merely indifferent.

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It has proven itself insufficient to meet the changing needs of Chicago.

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Nor can it rise to the challenge of change.

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The power base of the administration is fragmented.

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The political apparatus is crumbling.

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Change is inevitable and rational.

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People don't resist the inevitable.

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The question facing us is not whether Chicago's people are able to meet the press of evolution,

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but when and under whose leadership.

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Will we tolerate another four years of corruption and mismanagement

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or begin now what must be done eventually?

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Gee, I get a lonesome feeling when I hear the cell doors chime

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Those prison cells are breaking up that old gang of mine

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The key to winning an election in Chicago, unlike other cities,

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is that you not only have to communicate well, but also you have to organize.

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No one is going to win this election or any other in Chicago without being in the precincts.

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There are 3211 precincts, they all have to recover on election day.

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We have to learn the tricks of the Democratic precinct captain,

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check the registration sheets, go through a dry run on registration

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so that we make sure we eliminate the ghosts, we register new people.

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And then come February, we will be in the precincts and familiar to the people

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in the same way that the regular organization is familiar to them.

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No matter how well I communicate, no matter how agreeable people are

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in terms of the issues and the positions I take,

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if we are not there on election day, the machine will be.

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But in order to win 50% of the vote or more, we have to be in the precincts

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and we have to get our vote out.

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And that's what organizing is all about.

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And the best possible precinct organizers are in this campaign.

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Chicago has changed and will continue to change, that much is certain.

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But are you ready to confront that change, to absorb it and direct it?

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Are you ready to accept the fact that it's time for a change in Chicago government?

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Are you ready to accept the responsibility for running a great city?

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I love Chicago, I love this city and I want to see a change

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and I want to see a change for people.

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I want to see a good city, I want to see a great city.

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I want to see a clean, clean city, a clean city and honest city.

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boo