Letter To The City

The first Action Project for the Policy class, a history and social studies styled class, has us creating a letter towards a governmental official that has jurisdiction over an improvement that we wished to see. This could be regarding the city, the nation, perhaps certain regulations you've questioned, maybe specific laws, or even how these changes would be handled. Initially, I found it to be quite difficult to even think of something I would want to change, as I always believed that the way things are currently are most likely the best, or else they would have been changed already. However when it came down to it, an FE (Field Experience; a purposeful "field trip" so to say) we went to earlier this Unit to Chicago's City Hall –to attend a meeting between the Aldermen and the Mayor (the president of the City Council) to discuss issues that have come up around/in the city– inspired me to write about the improvement of the way the City Council does things, as the meeting had several things that simple seemed inefficient, although our class did only attended the first hour of it. So without further ado, you can see the letter just below, which discusses how addressing issues during the City Council meetings can be improved.
____________________________________________________________________________

Vítor Garcia
GCE Lab School
1535 N. Dayton
Chicago, IL

April 30, 2016

Mayor Rahm Emmanuel
121 N LaSelle Street
Chicago City Hall 4th Floor
Chicago, IL 60602

Dear Mayor Emmanuel,

I'm sure you have a handful with all of the city's issues that require refinement or fixing, however I feel that you might be missing out on an efficient way to deal with the lot of them. See, during a visit to a City Council meeting in early April, I noticed that within the one hour stay, many issues seemed to be gleamed over or not referred to. More importantly, there was a lack of more than a few Aldermen, including my own, Ameya Pawar. Now of course, there's only so much time in a day and this was indeed the first visit, and so far the only one I've had but it just seemed lacking in the response towards a plethora of the issues brought up. On the first note, before I mention the main points of organization during the meetings, I want to point out that based on citizen word, many of Chicago's problems here are hardly being attended to, and when there are Aldermen that don't even attend to the meetings, it makes me wonder just how much can even be known of in the long run. One would assume that the meetings are mandatory, with little room for excuse or exception, but how can we say that the time spent during these meetings are even optimized with the officials that do show up?

There was some informal, irrelevant joke when one of the representatives claimed that your two daughters were interesting to his two sons... Now of course, comedy and light hearted tones are actually quite lovely in a majority of situations, but during a crucial meeting where Chicago's many problems are meant to be taken note of and fixed, is it worth having notes such as these take up the limited time? Granted that it's not impossible to for something of the sort to happen, the rest of the meeting is the main reason why I bring that detail up. When we speak of ones who have passed and who shall be appointed to replace them, it's understood that certain things need to be said, however perhaps such words of appreciation should be stated during an event that's centered around the person who has unfortunately died. It may sound cold for me to say that there should be no dawdling with things that could easily be brought up during a funeral, but seeing as how Chicago is one of the top cities in terms of gun violence, and that Illinois is in a budget crisis, doesn't seem more appropriate to tackle a solution to as many problems as possible?

When it was addressed that a couple police officers withheld someone's inhaler, and did not give it under any circumstance, despite the detainee suffering from it in the moment, that was a prime example to open a debate as of how to improve the issue and claims of police brutality. Look at the problem as objectively as possible, and find a way to fix it. When emotions or opinions are involved, that influences extreme reactions or acts to solve the issue, and one would assume that you clearly wouldn't want to create a problem whilst in the process of solving one. However during this topic, far too much time was consumed to keep restating what happened via different viewpoints. Of course it's impossible not to state both sides when viewing the topic objectively, but by the time everything was said and done, it was only stated that there will be a new person to fill in position of commissioner, rather than provide options and describe any clear improvements. That would be like having a new president and he never made a statement. Hopefully you may understand the point, while the inductive reasoning is that most cases show a plethora of police brutality, therefore the entire force must overuse violence, but of course that's not the case. However to ensure the people's confidence in your actions, the least you could do it say what exactly it is that you'll be doing as a simple reappointment that lacks descriptions is far to vague for anyone to understand what your aims are.

I do hope that rather than seeing this all as nitpicks, you view this as a suggestion to be more descriptive, and hold these meetings for efficient problem solving and make it known to the public that you, the Mayor of this city that needs improvement, are doing everything you can to solve as many problems as quickly as possible. The civilians lack confidence in your actions, and as a young mind that only hears the backlash from those who face these issues every day, I feel that there is a need, not to scold you, but to tell you that judging from my only experience in regards to your decisions, you've have lackluster appeal and action, which doesn't help anyone in this great City of Chicago. Gun control, police brutality, quality of education, roads, and taxes, it could all be improved given the current circumstance, and once you gain momentum traveling up the slope, you should be on a roll until you're at the top. Thank you, should it be the case, for taking the time to read through this letter, and I hope to see some more efficient work within future meetings.

Please do consider all of your options before giving up, because there's no doubt in my mind that simply speaking out to the public will help you help them, featuring a collaboration between citizens and government officials.

Sincerely,

Vítor Garcia