NO DIBS, NO MORE! TWO STORIES

PARKING SPACE DIBS

Because I cannot parallel park, it personally does not matter to me if someone has reserved a snow-cleaned side-street parking place with some piece of old junk. I would not be parking in that spot in the summer and won’t be parking in it during the winter. But if I could parallel park, I think any legal spot should be available for my use. No lawn chairs, boxes or other flotsam and jettison should block neighborhood parking spaces just because someone feels they can claim the spot for the reason that they cleared it previously. No dibs, no more!


Chair Free Chicago is a website and group that hopes "kindness triumphs over selfishness." The folks behind Chair Free Chicago believe that there are more people who are as frustrated by the concept of dibs as there are people who dig out parking spaces and claim them until the first thaw with a resin deck chair, cardboard box, old tires, or whatever detritus they can lay their hands on. To help further their movement, Chair Free Chicago sells fliers and signs online that can be taken as passive aggressive in tone by the odd man who's thisclose to a coronary after shoveling out a parking spot. But they feel that they're being nice in reminding those who claim dibs on parking spaces that we're all suffering through a Chicago winter together.”


At their website one can order sturdy signs to tie around trees or print their own flyer  to let people know that the area is chair-free.


The site tells us, “When it comes to saving parking spots, we believe people who are frustrated by it outnumber people who appreciate it. Chair-Free Zone signs can help communicate that sentiment. Some people are born with an extra chromosome of entitlement, and probably won’t change. For others, it’ll have them thinking twice about calling dibs on a public space (and screwing their neighbors in the process). And really, isn’t it worth a try?”


Laz Parking is the only company that “owns” parking spaces in Chicago, no citizen does—until City Council Votes differently.


PUBLIC JOBS DIBS


(From Animal Farm where some pigs are more equal than others.)









Blog follower Mike wrote me last week, “I am so disgusted. I just telephoned Toni Preckwinkle's office, (312) 603-6400, to voice my opinion of Berrios hiring his sister and son. Perhaps similar calls from your blog followers will help stop such blatant cronyism.” While I agree with Mike that it is disgusting that newly-elected Cook County Assessor Joe Berrios immediately hired his son and his sister to work for him at his new position, it is more disgusting that he was even voted into office.


By now, everyone knows that as soon as Berrios was sworn in, he hired his son Joseph “Joey’’ Berrios as a $48,000-a-year residential analyst and sister Carmen Cruz as director of taxpayer services at a yearly salary of $86,000.

When Berrios was campaigning they were many stories about his accepting donations from attorneys who appealed cases before the tax appeals review board and for having family members on the county payroll. When he was asked whether the hirings confirmed the past criticism, Berrios said: “I still won the election.’’


On WBBM 780-AM radio's "At Issue" program that aired last Sunday, newly elected Cook County Board President Preckwinkle said she is "prepared to consider" an ordinance prohibiting such hires.


Maybe the “chair” people can create a website http://www.relativefreecookcounty.com/. Nobody should have “dibs” on a public sector job, no matter who they are.