To Reagan: 'Brother, can you spare a dime?'

By MILTON RAKOVE

AS THE NEW Republican administration in Washington settles into place to attempt to govern the country for the next four years, the harsh realities of the financial future of state and local governments in the United States are beginning to penetrate the consciousness of the politicians and public officials who have to minister to the needs of their constituents at those levels of the American political and governmental systems.

What are those harsh realities?

It is clear that the halcyon days of the open spigot of money from Washington designed to alleviate the burdens of local governments are coming to an end. If President Ronald Reagan carries out his campaign pledge to reduce the role of the federal government in dealing with societal and social problems, and to turn those problems over to state and local governments, those governments and the officials who must try to govern at that level are in for deep and continuing trouble. Reagan will give them control of and responsibility for the problems, but not the money to deal with them. If he is to cut federal corporate and income taxes, and increase defense expenditures in a period of rising inflation and declining productivity, somebody is going to have to lose out.

Who will lose out?

Cities like Chicago and states like Illinois will most likely be close to the top of the list of those who will get less from Washington, without having the ability to provide more from their own resources to meet their current and future responsibilities. Chicago and Illinois are in the mainstream of those cities and states which are losing population, political power and economic viability.

The City of Chicago has suffered a massive population decline in the last decade, from 3,300,000 in 1970 to somewhere between 2,700,000 to 3,000,000 in 1980 depending on whose figures can be deemed most accurate. With that decline will come a substantial reduction in federal monies for programs based on population. That reality will be exacerbated by the forthcoming new Reagan concepts of giving cities like Chicago less as a general policy.

At the same time, the State of Illinois, faced with its own developing financial problems and added responsibilities, which will be shunted to it by Washington, will surely refuse to increase its aid to the big city up north. In fact, the state will almost surely attempt to reduce its support for problem-plagued cities like Chicago, since the massive population decline in the city means less representation in both the national House of Representatives and in the Illinois General Assembly. Less representation means less political power and declining influence in pressuring the governor and the legislature to allocate state funds to Chicago's needs. As the political power of the suburbs of Chicago grows in proportion to the increased representation, those areas will get — at the expense of the City of Chicago — increased representation which will inevitably mean more influence in Springfield — at the expense of Chicago.

The bonds of common interest between Chicago and its suburbs, which were never very strong, will inevitably deteriorate even further as a consequence of the passage of the constitutional amendment which cut the Illinois House by one-third and splits the state Senate districts into two House districts. In the new Illinois House, most of the liberal Democrats from the suburbs who were concerned with and who fought for many programs that helped Chicago deal with its problems, will no longer be there. Increased suburban legislative representation will almost certainly be made up of conservative Republicans who will have little interest in Chicago or its problems, and who will ally themselves in the legislature with conservative downstate Republicans.

In the executive branch of state government, Republican Gov. James R. Thompson, as well as President Ronald Reagan, can read the numbers of the 1980 election only too well. Chicago voted overwhelmingly for Jimmy Carter and will probably vote heavily for the Democratic gubernatorial candidate in 1982. Carter carried the black wards by majorities reminiscent of the heyday of black machine boss William L. Dawson, and a liberal Democratic gubernatorial candidate would probably do the same, Neither Thompson nor Reagan will extend himself to push for programs that would cost money and benefit blacks who are not their supporters. Thompson, like Reagan, is looking to the suburban and downstate vote for 1982, and will support policies designed to benefit those areas, not the City of Chicago.

Can Chicago pick up the financial burdens which are being dropped by Washington and Springfield?

The prospects are not very good. The city's financial problems are increasing and its bond ratings have been declining. Its sources of revenue, which are geared mainly to the property tax, are limited. Raising the property tax is fraught with great political danger for politicians and public officials. Property owners are better organized, more sophisticated, more politically potent, and disinclined to pay more taxes for government programs which do not benefit them, but which minister to the needs of the poor and less fortunate in the city.

What is developing in Chicago's financial and governmental picture is a situation in which the city's problems are increasing, its financial resources declining, and its prospects for assistance from the state and federal governments growing dimmer. It is not a healthy situation.

February 1981/Illinois Issues/32