MR. CLAYPOOL GOES TO THE CPS: GOING AFTER THE BUREAUCRACY…AS ONLY A BUREAUCRAT CAN

1/25/16

Forest Claypool is Rahm Emanuel’s man at the Chicago Public Schools (“CPS”), just as he was Richard M. Daley’s man at the Chicago Transit Authority (“CTA”).   Mr. Claypool, a lifelong bureaucrat who is well thought of by other denizens of what passes for local government in and around Chicago, is charged with reducing the bureaucracy and cutting out the fat at the CPS in an effort to save the schools from bankruptcy and/or get the state to bail out this plaything of local pols called the Chicago Public Schools.

One of Mr. Claypool’s first moves in tilting at this particular windmill was to create two new positions, to wit…

“Director of CPS’ Project Management Office”

And

“Executive Director of Change Management”

and putting two of his old cronies, Carol J. Rubin and Sally Csontos in these positions.

Now, I know nothing about the qualifications of Ms. Rubin and Ms.  Csontos.  For all I know, they are super-bureaucrats and wonderful people.   And one can say with certainty that they play their politics correctly; how else do people get jobs that pay $170,000 and $160,000 respectively in a school district that is broke?   But I digress; the qualifications of Ms. Rubin and Ms. Csontos are not the point here.

The point is to ask the question…

Does Mr. Claypool see the irony in combatting bureaucracy by hiring a “Director of CPS’ Project Management Office” and an “Executive Director of Change Management”?

You see the irony.  I see the irony.  I doubt that Mr. Claypool, or Mr. Emanuel, for that matter, sees the irony of creating posts with gobbledygook names that reek of bureaucratic nonsense and that sound like something right out of Alice In Wonderland…all in an effort to combat bureaucracy.  It’s as if Mr. Claypool is fighting bureaucracy by creating more bureaus yet has no idea why such an approach is ridiculous on its face.  But, after all, how could Mr. Claypool, a lifelong bureaucrat, possibly see the irony in this latest trip down the rabbit hole in which our local bureaucrats and pols have buried themselves?

 See my two books, The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics and The Chairman’s Challenge, A Continuing Novel of Big City Politics, for further illumination on how things work in Chicago and Illinois politics.