With the city mayoral election quickly approaching, WBEZ Chicago is analyzing how Mayor Emanuel has handled important issues during his past four years in office. Mark Segal, Chair of the Chamber’s Public Policy Committee, joined a panel of experts on WBEZ's Morning Shift to evaluate Mayor Emanuel’s performance on jobs and the economy on Monday, January 26.
The panelists discussed topics such as the job growth in various areas of the city, STEM education, job training programs and the raise of the minimum wage. They also evaluated the mayor’s role in supporting Chicago’s booming tech sector.
“In terms of the technology sector, this is one where I think there is more of an overall growth concept for the city of Chicago,” said Segal. “We have large enterprises like Google reinvesting in Chicago, and what they’re doing on the west side has ended up creating an entire ecosystem of development and employment opportunities.”
Overall, Segal gave Mayor Emanuel an above average grade on his first term.
“We give him a B for…the fiscal responsibility, the investments in pro-business, pro-growth reforms that he’s made in terms of creating opportunities for small business, as well as the education and workforce advances,” said Segal. “Two issues that we had with (the) mayor were the recent affordable requirements ordinance changes that were … published and differed…. as well as a concern about the minimum wage ordinance.”
Click here to access the podcast and for additional information on the WBEZ “Grading Rahm” series.