How's Mayor Emanuel Doing? CBS 2 Asks Chicagoans
CHICAGO (CBS) – Incomplete. That's the grade Mayor Emanuel gave himself when asked last week to judge his first month on the job.
As the mayor took a day off Friday, CBS 2 Chief Correspondent Jay Levine asked a number of Chicagoans for their thoughts on his performance.
The general consensus: So far, so good.
Paul Reed of Garfield Ridge says he's impressed that Emanuel has been "making people accountable."
Evon Stewart of Englewood already sees a difference in public safety.
"He's doing a great job with the police. I see a lot of police out and they're doing a great job," Steward said at the Home of Chicken and Waffles in Bonzeville.
Emanuel's landslide victory was due in part to overwhelming support among African American voters. Lucius Black Jr. was not among his supporters in Chatham.
"He's got some work to do," Black told Levine.
At Coleman's Barber Shop on Stony Island Avenue, one man said he was still waiting for proof the mayor will be fair about minority contracts.
"We make up over 35 percent of the population, and last I heard we were only 3 percent of the contracts going out in the city," Paul Crutchfield of the South Shore said.
Others are already convinced. That includes one diner at Manny's on the Near South Side, who has seen them come and go for more than 80 years.
"I love him, I think he's going to be a great mayor, a wonderful mayor," Edwin Simon of Streeterville said. "I like what he's done with the teacher's union. I like what he's done with the police force.
Crime, schools, accountability were subjects people brought up again and again. And while most, like the mayor, thought it was too soon to grade his performance as anything but incomplete, the consensus was he was off to a good start.
