Mayor Richard Daley says he will not run for re-election in 2011.


"The truth is I have been thinking about this for the past several months," Daley said at a City Hall news conference. "In the end this is a personal decision, no more, no less."

Daley spoke for less than five minutes and took no questions.

Ald. Edward Burke, 14th, announced the mayor's retirement in the middle of a City Council Finance Committee debate that he was leading at the same time Daley was making his announcement.

"Wow, wow," Burke said. "So all you wanna-be mayors, I guess you better run out and get your petitions."

He then referred to Ald. Scott Waguespack, 32nd, who has touted himself as a potential mayoral candidate.

Daley's public approval rating had dipped recently, with a Tribune poll earlier this summer showing that more than half of Chicago voters said they don't want to see him re-elected.

The poll found only 37 percent of city voters approve of the job Daley is doing as mayor, compared with 47 percent who disapprove. Moreover, a record-low 31 percent said they want to see Daley re-elected, compared with 53 percent who don't want him to win another term.

The mayor's administration has been buffeted by a spate of summer violence, a weak economy and a high-profile failure to land the 2016 Olympics. Dissatisfaction abounds, the survey found, over Daley's handling of the crime problem, his efforts to rein in government corruption and his backing of a controversial long-term parking meter system lease.

A few aldermen are shopping themselves around as potential candidates, and some politicians with broader political bases have been glad to see their names tossed into the ring –– but none had shown a willingness to challenge Daley.

Among aldermen discussed as potential mayoral candidates are Robert Fioretti, 2nd; Sandi Jackson, 7th; Thomas Allen, 38th; Scott Waguespack, 32nd; Brendan Reilly, 42nd; and Thomas Tunney, 44th.

Earlier this year, White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel voiced his mayoral ambitions. But the former North Side congressman quickly added that he wouldn't take on Daley, for whom he served as a strategist and fundraiser in the mayor's first winning bid. Likewise, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart said he won't run for mayor unless the office is open.

Outgoing Cook County Assessor James Houlihan, by contrast, was considered a potential candidate whether or not Daley runs again. Former Chicago Inspector General David Hoffman also has been mentioned, but he just lost a grueling Democratic U.S. Senate primary.

Copyright © 2010, Chicago Tribune


Sorry if dupe.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-chicago-mayor,0,3809662.story



As big as an anti-gunner that Daley is, I have a tough time believing he will be replaced by someone worse than him. Maybe things will get better in Chicago with the Daley era ending.

I bet he knows if he runs again he'll get thrown out.  Nobody waits this long to call it quits.  

Looks like a plea deal. Feds drop the investigations into his little kingdom, and he sets the stage for Rahm to exit the Obamination's cabinet and come home.

Correct. The "quit while you're ahead" plan.



 

Yep, Emanuel will inherit the Daley fiefdom.

 

Has the electorate changed any?

Nope..the dead still vote,crooked cops and aldermen take cash and the stage is set for the criminal types that obanger took to Washinton to come back home for a new band of crooks

Daley...rein in corruption?

Oh, it's possible.  Any black mayor that is palatable to the blacks in this city is capable of doing to Chicago what Coleman Young did to Detroit.  Either out of incompetence or sheer leftist malevolence.  Thank God Harold Washington croaked before he could do too much damage. The only one that I could consider the exception would be the late Eugene Sawyer.   The white democrats are all a bunch of machine hacks and union suck-ups.  They suck too.  





 

Do they still hand out liquor for votes there?

wow, that's too bad.  I guess you can only destroy the infrastructure of a city for so long before it's time to move on?





John

That asshole got elected for 6 terms? Seriously? Oh America, what's happened to you?

That's it; these politicians don't just go away without some serious incentive. One of Cleveland's former mayors got a similar deal from the feds. He's downstate raising alpacas these days instead of occupying a seat in Columbus or DC.

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