Chicago’s 49th Ward Weak-on-Crime Alderman Has a Conflict with Common Sense
Perhaps Alderman Maria Hadden should move to Wisconsin
On the northeastern corner of Chicago sits the 49th Ward, which covers Rogers Park and a small portion of West Ridge. The ward represented by Maria Hadden, who is a member of the City Council’s Progressive Caucus.
“One of the leftier aldermen in the city of Chicago," podcaster Ben Joravsky said of Hadden on the July 20, 2021, edition of his show, "a good leftist in my humble opinion."
"Maria," Joravsky continued, "I don't know if you like being called a leftist."
"It's accurate, it's accurate," Hadden replied, "so that's fine."
Hadden was first elected to the City Council in 2019, easily disposing longtime Alderman Joe Moore in the general election. Last year, she comfortably won reelection and avoided a runoff, winning nearly three quarters of the 11,000 votes cast.
Hadden's pre-City Council background is in something called" peer mediation" and "conflict management."
Hadden’s resume is important to know because in 2023 her e-mail newsletter promoted "The People's Ordinance," which Native Sons, a Rogers Park-based "holistic village healing" group, proposed a daily ceasefire to counter a gang war that CWB Chicago said was between the Gangster Disciples and the Black P. Stones. Native Sons’ "ordinance" called for no gunfire between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. daily.
Did Native Sons — and Hadden — expect gang members and other gun-toting criminals to set their alarms on their smartphones accordingly?
Skipping ahead to 2024, CWB Chicago reported last week that nine people were shot in Rogers Park in the month-long period beginning October 6. This year, through November, 28 people have been shot in Rogers Park or West Ridge, which is down from 29 in 2023 during the same time-span. The year prior, 25 people were shot in Rogers Park in the same time frame, but three of those shootings were eventually classified as self-defense.
The shooting on October 6th occurred a block away from Hadden’s ward office.
Hadden holds naïve views on law enforcement
While discussing crime during her first aldermanic campaign, Hadden told the Rogers Edge Reporter, “It’s not more police that will help us.”
Chicago needs more cops.
Earlier this year Larry Snelling, Mayor Brandon Johnson’s choice as police superintendent, told reporters the Chicago Police Department is suffering from a shortage of 2,000 officers.
During a February 2020 episode of the Bourbon ‘n Browntown podcast, Hadden spoke out against more police funding, while admitting she isn’t listening to citizens’ concerns about law enforcement.
“We can’t keep funding police in the way that we operate. And especially not at the expense of, right, other social services. And also, there are large percentages of residents who don’t know what else to do, and so they want more policing, right? We’ve got like, what is it, 200 to 300 years of this type of police structure — it’s going to take us a minute.”
Later, in the same podcast, Hadden further exposed her cluelessness about policing.
“I was in some place, some small town in Wisconsin for a weekend and they had public safety officers that weren’t police. Right, they drove around in cars, and they were there for people to ask questions, and they weren’t sworn police officers -- they didn’t have guns.”
One of the podcast hosts asked the alderman: “Are you saying we can have that in Chicago too?”
“We could,” Hadden replied.
It’s almost a certainty that the small town in Wisconsin Hadden visited doesn’t have factions of the Gangster Disciples and the Black P. Stones engaging in violent turf wars. If it did, those public safety officers in that town wouldn’t use peer mediation to solve a dispute between them. They would call the police.
Two months ago, despite a majority of the City Council objecting, Johnson allowed the city’s contract with ShotSpotter to expire. A gunfire detection system, ShotSpotter wasn’t installed in Hadden’s ward, but based on the level of violence in Rogers Park, perhaps, if it returns, it should be.
Hadden, unsurprisingly, was one of the aldermen who voted against keeping ShotSpotter.
Hadden was also the chief sponsor of the Anjanette Young Ordinance. A response to a mistaken CPD execution of a search warrant that saw police enter the wrong home, CPD’s error was universally condemned. Hadden responded with overreach as the lead sponsor of that bill, which never made it out of committee. Her ordinance would have banned no-knock warrants. Instead — after a knock — those inside would be given 30-seconds to answer. Perhaps, in a way, this would offer a brief time for the accused for some “conflict management.” The original version of her bill was even worse, police home raids would have been allowed only between 9 a.m. and 7 p.m.
Hadden is also out of touch regarding energy. The chief sponsor of the Clean and Affordable Building Ordinance, Hadden stated the purpose is to set new emissions limits. "We are seeking indoor emissions standards that would effectively eliminate the use of fossil fuels in newly constructed buildings in Chicago,” she said of her bill. This would mean no natural gas heating or stoves in new buildings across Chicago.
The elimination of gas stoves would almost certainly mean higher utility bills for Chicagoans residing in newly built homes.
Living in Chicago is already expensive, but Hadden, who earns $131,000 annually as an aldermen, does not quite seem to understand the needs of those who live paycheck to paycheck.
Hadden’s proposed ordinance ignores whether our electrical grid can handle a shift from natural gas.
While a guest on the Unbossed podcast in 2020, Hadden outlined how peer mediation works, such as “setting ground rules.” Those ground rules include listening to people who have differing opinions.
Imagine speaking with random people waiting on the Jarvis Red Line platform in Rogers Park about Hadden’s wish to ban natural gas in new construction. One could expect to receive responses such as “I like gas heating” and “you never see electric stoves and ovens on cooking shows.”
Hadden’s ground rules as a member of the City Council should include listening to others, especially when proposing unpopular laws.
While Rogers Park and West Ridge are a reliably deep blue part of Chicago, it would be wise for Hadden to take notice of the results in some of this month’s political races. No, not the presidential contests, but instead some of the elections in California. George Gascón, a Kim Foxx-style catch-and-release prosecutor in Los Angeles County, was defeated and another far-left prosecutor, Pamala Price in Alameda County, was recalled.
San Francisco’s mayor, London Breed, was denied reelection by an opponent who promised to crack down on crime.
In Georgia, another lax prosecutor, Deborah Gonzalez, the district attorney for two Georgia counties, was soundly defeated in her reelection attempt.
And finally, Cook County’s state’s attorney-elect, Eileen O’Neill Burke, prevailed in a tight Democratic primary this spring over a Toni Preckwinkle-endorsed opponent, Clayton Harris III. Preckwinkle endorsed Foxx in both of her previous campaigns for State’s Attorney. “If you like the way things are going right now, you have a candidate in this election, it isn’t me,” was her closing statement in a debate with Harris.
Voters are running away from soft-on-crime politicians. Hadden’s self-defined “minute” of undoing “200 to 300 years of this type of police structure” has passed.
If Hadden chooses to run for reelection in 2027, 49th Ward voters can issue some conflict management by sending her packing.
And there just might be a small town in Wisconsin in need of a peer mediator.
