A Sleeping Tiger in the 32nd Ward

On a brisk Saturday morning in November, Scott Waguespack rang the bell of a two-story brown brick home on West Barry Avenue and waited, hands folded neatly, with one gripping a clipboard. After a moment, he tucked a glossy, colored postcard in the door and continued to the next house. Underneath the slick finish, the picture on the postcard shows a smiling young man with close-cropped black hair.

At the second house, there was no answer. At the fifth, still no luck.

Across the street, campaign volunteers canvassed the Hamlin Park street, sticking flyers in doors and fence posts and soliciting signatures for Waguespack’s petition.

“A few weeks ago, I spoke to this young guy, about 32, over in Roscoe Village,” Waguespack said. “He had bought a condo for about $190,000. The taxes on it are $14,000. He thought he had an investment, but the taxes have skyrocketed. If things don’t change, he said he’ll have to sell out and leave.”

The gripes about property taxes are ones Waguespack frequently hears. Residents also often talk about problems with new construction projects, the decline of area schools or delinquent trash pick-ups when he comes knocking.

On Saturday, though, the Ohio State versus Michigan game kept many people from the door.

Finally, about halfway down the block, a woman answered the bell. Waguespack smiled.

“Hi,” he said, extending his hand, “my name is Scott Waguespack and I’m running for alderman of the 32nd ward.”

Waguespack, a longtime Bucktown resident and city administrator in Berwyn, hopes to unseat current Ald. Ted Matlak in the upcoming elections on Feb. 27.

More...The 32nd ward, located in the Near North section of Chicago, is composed of several affluent neighborhoods including Lincoln Park, Bucktown and Wicker Park. Though the ward was originally settled by Polish immigrants, in recent years the area’s immigrant population has been replaced with high income white families. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, only 11 percent of the ward’s 60,000 residents were born outside the United States. The majority of residents, renters and homeowners, stay in the ward only temporarily; according to the survey, nearly two-thirds of residents have lived in ward less than 10 years.

The higher turnover, however, has led to a drastic increase in the wealth of the area. In 1999, the median household income reached more than $64,000, almost double the median income for the city as a whole.

But Waguespack’s supporters say though the demographics of the ward have changed, the machine politics have not. Matlak, who served as chief of staff to former 32nd Ald. Terry Gabinski, has represented the ward since 1999, when he was appointed by Mayor Richard M. Daley to replace his boss. Before that, Gabinski held the council seat for nearly 30 years.

Over the years, Matlak has lost touch with his constituency, especially regarding decisions about zoning, according to Roger Romanelli, a Wicker Park resident and economic development professional.

“One of the primary problems with Matlak is the lack of involvement of citizens in decision-making. He’s on record as someone who believes zoning changes should be given freely to developers,” said Romanelli, 39, who has lived in the ward for 14 years. “In both Roscoe Village and Bucktown, he told the community groups he would work with them and has bypassed them. We have a system in 32nd ward right now where the future is being decided by one person and his political machine.”

Craig Norris, another volunteer for the Waguespack campaign, was also galvanized by concerns over zoning, particularly the concept of “aldermanic privilege,” a tradition that allows aldermen to approve zoning changes without going through the regular channels in city council.

“The aldermanic privilege concept lets [the alderman] do whatever he wants,” said Norris, 45. “Developers buy a property and then go to the alderman and get it rezoned to something higher and denser. The zoning code says that rezoning should respect the scale and density of the area. But they don’t.

As a founder of the 32nd Ward New Leadership Alliance, Romanelli had previously considered running against Matlak. Romanelli, who got his start in the urban planning department at Northwestern University and spent the past 15 years working in Chicago neighborhoods, has since thrown his support behind Waguespack, who advocates for more “balanced development” in the Ward.

“Scott understands the power is in listening to people and in forging consensus,” Romanelli said. “He might not always agree, but he understands the role of a public official is to convene, communicate and attempt to reach a consensus with other people.”

Waguespack said his ideas about leadership and consensus-building come from years of working on political campaigns and extensive travel abroad. Born in Chicago, at age eight, Waguespack moved to Hotchkiss, Colorado, a rural town of 1,000 located about 200 miles from Denver. The middle of five children, Waguespack spent his childhood on the family’s apple farm. His mother, Scarlett, stayed at home to care for the children, and his father, Sylvestre, farmed and worked as a coal miner during the winters. Though Waguespack left Hotchkiss in 1988 for Colorado State University, the town’s commitment to the community left a lasting impression.

“It was pretty rough for [my family] for awhile, but a lot of people in our small community really reached out and helped us,” Waguespack said. “From day one, that’s always been the way I look at things. I don’t have a problem giving myself to help others.”

At Colorado State, Waguespack majored in political science, occasionally dabbling in student politics. He spent his junior year abroad as an exchange student in Germany, an experience that encouraged him to join the Peace Corps and work in Kenya for two years after graduation.

“I think [the Kenyans] probably taught me more than I taught them.” Waguespack said, laughing. “When it boils down to it, you learn way more about yourself and about other cultures and the way other people live. You’re not just there teaching people. You’re there learning from them.”

In 1995, Waguespack returned to Chicago, moving into the house on North Hoyne Avenue in Bucktown where his mother grew up. After working at a law firm, he enrolled at the Chicago-Kent School of Law at the Illinois Institute of Technology. As a law student, Waguespack traveled abroad again, this time working in the war-torn Balkan region on a number of war crimes and nation-building projects. At the end of the war in Kosovo, he also served as an advisor to the interim president of Kosovo.

“We were basically building a country,” said Waguespack, recalling how the area looked similar to destroyed areas of East Berlin he had visited in the late 1980s.

Since then, Waguespack has worked on a number of political campaigns. In 2002, he volunteered for Hank Perritt, the dean of Chicago-Kent, in his run for the 10th congressional district in Illinois. He also served as the issues and policy director on Carol Mosley Braun’s presidential campaign.

Last year, Waguespack managed a successful campaign for Michael O’Connor, an independent running for the mayor of the city of Berwyn. After O’Connor’s win, Waguespack returned to his passion for rebuilding, helping Berwyn reestablish departments and financial solvency as the city’s administrative coordinator.

After Feb. 27, Waguespack hopes to turn his rebuilding skills to the 32nd ward. While rezoning is a top priority among his supporters, Waguespack also stresses a number of other issues: curbing increases in property taxes, advocating more funding for schools and improving basic services for residents.

According to Waguespack, residents have been receptive to his message. He expected an uphill battle, where only one person out of 30 would be interested, he said. But when he goes door to door each weekend, he finds about 29 out of every 30 residents eager to here about his proposals.

“I respect [Matlak] as a person and his office, but I think people are sick and tired of the way things are,” Waguespack said. “There’s an old Chinese saying: ‘If you kick a sleeping tiger in the butt, you better be ready to deal with its teeth. I think that’s indicative of what’s happened to people in our ward. They kept kicking people and kicking people and kicking people, not realizing it was a tiger. It finally came back.”

ALDERMANIC ELECTION STORIES: Catherine Zaryczny (32nd) Scott Waguespack (32nd) Mell Monroe (3rd) Pat Dowell (3rd) 48th Ward Challenger Sues Incumbent.