Pictured: Michael Harrington. Photo by Tracy Baim
Chicago's 49th Ward has a history of community activism and passionate politics. From even before the days of former Ald. David Orr, residents have been very involved in the area's development.
With the next city elections scheduled for early in 2003, aldermanic candidates are already staking out their turf in some of the heavily gay North Lakefront wards. In the 49th, an openly gay man is running against incumbent Ald. Joe Moore, who has served the area since 1990.
While both could be called progressive Democrats, their styles are markedly different. And while Moore has a long history of supporting gay causes, some view him as more passive and reactive on gay rights, compared to alderpersons just to the south, particularly Mary Ann Smith, Helen Shiller and Bernie Hansen.
But Michael Harrington's history in the GLBT movement is not without baggage. He is the former board president of the Frank M. Rodde Fund, which operated the Rodde Lesbian and Gay Community Center. The Rodde Center died a controversial death soon after Harrington stepped down as its leader, and it has taken years for a new, entirely separate Center...the Center on Halsted...to gain trust and support from the community. He also has been involved in several other community groups, both gay and mainstream.
Most recently, he has been part of the Rogers Park Lesbian and Gay Neighbors Association, causing controversy when, as an officer of the group, he accepted the endorsement by the group's leaders when his opponent was not allowed to be a part of the process.
If he were to win, Harrington, who ran for elected office in the past and lost, would be the city's first openly gay alderman.
Windy City Times sat down with Michael Harrington to ask the questions that are still on many people's minds, nearly a decade after the Rodde Center failed. Why are these issues still rel evant? Because now Harrington is seeking public office, and because for many, the issues were never fully resolved.
For more history on the Rodde Center, see accompanying article this issue.
Windy City Times: Let's start with your work projects, volunteerism, etc…
MH: One of the things I'm most proud of is working with Lesbians and Gays for Harold Washington [ when he ran for Mayor ] . I spent a lot of time working on issues, visibility and fundraising to help win the election for Harold Washington.
WCT: At what level in the campaign were you involved?
MH: Oh, I was just a real good volunteer, like thousands of other people. I remember writing position pieces on lesbian and gay issues for the campaign, circulating flyers in bars and public gathering places to promote his candidacy. I remember working many many nights going to fundraisers on the South and West side of Chicago working with a team of people that were raising money.
Former Cook County Board Commissioner Charles Bernardini with Rodde's Michael Harrington ( center ) and Executive Director Al Wardell ( right ) . Harrington supported the early 1992 ouster of Wardell, which sparked controversy because of Wardell's long-time activism. Wardell died of AIDS complications, March 1, 1995. Photo by Vernon Hulls
WCT: What was the mood in the gay community toward Harold? As far as I remember there were still people that were for Byrne, for the old school style, within the gay community. Was there a lot of resistance to Washington? What was the coalition like that came together?
MH: I think what I was most excited by was that it was a very interracial group of people, Black, white, brown and Asian working on lesbian and gay issues. We were very enthused by his goals of participatory democracy. Obviously, there were people that still believed that Jane Byrne was also an advocate. It evolved that most people believed and Harold won.
WCT: This was the mid 1980s?
MH: [ Yes, it started ] as Prairie State Democrats. Chuck Renslow, Jerry Williams, Jim Flint [ at a ] meeting in the Baton organizing lesbians and gays to be involved in electoral politics, supporting candidacies.
WCT: Professionally, what has your full-time work been?
MH: I was working with the Chicago Teachers Union and Citizens Schools Committee. I was a communications specialist. I was responsible for the very large monthly newsletter. I was the editor and photographer and also wrote speeches for Jackie Vaughn and wrote policy pages and was the media person working during crisis. I was part of that in 1984. I was executive director of the Citizen Schools Committee, managed a four-person staff, working on school policy issues. It was a historic school watch-dog organization. I was originally the research director and a year later I was appointed executive director of that agency. At same time, I was busy as a volunteer in the community. I was on the Newport Neighbors Block Club, which had a very healthy lesbian and gay membership.
Mayor Daley attends an April 1992 violence march sponsored by Rodde Center to mark the 15th anniversary of the agency's founding. Rodde Center was named for bartender Frank M. Rodde, who was violently murdered April 2, 1977. Photo by Mike Carter
WCT: What made you decide to leave the Chicago Teachers Union to start Harrington Communications?
MH: I realized at that time I was probably serving on eight or nine boards of directors of citywide, civic and community-based organizations, including the Lake View Citizens Council. I [ served ] on that board for about seven years. And I realized through all of this volunteer work that many times we were hiring consultants to do the writing that I was already doing as volunteer work. We were hiring consultants to do decision making, planning and organizing that I was already doing. I thought I could do this full-time myself. I left Chicago Teachers Union after three years and started Harrington Communications.
WCT: At any point, were you on a board that you also were a consultant with?
MH: No, that would be a clear conflict of interest. I wanted to do this writing and get paid for it. And also I would be able to work harder on the issues I cared about and get paid for it. As a consultant you can pick and choose who you work for. For the past five years, there have been more requests for my work than I am able to answer. So I've been quite successful for a while and I've never advertised once. It's all word of mouth. People hear about your work and one client refers you to another. ... Michael Harrington is a good facilitator. My work is about helping groups of diverse interests come together around a single goal, find out what it is we agree on and pursue that. I get paid to do that.
WCT: Why now run for office, why alderman, and why against Joe Moore?
MH: Why now is because neighbors have asked me to run, plain and simple. Residents in the community, business people in the community, many of us have wanted change for a long time. The issues and needs of the community are very serious. Neighbors asked me to run because they respect the work I've done in the community, they respect the leadership I've shown. What we need is an alderman who is committed to the 49th Ward, who will pledge to be a full-time alderman, as I have. Years ago, the current alderman decided he didn't want to be alderman and he announced his candidacy for County Clerk. That told everybody that he wasn't committed full-time to be the alderman. That was the straw that broke the camel's back, and I started receiving more requests. People were calling me, 'Michael what are you going to do?' I was in Joe's leadership. My picture was on his campaign brochure. I voted for him. It was thought when we elected him 12 years ago that he was going to be the accountable Democrat that our ward needs. We realized that that wasn't happening.
The perception was when he was elected 12 years ago that he was a progressive Democrat, and when I moved into the ward seven years ago I had thought because he had followed David Orr that he was the progressive Democrat that believed in resident participation. What we've learned over the years is the reality is that that was not true. There are too many instances where we've discovered and learned that he is not about inclusive participation; that he's not about sharing of information and the involvement of residents in decision making in the ward.
Ald. Mary Ann Smith and Ald. Eugene Schulter at an early 1990s reception at the Uptown Bank Building space for Rodde Center, with Windy City Times columnist Jon-Henri Damski. Photo by Vernon Huls
WCT: Can you give examples?
MH: I certainly can. The list is long. There is the North Howard Task Force Commission that the community had pressed for a long time for ... . And a very diverse group of people was called together by the alderman finally to sit down and plan for Howard Street. Months later there was no product at all because it became clear it wasn't something he was interested in managing.
WCT: Is there a way you can characterize Moore's campaign?
MH: I think, yes, he was a progressive ... but we discovered that he wasn't. His relationship with the mayor, I can't really speak to anything to what his personal interaction is. It's my understanding that there is no relationship, frankly. I've known the mayor since 1992, and we have a good working and respectful relationship. And that's what I plan to bring to the 49th Ward. There are services, there are needs in our community that take an effective communication with City Hall to achieve.
WCT: Will Mayor Daley make a decision in this race?
MH: This picture in my brochure [ Harrington with Daley ] was taken in October when the mayor gave me an award for my work with Chicago Department of Public Health, and I asked him for his permission to use the picture and he said yes. … I met the mayor in 1992 when he came and joined an anti-violence march that I was leading with other people and from there we started a working relationship to talk about issues. We were able to agree to disagree, but overall when I met with him in December to talk about the 49th Ward we talked about the needs of the community.
WCT: Was this a one-on-one meeting?
MH: Myself and the mayor. I cannot comment on when or what and how the politics … What's really clear is a wide range of residents are coming forward asking me to get involved, asking me to do leadership. I was at a coffee [ at one condo development ] . What they presented was six years of problems with the current administration. They even showed me a letter that they got from the alderman two months later saying, 'Sorry, we are not going to help you.'"
WCT: Was there a conscious choice between running for alderman as opposed to a state race?
MH: I'm involved in my block club in Rogers Park. I was on the Rogers Park Community Council. I was a leader in calling for and organizing better services from the police department on tackling issues of crime and safety. I'm recognized for that work and I think I'm focused on what's happening in my neighborhood. At the same time, residents were realizing we weren't getting the services we expected from the alderman. So that's when people started asking me, "Why don't you run?"
WCT: When did you become involved in Rodde Center and how?
MH: It would have been probably in 1990. I was recruited by the Rodde Fund board. I received a phone call from then President Michael McNamara. My work in the community was known. I was respected. The Rodde board invited me to join … they elected me to the board in 1991.
The July 1993 Outlines ran this drawing and photo of the proposed new center on Clark.
WCT: This was as an at-large member?
MH: Yes. And in about a year they elected me president.
WCT: The sale of the Sheffield property happened at what point during your tenure on Rodde Board? Were you on before or after the Uptown lease was in place?
MH: It was awful. I was another member in the gay community reading about that tragedy [ when the Sheffield property was sold for under market value, in a huge rush with little outside community input; see separate story ] . And I was not on the board, not involved in the organization, and had nothing to do with it. When I was invited, they were already up and running on the top floor of Uptown Bank building.
WCT: How much was the Uptown monthly lease? At the point you became involved at the president level, what was the financial situation?
MH: I remember we always kept talking about these two wonderful $50,000 CDs that we had at Mid-Town Bank and tried not to tap into those, at the same time we had enormous overhead and staff costs. This is where money went. In the Uptown Bank building we had been giving free space to ACT UP, Men of All Colors Together, Association of Latin Men in Action, Open Hand Chicago. That's what the Rodde Fund was very successful doing. They were subsidizing [ these groups ] , most of them were not paying rent. When I came on board, that was the mission of the Rodde Fund, to be an incubator for good community organizations that were doing good community development. And it was everybody's firm belief that we were supposed to provide space, staff support and office equipment. And we were quite successful at that. And we were challenged by people who didn't want us to give ACT UP meeting space. ACT UP was controversial, many people did not believe in what they were doing.
WCT: What was the staffing situation?
MH: Al Wardell was the full-time executive director, but they had part-time staff. I was involved in looking for other part-time staff. We had a center administrator, Ellen Rosner. Wardell resigned from board [ when he became a paid staff member ] .
WCT: What was actual rent per month?
MH: I remember a figure of $5,000 a month for rent, utilities and staff. It was a huge nut. We were busy doing fundraising, but at the same time we were competing with the community's major fundraising issue: fighting HIV. And that's ultimately what led to Rodde's failure to achieve its grand vision...the buying of their building [ after the sale of the original property on Sheffield ] . Competing against AIDS was the No. 1 priority.
WCT: What kind of resources were put into the Clark Street property both staff and financial? [ While occupying leased space in the Uptown Bank Building, the Rodde board put resources into a potential new home on Clark Street just north of Diversey. ] The overarching question is: was money being drained from Rodde for a misguided purpose? Was the Clark Street property ever viable? Was the Uptown lease a good thing? Please explain what you believe occurred when you were in charge of the Rodde Center.
MH: Tremendous amounts of volunteer work of other members of the board. We were having fundraisers every night in bars in the community. What we needed was major influxes of money. I gave, and members of the board also gave personally from their own resources.
WCT: Was it a separate fund set up for the Clark Street building?
MH: We got foundation and development grants that were based upon closing. I wrote Chicago Community Trust and they gave us $20,000 and this directly went to pay for staff.
WCT: What funds were raised that were not tied into the closing? Cash?
MH: We had a lease to purchase agreement.
WCT: The money was in place even though there was no occupancy?
MH: It wasn't up and running fully but people were using it. At the same time, we were remodeling it.
WCT: Was that legally able to be occupied?
MH: It was fine, but once construction started, we had to stop it.
WCT: Was there a double lease? Was Uptown Bank still being leased?
MH: The transitioning from Uptown Bank, [ we were ] paying rent there and paying on the lease to purchase the building on Clark Street. Also, a Capital Development Fund paid for the rehab. All of us were putting money into the Capital Development Fund.
WCT: How much was eventually raised from that fund?
MH: It wasn't enough.
WCT: Was it more than $20,000?
MH: That would have been fantastic. As I recall, the total purchase cost was only about $300,000. No, No. Nothing Like that, Tracy. [ They raised less than $20,000. ]
WCT: So what happened with that? Was there a deadline that came and then there wasn't enough money raised?
MH: Exactly. The money had been spent on the month-to-month lease and the rehab work. But we did have a deadline that the community needed to raise funds to actually put a down payment on the purchase.
WCT: Talk about when you inherited $100,000 in CDs in Uptown and the property on Clark Street. Those things have created a scenario...two perceptions that people have said to us: one is that it just didn't work. It was a failure. And whether it was a multiple leadership failure on the entire board, you were the president on that board. AIDS was a factor, but there were other organizations, for example Horizons, that were raising money during that time. The other perception was that there was actual mismanagement and theft going on. Because nothing was ever said at the time, including how you left the organization. That's what we're here to address. What happened to that money and how did that translate to you running for alderman in charge of much larger budgets?
MH: First, let me get directly to any allegations that any money was stolen or disappeared. Quite the contrary is true. I gave to the fund and board members gave to the extent that they were financially able. On managing the fund, I'm actually proud of the successes I achieved, and other members of the board, in serving the community with the Rodde Fund. They did a tremendous job in paying for space, services and volunteer support to about 40 organizations in the Uptown Bank building when I was president. They also did great work in the community ...AIDS Walk, Open Hand, ACT UP …
They were doing desperately important work. I think the fund failed to raise the money needed to buy the building. We were clear that our major competition was fundraising for AIDS. We were asking for the major donation dollars. People were already focused on...is this important or is AIDS important?
WCT: Was that known while you were doing the Capital campaign, because if it was, that strategy perhaps was not the best way to … ?
MH: The many organizations that we provided services for wanted us to stay open and continued to support us. They weren't wealthy organizations by any means. These were organizations that had no money and that's why they were housed at the center. They were very serious, obviously they were benefiting from it, in urging us to keep doing what we were doing. Some of them were focusing on AIDS funding and AIDS services … for example North Side HIV Treatment was created, housed and supported at the Rodde Center. I think our management and the skills that I brought were effective in providing those services.
The management issue there, that is a real concern; how does my management link me to running for office. People recognized my management abilities, [ and ] they recognized that it was not happening in the 49th Ward. There is very weak service from the alderman's office, no phone calls returned, a wide range of bread-and-butter issues are not being addressed.
WCT: How did the decision get made, knowing the AIDS crisis was taking people's time and money, to take on another large fundraising project [ for the Clark Street building ] ? Was it all or nothing?
MH: Exactly. That is very true and we also had leaders telling us we should not be renting space. We need a building the community owns. Renting space was not preferable. However, none of those kind thoughts and encouragement translated into the resources necessary to make happen what they wanted. We were acting on the direction and wishes of the larger community, which wanted one thing, but ended up not being able to support it.
WCT: Tell me what happened at the point that the mortgage could not be attained?
MH: You know, I resigned from the board after giving a hard four years. The board had hired Dale Mueller as its executive director. I had nothing to do with it after that. I left in 1994.
WCT: You left before money was raised … before the D-date for purchase at Clark Street?
MH: I don't remember the exact sequence of it.
WCT: But at some point you decided to leave the organization … Who was president after you?
MH: I don't even remember.
WCT: Was it a year-long process [ to transition to new leadership ] …
MH: The deadline was coming up outlining the services we had provided and the answers we still needed. We also talked about the fact I had given four years to the Rodde Fund and I was physically exhausted.
WCT: So it sounds like it was before the deadline … a news conference said the deadline was coming up?
MH: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I remember Dale Mueller was executive director, that's all I recall. I can't remember.
WCT: The vice president was not being groomed for president and then took over?
MH: I don't recall. I know I gave them my everything.
WCT: Were you ever a consultant to the Rodde Center?
MH: I was a hard-working volunteer.
WCT: You were an at-large board member to start, for one year, and then board president for four years?
MH: I think one of the reasons they asked me to run for president was because of my ability to help re-organize what they were doing. It is established, we needed to bring in more resources and people with skills to help push this visionary project forward. I was doing a lot of that. I was chair of a number of committees on the board but, no, I was never paid staff. I gave tremendously financially to the Rodde Fund.
WCT: What warning did you give them that you were stepping down? Was it a term that just ended?
MH: Yeah at the end of my term. Although, we were talking about needing to start looking for more people to be involved. I think Dale Mueller was on the board.
WCT: This brings up a leadership gap.
Follow the link for the final part of this story:
www.windycitymediagroup.com/gay/lesbian/news/ARTICLE.php
