The Reader‘s archive is vast and varied, going back to 1971. Every day in Archive Dive, we’ll dig through and bring up some finds.
Once she was elected, Pappas put her people skills—and her skills in handwriting analysis—to work, quickly earning a reputation for clashing with then-Cook County Board president Richard J. Phelan. The first time she saw all the commissioners’ signatures she made some conclusions:
“We are looking at a situation where being elected means having the money to buy television time. George Dunne used to raise maybe $80,000. Now we have people raising $3 million, $4 million to win a county-wide office because they’re buying television time. Who ends up paying for that television time? The taxpayer. Because the construction projects continue, the consulting contracts continue, the building continues, the change orders continue, the patronage continues—and it just gets bigger and bigger. And the same people make the donations that pay for the candidate to be on TV.”
