Chicago's Refusal to Deal with Its Nearly Empty Schools

To give a little more context: Chicago Public Schools has some of the best schools in the state/country and some of the worst. On the north side of the city, there are overcrowded, high-performing schools with classes being held in trailers parked on the grounds. The “selective enrollment” schools - where you have to pass a challenging test administered by grad students at the Illinois Institute of Technology - have kids from the wealthiest suburbs in them. Their parents rent a studio apartment, keep it empty, and use that as a fake mailing address. When discovered, the families are forced to pay $30-40k per year tuition. Which they do!

One of the major problems is that nearly all the under-enrolled school are in poor, black areas of the city that have already lost so much. They are in a death spiral; closing the school would make these neighborhoods worse. But then again, how can the city afford to keep them open? On the other hand, there is measurable demand for housing construction in these areas. If allowed to build, the schools may not be so empty and may not be such a financial drain. Are they allowed to build? No, of course not! There is a state legislator [1] that represents one of the districts. Every session he introduces bills that would force cities to allow housing to be built. It never goes anywhere. It’s honestly like nobody wants anything to get better.

[1] https://www.ilga.gov/house/Rep.asp?MemberID=3366