Marathon Pundit: About Valerie Jarrett...a member of Obama's transition team

President-elect Barack Obama announced that his presidential transition team will be led by John Podesta, who served as chief of staff under President Bill Clinton, campaign advisor Valerie Jarrett, and Pete Rouse, who has been Obama's chief of staff in the Senate

Let's focus on Jarrett. She's been also rumored to be a possible Secretary of Housing and Urban Development--that would be troubling.

Jarrett is a veteran of both the Harold Washington and Richard M. Daley administrations. Her maternal grandfather was Robert Taylor, who headed the Chicago Housing Authority in the 1940s. He suffered the indignity of being the namesake of the since-demolished Robert Taylor housing project that ran parallel to Chicago's Dan Ryan Expressway.

Most Chicagoans have heard of the Taylor homes. But not Grove Parc.

From a June Boston Globe article:

About 99 of the units are vacant, many rendered uninhabitable by unfixed problems, such as collapsed roofs and fire damage. Mice scamper through the halls. Battered mailboxes hang open. Sewage backs up into kitchen sinks. In 2006, federal inspectors graded the condition of the complex an 11 on a 100-point scale - a score so bad the buildings now face demolition.

Grove Parc has become a symbol for some in Chicago of the broader failures of giving public subsidies to private companies to build and manage affordable housing - an approach strongly backed by Obama as the best replacement for public housing.

Valerie Jarret was the CEO of Habitat Company, which managed (badly) Grove Parc, which is on the border of Barack Obama's state Senate district.

Privately run, but publicly subsidized housing developments has been something Barack Obama has championed since he served in Springfield. Grove Parc turned into a slum, as did similar projects run by Antoin "Tony" Rezko. Obama's former law-firm boss, Allison S. Davis, was also involved in Grove Parc.

Jarrett is a busy woman. She has the top post at the University of Chicago Medical Center. From an July Washington Post article:

The medical center's chairwoman, Valerie Jarrett, is a close friend and top adviser who travels frequently with Barack Obama. One of Barack's best friends, Eric Whitaker, is executive vice president at the center and is now in charge of the Urban Health Initiative. Hospital board member Kelly R. Welsh is executive vice president at Northern Trust Co., which extended the couple a $1.3 million home mortgage shortly after Barack Obama was elected to the U.S. Senate. Dan Shomon, Barack Obama's former campaign manager, is a university lobbyist. Jarrett, Whitaker, Welsh and Shomon all declined to be interviewed or did not respond to requests.

More...

Shortly after Barack Obama joined the U.S. Senate in 2005, the medical center promoted Michelle Obama to vice president of community and external relations, and more than doubled her salary. She is now on leave from the $317,000-a-year post, in which she sought to bridge the gap between the wealthy institution and its poorer neighbors. The hospital declined to discuss the budget for her program or her input into budgetary decisions.

By "bridging the gap," that meant shifting poor patiants away from the med center to nearby, but less prestigous hospitals.

To publicize the controversial program, a public relations firm was hired, ASK Public Strategies. It's co-owned by David Axelrod.

I will have plenty to blog about in the next four years, because Chicago is invading Washington.

That's not change I can believe in.

Technorati tags: