(The Center Square) – A new WalletHub study of the148 largest cities ranks Chicago as one of the worst run in the country, including being dead last in financial stability and among the bottom-tier in economic ranking.
Overall, the city ranked No. 131 in “Quality of Services” scores, which included 36 metrics grouped into such categories as financial stability, education, health, safety, economy and infrastructure and pollution. Researchers also weighed the effectiveness of local leadership, seeking to show how well city leaders manage and spend public funds by analyzing the quality of the services against the city’s total budget.
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson recently urged for more taxpayer resources.
“In order for us to transform our communities, we have to have fully funded neighborhood schools, we have to ensure that health care and mental health care is available for our people,” Johnson said. “We have to build more affordable housing.”
State Rep. Dan Ugaste, R-Geneva, feared things may get worse before they get better.
“They think that government investment is the answer and that would require increased taxation and that’s just going to compound the problem exponentially,” Ugaste told The Center Square.
Ugaste also worried the city’s crime is a major factor.
“And if you have crime out of control, you’re never going to have the economy that you should,” he said. “That’s a start.”
Chicago Police Superintendent Larry Snelling recently said they’re taking a targeted approach to address crime.
“We will be looking at those locations where we’re seeing the most and the most violent crime. We will be focused on that,” Snelling said. “We’re building better cases so when we have people who we know are very violent repeat offenders, we will be trying to get those people off the street as soon as possible and we will try to keep them off of the streets.”
In the WalletHub survey, San Francisco ranked at the bottom, with New York at No. 145 and Los Angeles at No. 139.
Greg Bishop contributed to this report.
