Outside spending targets Hilario Dominguez in closely watched Chicago race | FULL INTERVIEW

Lots of money being poured into this race, and a lot of that money is against you. Michael Sachs being the biggest contributor to the opposition. Why is there such a coalition of money against you? That's a great question. This billionaire, Michael Sachs, he wrote a letter in the beginning of this entire campaign and pledged to do and spend whatever he could to beat me. You know, a kid from born and raised in Pilsen that is fighting for universal pre-K, better school lunches, pathways for better careers and jobs for our young people. Look, I think there's been a real concerted effort here by billionaires and privatizers to buy our democracy, control our schools, mislead people. It's the same billionaire who helped Rahm Emanuel close 50 schools in the South and West Side. right a mayor let's not forget who also covered up the murder of Laquan McDonald i think at the end of the day folks want to control our schools but i know that we didn't go from mayoral control so we can have billionaire control this is about the people having control of their schools the majority black and brown uh district um you know our families our mothers having voice in the schools that they send their babies to you mentioned springfield that's a big part of the conversation when it comes to our school district you supported a budget counting on 150 million dollars from the state but the state hasn't committed to it just yet if that money doesn't arrive what would you vote to do yeah and let's be clear right cps budgets have long projected revenue from the city this time around school board members decided hey we should also uh project revenue from the state a state that owes us two billion dollars by their own formula just to get us to 90 percent right meanwhile evanston over 300 oak park over 150 that's the reason why our students were able to go back to their math teachers their social workers their counselors and so let's talk about where that money should come from from the state right now the state has a billion dollars in unexpected revenue they were expecting to be in the red they're in the black by a billion dollars then there's the meta settlement that they won 760 million dollars and that doesn't even account for the progressive revenue policies that are on the table that would tax the rich and the wealthy corporations and bring in four billion dollars in towards our state last session we won a digital ads tax that would bring in two billion dollars so there's real ways that our state can fund our schools and our education and i believe that our legislators want to do that why wouldn't they want to fund the schools for for our students you know, a state that is over 75 percent underfunded. Why wouldn't they want to do that? Why wouldn't our governor want to fund our schools? I believe they want to do it. Now, of course, CPS is not the only district that's going to be asking the state for money for education. Do you have the relationships from Springfield to prioritize and make sure they do prioritize CPS when they're allocating that money? Yes. And that's how that's why we've been able to win things like the digital ads tax last session. That's also why we were able to get some charter accountability out of the Senate we got to work a little harder in the house but I've been down in Springfield doing the work to work in coalition with educators across the state parents across the state administrators to win the schools that our students deserve but you're exactly right over 75% of the school districts in our state are underfunded Peoria Elgin Rockford all of all these districts are predominantly black and you know our students deserve fully funded schools and it's gonna take the coalition necessary if you're not able to secure that money though you're absolutely against cuts correct cuts closures the same austerity culture that we've been pushing and by the way Brendan I know where you're going with this I'm not saying the state needs to do it alone you know we can do things in our district to also save money that's why I've been talking about school food not a lot of people know that contract is up right now as we speak we pay over a hundred million dollars for that contract for a lunch participation rate of only 50% meanwhile if we can increase our lunch participation rate by 10% then we can actually generate revenue because we'd have more access into the federal reimbursement dollars we can bring in 15 to 20 million dollars so how do you do that how do you increase that participation rate we have to serve our students better food the only way to get our students to participate is to give them better food and the only way to do that is to find a school food vendor as we are shopping that bid right now that is going to commit to do so and the way it can cost more money but also means we have more access into federal reimbursement dollars because this is how it works the federal government reimburses us five dollars and 41 cents per meal participated in meanwhile CPS is about five dollars all in so you can make the 41 cents difference if you have more students participate right so if you serve our students more quality food then you can get access to those five dollars and forty one cents and make some money are you against borrowing to get that money to get to give which money get the hundred fifty million dollars well right now I think there are pathways where we can get it I don't borrowing and cuts that's you know further along the line we're talking about at least 15 steps that we're missing. You know, right after election day, veto session starts. We need a leader that's going to go down to Springfield immediately and work with the coalition and legislators to win the $150 million. And we can do it. And we can point to at least three different revenue sources where they can do it. School closings has been something you've been very vocal about. You're the only candidate in the race who's completely against closing schools. You know, the reality is that there are students that are in schools that are not full, you know, 80 students in a school that's meant for 200 students. And that can be really unfair to the student, to the parent, because that can mean lack of service and lack of the full things they need. So what is the alternative? What do you do about those schools if it's not closing them and moving those students to other schools? It's a great question. And before we get there, I do have a question because we often talk about these utilization rates. Who decided a school's utilization rate? Who decided on that formula? Why do we think that a school is supposed to fit a certain number of students? How many kids is that based off of in classroom? See, these questions haven't been asked. We've just accepted that a school is underutilized. No one can tell us who defined that in the first place. How would you define it? I would define a school based off of its value for our communities, right? think we should be asking the question what else can we add instead of what can we cut consolidate and close and that's why I point to models that are working models like Drake Austin Steinmetz to have full-time health clinics inside of their schools they can generate revenue for the school community drive your costs down by caution but the most important part is that the community in the school came together to decide what they needed in their school buildings in In those clinics, the one in Drake, for example, it generates $2 million for the school community. And Chicago isn't alone. See, we've set the model for the entire country, and now in Atlanta, they're building grocery stores inside of their schools. Gooder, a black woman-owned organization, partners with the school district in Atlanta to put grocery stores inside of schools. So in a city like Chicago, where one in three Chicagoans are food insecure, we can have a world where a grandmother can drop her baby off, walk down the hallway, and pick up groceries for the household. And here's another example. I hate comparing us to Los Angeles, but in Los Angeles, they're building affordable housing in their schools. Selma Avenue Elementary School. 66 units of affordable housing, 70% of which are set aside for unhoused students, unhoused staff. Right inside of their elementary school, a campus for the community. That's what we can have here. We have 51 of those schools are called sustainable community schools. We're set to get to 70 by the end of this year. We can continue to scale that. Some people are going to hear that and they're going to say that sounds like more money being spent. Great question. Those clinics at those schools that I mentioned, they were invested in, operated in the entire funding by UI Health, not even Chicago Public Schools. So none of that came from CPS. So utilizing kind of public and private donations and support. I'm talking about utilizing the school building. If a school is so-called underutilized, the solution isn't the problem. Utilize the school. So let's say that there was if there was evidence presented that would support consolidation potentially or support that students are struggling because of, you know, the class size versus the teacher, things like that. would you support consolidation at all? Is there any scenario where consolidation would be on the table for you? Great question. Right now, all the evidence shows us that we don't save money, see the Stanford study. We don't improve our academics, see the Brown University study. But we do increase gun violence in the area around the closed schools, see the Chicago Johns Hopkins study. So in fact, the research right now shows us otherwise, that when you close a school, the students from the closed school and the students at the receiving school are less likely to graduate from high school, go to college, graduate from college, get a good paying job. So right now, our research and our experience of over 180 different times that we've tried this shows us school closings don't work. It's a failed solution. But I understand why people, you know, wanna continue to consider it, at least some people, because look how long it took us to realize and to accept that building with asbestos was dangerous, that having lead in our paint was dangerous. Took us a while, but after seeing the data, after seeing the research, we finally started to try different things. That's what I'm saying, is that the data, the research experience, all show us school closings don't work. It's about time we have leadership that is willing to look at different solutions. Ones that don't harm our communities, but also add value to them, and figure out how to build beyond the academic institutions. All the candidates in this race have faced slings and arrows. It's been kind of a three-way firing squad in a sense. You've definitely faced your share of slings and arrows. So I do have to address some things you faced recently. The inspector general found insufficient evidence to substantiate the sexual misconduct allegations against you. But the report also said the alleged conduct would violate today's boundaries. Do you agree with that assessment? What I am grateful for is that voters, for the fourth time, have seen me go through accountability, have seen me go through due process, and that the conclusion is the same, that it is unfounded, unsubstantiated, and that now they have all the information they need to make the most informed decision that they can at the polls. You know, here's what I'll say is that I am glad that we've been able to show what accountability looks like, what due process looks like, and now for the fourth time, what it looks like to accept conclusions and move forward and focus on what voters here deserve, the issues. It's been pretty serious stuff. People have lobbied. People have brought up misconduct. They've said grooming, all kinds of allegations. What do you say to voters out there who they've seen the OIG report get closed again, but they've still been given pause by these allegations? And how do they know that you are a leader they can depend on to keep their students safe? Yeah, what I ask voters to do is look at my record and look at my actions. And my actions, at every step, have always been to believe in accountability, take any allegations seriously, actively participate in any investigation. But then here, the last word is the OIG's. That it's, my name is clear, unsubstantiated, unfounded. But we also have to address something that we've seen. You know, I know what unfair treatment looks like. And here's a Latino man that has gone through multiple investigations, been cleared every single time, you know, and yet they continue to try to paint me in a certain way. Do you support a probe or investigation into how this investigation was handled? Because there have been voters who have questioned connections with the mayor, connections with you and independents. Do you would you explore potentially an investigation into the handling of this? Yeah. I mean, look how, again, we're asking, you know, the person that's been investigated, cleared four times. Would I support another fifth investigation? And here's the thing. I'm going to always be accountable. But let's not forget the OIG did something unprecedented by reopening my case, unprecedented by commenting publicly on my case. and yet for the fourth time same conclusion my name is cleared unfounded unsubstantiated you know at this point I gotta say after two weeks of this thing when are we getting back to the issues because that's what our voters deserve is for us to talk about who's going to close their schools who's going to fight like heck for them in Springfield who is going to lead this district so that our black and brown students don't continue to get disproportionately disciplined but but get the restorative justice that everyone deserves let's get back to the issues then something i want to ask you i hear a lot of voters talk about how they want independence from their school board president and this is a school board race where there's a lot of different outside groups whether it's Chicago Teachers Union whether it's charter union groups whether it's things like that right what's the hardest decision you're prepared to make that might anger or upset the people backing you? You know, the people backing me, I just want to be clear here. You got retired principal, Dr. Joyce Kenner, hunger striker, G2 Brown, retired educator, Dr. Carmen Palmer, hundreds of parents. I mean, you know, folks are supporting me because as we say in Chicago, I haven't just talked about it. I've been about it since I was 17 years old when I organized a walkout from our schools. And then when I was arrested for protesting a mega developer so that we can win those TIF money back into our schools. I've been about this life. I've been fighting for our communities. And so when I hear you say, you know, what decision am I going to make to anger them? I can't think of a decision that would anger parents and students and mothers, you know, because the decisions I'm going to make are the ones that are going to center them. They're going to be at the center of every decision. That's what they deserve. That's what we deserve. That's we fought for an elected representative school board is so that our students and our parents are at the center of decisions not you know corporate um corporate folks that are getting put in positions where they're closing our schools so as if you were president of the school board would your loyalty be to the chicago teachers union's interests or would it be toward the district's interests as the only candidate born and raised in chicago the only candidate that went to Chicago public schools, taught in Chicago public schools. My loyalty is to this city, Chicago. That's why I wear this hat. Public schools raised me. That's at the heart of this campaign, this city. In this city, we got a secret handshake, and that's what schools you go to. And that's because we don't do Zodiac signs. We do high schools. And that's what's going to be at the center of this campaign and the center of my decision-making as Chicagoans, parents, students, people that love this city and trust in Chicago Public Schools. And finally the hard-hitting question many folks have been wanting to know what's with the hat? Will you take it off? If you were to be school board president are we gonna see that hat all the time? I'll tell you what on Election Day I'll surprise people with my hat. But this hat is a reminder for me and for everybody that at the center of our city are our schools and they always happen. they make up who we are you know it's why Chicagoans love their schools it's why Dolphins say should have been a dolphin it's why Lindblom alumni say swoop swoop it's why Kenwood Broncos you know ride and dive for their school so this hat is a is a shout out to all of them and a nod