Running on a progressive platform, he faced President John H. Stroger.
But Claypool’s campaign was derailed when Stroger suffered an incapacitating — and ultimately fatal — stroke. Now Claypool, a Democrat, is saying goodbye to the board. He’s choosing to sit this election cycle out while focusing on Rise Health, a new medical technology venture.
He spoke with the Chicago Current about his decision to leave politics, where the county board has succeeded in recent years, and why he’s not endorsing a candidate for president.
You surprised a lot of people by announcing you wouldn’t run for reelection. Why did you decide to step down now?
For a few reasons, one of which has not really come to fruition. I expected others would step up with the independence and management experience to carry the banner, but that didn’t quite materialize as I had anticipated.
But I also felt I was in the middle of something I needed more time to develop. (It is) a new model that I feel has the potential to reduce costs and improve quality of health care, as well as expand access, which is kind of the Holy Trinity of health care reform.
It’s a new venture I wanted to launch, and there was a conflict in timing (due to the early primary).
Does that mean you’re retiring from politics altogether?
I don’t know.
Nobody knows for sure. My objective was not to leave civic or political life entirely. It was basically to put in motion this experiment to demonstrate this model of health care delivery, which I think has the potential to solve the health care crisis.
When you look back at your years in county government, what is your impression?
I think there’s been a lot more success than people realize from the reform movement. When I was elected in 2002, along with several other reform commissioners … the county board was just a pure rubber stamp. When I ran, the parade of horribles was even greater than it was today.
When we went in, we were being strip-searched at the jail in violation of our constitutional rights.
The forest preserves were strewn with garbage and were overrun with invasive species and were being polluted.
The kids were being beaten regularly and brutally by the staff at the juvenile detention center.
The hospital system was not even bothering to bill, let alone collect, $250 million a year in payments due. There are still some abuses in the system.
But because of the spotlight that the reform movement, with the help of the media, has put on these things (there have been more lawsuits and more oversight).
I think the fact that there were independent voices on the board facilitated that process and accelerated it.
County government, as a whole, is still poorly managed. It’s still a patronage bin. It still taxes too much, spends too much; it’s bloated and wasteful. You look at it compared to what it would have been had there not been a mini revolution with the publicity and attention that the reform commissioners generated, I think it could have been worse than it is today.
Is Cook County government cleaner than it was when you first became a commissioner?
I wouldn’t say cleaner. That’s a different issue. We still see some of the contract issues.
What I said when we started was that there were highly visible abuses. Some of the worst abuses, because of the efforts of the independent commission in alliance with lawsuits and publicity, have stopped some.
(Corruption) ill serves the people who need (government) the most, the people who need health care, who need job training, who rely on the forest preserves as their sole source of recreation. There is still an enormous way to go. I can’t imagine how bad it would be had voters not decided to throw out half a dozen incumbents in 2002.
A number of candidates, including one running for your seat, John Frictchey, and another to whom you’ve given your endorsement (Jesus “Chuy” Garcia) are running on a reform platform. Do you think they will be successful?
I don’t know. As usual, the survival of the Democratic machine is paramount in the minds of incumbent politicians, so they have worked with our esteemed state party chairman, Mr. Madigan, to schedule the election on the coldest, iciest, bitterest day of the year, Feb. 2 (to discourage voters).
It’s going to be difficult, I think, for some of the independent-minded reform challengers to win. I’m hopeful on some. But the system is really rigged to support the incumbents. We’ll see what happens on Feb. 2.
Are you endorsing anyone for county board president?
No.
Why not?
The next president of Cook County has a Herculean task.
What’s required is a combination of reform-minded independence from the establishment — from the political establishment — and a proven track record as a manager of success in managing large organizations, particularly troubled organizations.
I don’t see that combination in this field.
I don’t have a high enough degree of confidence to basically say I predict who might have the best chance of truly changing and fundamentally reforming and modernizing that $3 billion government.
Doesn’t each candidate have some of those qualities?
You’re talking about a very complex, diverse, dysfunctional bureaucracy. To take over the reins of a government like that without significant managerial experience is a problem.That combination just doesn’t seem to be present in the field.