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Matt Martin
Matt Martin is a member of the Chicago City Council in Illinois, representing Ward 47. He assumed office on May 20, 2019. His current term ends on May 17, 2027.
Martin ran for re-election to the Chicago City Council to represent Ward 47 in Illinois. He won in the general election on February 28, 2023.
Elections
2023
See also: City elections in Chicago, Illinois (2023)
General election
General election for Chicago City Council Ward 47
Incumbent Matt Martin won election in the general election for Chicago City Council Ward 47 on February 28, 2023.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Matt Martin (Nonpartisan) | 100.0 | 16,253 |
| Total votes: 16,253 | |||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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2019
See also: City elections in Chicago, Illinois (2019)
General runoff election
General runoff election for Chicago City Council Ward 47
Matt Martin defeated Michael Negron in the general runoff election for Chicago City Council Ward 47 on April 2, 2019.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Matt Martin (Nonpartisan) | 62.5 | 11,813 |
 | Michael Negron (Nonpartisan) | 37.5 | 7,089 | |
| Total votes: 18,902 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
General election
General election for Chicago City Council Ward 47
The following candidates ran in the general election for Chicago City Council Ward 47 on February 26, 2019.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Matt Martin (Nonpartisan) | 39.3 | 7,586 |
| ✔ | | Michael Negron (Nonpartisan) | 21.4 | 4,126 |
 | Eileen Dordek (Nonpartisan) | 17.5 | 3,373 | |
 | Jeff Jenkins (Nonpartisan) | 8.3 | 1,602 | |
| Heather Way Kitzes (Nonpartisan) | 4.8 | 931 | ||
| Angie Maloney (Nonpartisan) | 4.6 | 888 | ||
| Thomas Schwartzers (Nonpartisan) | 1.9 | 372 | ||
| Gus Katsafaros (Nonpartisan) | 1.8 | 344 | ||
| Kimball Ladien (Nonpartisan) | 0.4 | 75 | ||
| Total votes: 19,297 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Campaign themes
2023
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Matt Martin did not complete Ballotpedia's 2023 Candidate Connection survey.
2019
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Chicago 2019 Candidate Survey
Matt Martin completed Ballotpedia's Chicago candidates survey for 2019. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Martin's responses.
Low-income families do not have the same choices, options, or alternatives when it comes to public school. How can this be addressed?
It is fundamentally unjust that any two schools in our one district, Chicago Public Schools, can vary wildly in access to resources and student success because of where the school is located, the values of the homes surrounding it, or the income of students’ parents. I serve on the Local School Council of McPherson Elementary, which is underfunded by about $1 million, and like many underfunded schools in Chicago, we are unable to fundraise the rest. The City of Chicago must utilize equity based school funding to provide every child access to high-quality neighborhood schools regardless of neighborhood or income.
How would you address inequality within and between schools?
I will first reduce the reliance on property taxes to fund schools, which exacerbates inequality, then look to progressive sources of revenue, such as a progressive city income tax, a tax on real estate transfers over $1 million, TIF reform, and legalizing recreational marijuana. Equity based school funding provides every school the specific resources they need to help their students succeed, rather than relying on detrimental stopgaps such as parent fundraising or increasing class sizes. I also support an elected school board, instead of one appointed by the mayor, to provide a more representative and transparent voice on important school decisions. To address inequality within schools, I will immediately hold hearings to prevent and confront crises like abuse of students, insufficient access to special education services, and poorly cleaned schools.
How can public schools better support their teachers and work more productively with the teachers’ union, parents, and the community?
An elected school board would foster greater democratic participation from all stakeholders in our public schools. I will institute a moratorium on closing schools as well as charter school expansion, which drains our public schools of needed resources. However, I will fervently support the rights of charter school teachers to organize and collectively bargain for fair pay and optimal learning conditions for students.
Do you believe that there is corruption in Chicago politics, such as pay-to-play practices when the city awards bids? If so, how would you address it?
Recent news has confirmed that there is corruption in Chicago politics. Our city government badly needs reform. We must ban secondary employment to eliminate conflicts of interest that mired Alderman Ed Burke’s property tax firm. The City Council should not be immune to inspection, opening itself to audits and investigations by the Inspector General. There should also be term limits for Committee Chairs to ensure no one alderman is too powerful, such as the Finance and Zoning Committees that Aldermen Burke and Solis, respectively, oversaw. I also support reforming aldermanic prerogative so that individual aldermen do not have an inordinate amount of power over the developments that affect their constituents.
How would you make the city’s policies more responsive to community input instead of donors or special interests?
For too long, big donors and the political machine have had an undue influence on Chicago’s City Council. Public financing reduces the impact of big money in elections by strengthening the impact of small donations from a more diverse base. In cities that have public financing, powerful incumbents no longer run opposed for decades and more women and racial minorities run for office. To avoid misuse of public funds and encourage candidates to spend time with constituents rather than fundraising, I would propose a small-donor matching program similar to what is in place in Los Angeles and New York City, which match funding to popular support among small individual donors. I would also lower the burdensome nominating petition requirements for citywide offices, which have been used to keep challengers without connections or money from running for office. Currently, citywide candidates must collect more petition signatures than candidates for governor.
How would you handle the “recurrence of unaddressed racially discriminatory conduct by officers” identified in the U.S. Justice Department’s investigative report of the Chicago PD published in 2017?
Every year Chicago spends over $100 million compensating the victims of police misconduct -- three times the amount we spend on affordable housing. At the Illinois Attorney General’s Office, I helped write the consent decree to ensure our police department establishes a plan for sustainable reform. I will work to ensure that our police officers receive proper training and supervision, and that officers are consistently held accountable when misconduct occurs. In addition, instead of spending millions of dollars on a new police academy, I will work to ensure that additional investments are made in community policing in order to rebuild the fractured relationship between the police department and residents.
What sort of proposals would help reduce police shootings and fatalities?
Until recently, Chicago police officers were only trained on when to use their guns once: at the police academy. And as evidenced by the murder of Laquan McDonald, officers have not consistently been held accountable when they engage in and cover-up misconduct. Remedying this decades-long problem is complicated, and must start with quick and complete compliance with the recently approved consent decree, which will help ensure that officers get adequate training, supervision, and oversight. In addition, we must ensure that the community has a seat at the reform table by supporting community oversight proposals like CPAC and GAPA.
How would you address criminal justice issues such as prison reform and the reintegration of formerly incarcerated persons into city life?
I support Cook County’s recent bail reform efforts to prevent pretrial detention of nonviolent offenders based solely on inability to pay. I also believe formerly incarcerated persons deserve the same rights to job opportunities, stable housing, and quality education as all Chicagoans. In addition, recreational use of marijuana should be legalized and all non-violent drug offenders should be released.
How would you address the displacement of people of color and long-term residents from their neighborhoods?
Displacement and gentrification result largely (but not solely) from a lack of affordable housing, exacerbated by development approved without community input. We need to invest in affordable housing by requiring at least 25% of new developments to include on-site affordable housing, strengthening the SRO Preservation Ordinance to prevent long-time residents from being displaced and ensuring affordable housing for those who need it the most, expanding vouchers for struggling working-class families, and modifying the zoning code to encourage more diverse housing options such as granny flats and coach houses. I will also fight to phase out TIFs, which have not been an efficient way to improve city infrastructure and have instead been used to line developers' pockets.
How would you ensure that development benefits residents in their neighborhoods and not solely the developers and other interests?
New housing developments should serve the needs of residents of our city, not just big real estate firms. I would increase the required amount of affordable housing units in new developments to at least 25% on-site. I would also expand vouchers for low- and middle- income families that are struggling with rising rents, and will modify the zoning code to encourage more diverse housing options such as granny flats and coach houses. High property taxes are making homeownership expensive, especially for those with low and fixed incomes, and are pushing rents up as landlords struggle to keep up on costs. To sustain affordability, we need to reduce our reliance on property taxes by focusing on progressive sources of revenue instead.
How do you propose to resolve the city’s underfunded pension plan for city employees?
Our pension liabilities are substantial and should be addressed swiftly and creatively. By the end of 2023, we’ll need to find approximately $1 billion in additional revenue for pensions alone -- to say nothing of badly needed revenue for schools, infrastructure, and police reform. As Alderman, I will work tirelessly to change the way we bring in revenue, so that we can fulfill our pension obligation without putting the burden on those least able to pay. Simply put, we cannot fill a billion dollar budget gap with property taxes, parking tickets, and assorted fees on core city services. We must move away from our reliance on these and other types of regressive revenue, which place excessive burden on low- and middle-income residents, and enact a progressive city income tax. And while our state legislators work to amend our state constitution to allow for this to occur, we should quickly and aggressively wind down TIFs and look at other less regressive revenue sources like a tax on large real estate transactions, a tax on high-speed trading, and marijuana legalization.
What’s your opinion on tax increment financing (a program that funds development using any additional property tax revenue that results from an increase in appraised property values)? What, if any, changes would you make to the use of TIF?
Approximately $660 million of city property taxes go directly into TIFs, many of which aren’t located in “blighted areas,” as was the original intent of TIFs. As a result, money is being siphoned away from infrastructure, schools, and pensions, and, too often, is dedicated instead to developments that are not a priority for our communities. TIFs are not an efficient or effective means of improving city infrastructure and should be phased out as soon as possible. We should not provide developers with taxpayer money to line their pockets with new developments, especially those that lack a large set aside for affordable housing. On City Council, I would support the Cardenas-Garza TIF surplus ordinance, the TIF reform ordinance brought forth by the Progressive Caucus, and an ordinance to require aldermen and women to post up-to-date information about the location and amount of money distributed by any TIFs in their wards.
How would you make Chicago a cleaner city with less waste and pollution?
At 9%, Chicago has the worst recycling rate of any major American city. We need urgent accountability of the private haulers’ practices and active enforcement of recycling ordinance violations. We should also explore municipal composting. Americans waste as much as 40% of all food, and sending food scraps to landfills contributes to methane production, a greenhouse gas 25 times more harmful than carbon dioxide. Additionally, separating compostable food scraps and yard debris away from landfill and recycling will decrease rat infestations in our alleys and dumpsters. I also fully support Chicago’s commitment to the Paris climate agreement, which pledges to reduce emissions by 26–28% below 2005 levels by 2025. I also support the Sierra Club’s Ready for 100 initiative which would transition Chicago to 100% clean energy. To fight air pollution, I will invest heavily in rapid transit improvements, especially in transit poor communities, greater bike-friendliness, and removing barriers to electric vehicle adoption. We should provide incentives to trucking companies to invest in electric trucks rather than dirty diesel polluters. In addition, the Department of Environment should be reinstated.
What would be your first steps for improving the transit system in terms of affordability, accessibility, and safety?
In recent years, the CTA has lost ridership to ride-share companies, and nearly 70% of all Chicagoans still commute to work by car alone. Population losses have also contributed to lower ridership. Chicagoans deserve a transit system they can rely on to get them to where they need to go quickly and safely without congestion or delays. The CTA should explore better security options for its trains and platforms, and all stations should be ADA-accessible. The city should invest in dedicated bus lanes on major thoroughfares to bypass congestion and make buses just as fast as trains. In the long term, Chicago needs dedicated investment into more rapid transit, electrification of buses, and faster boarding options.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
See also
2023 Elections
External links
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Officeholder Chicago City Council Ward 47 |
Personal |
Footnotes
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by - |
Chicago City Council Ward 47 2019-Present |
Succeeded by - |
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State of Illinois Springfield (capital) |
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