(WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- This week's narrow and contentious approval of a Gaza ceasefire resolution may indicate how divided the Chicago City Council is, but it's not clear how much of an impact that will have.
Ald. Debra Silverstein (50th), who opposed the ceasefire measure, says the council will need to heal, but co-sponsoring Ald. Rossana Rodriguez-Sanchez (33rd) said it usually does.
Either way, University of Illinois-Chicago political science professor Dick Simpson says, the days of the rubber-stamp council have long been over.
The former alderman says today’s council is more like a true deliberative body, compared to previous eras of rubber-stamp councils under iron-fisted mayors.
“We have a more healthy situation, but the tensions can get bad. And particularly, the Israeli-Palestinian war is one of those that’s raising tensions across the nation,” said Simpson, an author of “Chicago's Modern Mayors, from Harold Washington to Lori Lightfoot.”
Still, he says, divided doesn’t have to mean counter-productive.
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