When Brandon Johnson is sworn in next week as Chicago’s 57th mayor, he will report to a public that is thoroughly aligned on the issues that most urgently need his attention. Their to-do list, whether or not they voted for him, starts with public safety and taxes followed in short order by affordable housing, economic inequality and public education.
Johnson and his team should not be surprised. Their own polling, like ours at the Harris Poll leading up to the mayoral election, undoubtedly has shown these are the same issues that nagged at Chicago residents throughout the campaign. And, like ours, their polling probably also has found that what people want most in their mayor is someone strong enough to finally fix things.
If being forewarned is being forearmed, Johnson should be victorious. Our latest survey, conducted in late April and early May, reveals widespread doubt, however, about whether he’ll be any more successful than his predecessors.
Three-quarters of the people who voted for Johnson view him positively, according to our poll. But they’re not the majority: Most Chicago adults either didn’t vote in the April runoff election or voted for Paul Vallas. Include them, and the total expressing a positive opinion plunges to 35%, with 25% holding a negative view. The plurality — 38% — are neutral or have no opinion.
Similarly, upward of 80% of Johnson voters say they think he’ll be effective at managing the city’s festering issues. But that percentage drops to half when everyone else’s views are included, and slips to 46% on public safety and 40% on taxes and fees.
We also asked a cross section of Chicago adults to look out five years from now — a year after Johnson presumably would have completed a full term in office — and predict whether the city would be worse or better off or stay the same on 10 major issues.
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No more than a quarter of respondents think the city would improve in any of these realms by 2028, and in six of them — taxes and fees, public safety, affordable housing, economic inequality, environmental health and public education — pessimists outnumber optimists by margins as large as 3 to 1.
Tellingly, not even most of Johnson’s supporters think Chicago will be doing better on any of these problems. More than a quarter of them foresee the situation on crime, taxes and housing actually worsening over the next five years.
Of course, a mayor can do only so much to mend a city this big and this troubled, as Lori Lightfoot and Rahm Emanuel learned. In our poll, city residents acknowledge the challenge: 4 of 5 say Chicago leaders need to be tougher than those in other American cities. Johnson has never played the tough guy.
To address the root causes of crime, Johnson has called for a “holistic” approach to public safety. He would boost economic development in neglected neighborhoods and fund 60,000 summer jobs for youths. He’s also called for dispatching health professionals instead of police to crisis calls. To pay for these initiatives, on top of maintaining the city’s current police force, he has floated $800 million in tax increases that he has said would be paid mostly by business and the “ultra-rich.”
But the incoming mayor may be constrained by the overwhelming belief among Chicagoans that they already are overtaxed compared with the rest of the country. Less than half of those who voted for Johnson say they’d support tax increases to finance his policies — and they’re more supportive than everyone else.
Only a third of Chicago residents approve of higher taxes on downtown business to support neighborhood development, while a third oppose it. By a 2-to-1 margin, people also reject raising any taxes to hire more police or more social workers. Almost half, though, would go along with reallocating municipal funds for those personnel.
Johnson faces one other big challenge. A quarter of current residents say that over the past year, they have contemplated moving to the suburbs while a third have thought about moving farther, to elsewhere in Illinois or another state. The percentages for Johnson supporters are roughly the same as the overall population. Their top two reasons for maybe quitting Chicago are neighborhood safety and cost of living, cited by more than half.
And that brings us to Johnson’s opportunity. As divided as Chicago is, residents almost universally share the same priorities, regardless of ideology. They want safe streets, reasonable taxation, affordable housing, quality public education and evidence that economic opportunities are available to all.
For now, the plurality of voters who are neutral toward Johnson are blank slates, but they ultimately will write his legacy. If he addresses their hopes and fears, he has a chance to not only succeed but also to go down in history for helping revitalize the city.
Chicago’s problems are great, but so, still, is the city itself. It just awaits the right leadership to catalyze a comeback. Johnson’s chance starts next week.
Will Johnson is the Chicago-based CEO of The Harris Poll, a global public opinion, market research and strategy firm.
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