Chicago calling him home?
Paul Vallas, now running the Recovery School District in New Orleans, says he “would be open” to exploring a run for governor of Illinois, according to The Chicago Sun-Times and The Chicago Tribune’s Clout Street blog.
Vallas was in charge of the Chicago school system from 1995 to 2001 and was credited with getting the district in better financial and academic shape. Vallas ran in 2002 in the Democratic primary for Illinois governor. He lost to Rod Blagojevich, who went on to election in fall 2002 and now is in his second term as governor.
A few months after losing the primary, Vallas was lured to Philadelphia, where he ran the school system from 2002 to 2007. Last year, the state of Louisiana hired him to run the Recovery district, which was created to resurrect Orleans Parish public schools, historically plagued by poor performance and decimated by the damage that followed Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
April 30th, 2008 @ 8:19 am
Illinois is finally ready for Paul Vallas to run and win as governor. Clearly IL needs major change and can not obtain this with the current longstanding corrupted IL political families that have traditionally run the state into corruption scandals and lack of accountability. IL needs true reform and would benefit greatly having Mr. Vallas’ long-needed leadership.