It's Curious City, where we take your questions about Chicago and the region, and investigate, report.

Explore from WBEZ.

Hey, this is Alex Keefe. I'm WBEZ's politics editor.

And as you probably know, at least maybe you should know if we're doing our job

here, Chicago is heading into another election season. In February, we'll vote for new citywide

officers, including a new mayor, and the city council, which is made up of what Chicagoans

call aldermen. So we thought it was a good time to bring you a story back from my reporter days

in 2013.

I answered the question about what it is that alderman actually do.

I mean, yeah, they pass laws and budgets, but so much of what they do happens outside of city council chambers,

attending to the needs of their constituents in surprisingly personal ways.

The story mostly holds up, but there

are a few updates, which I'll do at the end. The question originally came from Andrea Lee.

I want a little bit more of a window into that black box of Aldermanic duties. And here's me,

fitter and speltter in 2013. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. The meeting will come to order.

So what we're listening to is a surreal moment in the city council chambers.

This is a hearing that took place last month.

All right.

Now, I understand we have an amended substitute.

A legislative hearing on Mayor Rahm Emanuel's proposed changes to the city's

unpopular parking meter privatization.

In about an hour into this legislative hearing, the chairman calls on this old-time

...