Ex-Bridgeport Village couple building a case against City Hall
Jose and Sandra Ruiz what they thought was their dream retirement home in the Bridgeport Village development, in Mayor Richard Daley’s11th Ward, for $900,000.
And now, according to a federal lawsuit they’ve filed against the Daley administration and some of the mayor’s political clique, they lost their home and their life savings due to corruption and clout.
Read the rest of the article at the Chicago Tribune.
Part 4 of My Interview with Chicago News Bench
Filed under: Mayor Daley, Reform, Spending, Taxes, Todd Stroger
Following is Part Four of the series of interviews I completed with Chicago News Bench. In this video, we discuss Cook County corruption, Tony Rezko, Mayor Daley, and the county’s oppressive sales tax. Please watch this interview here:
Privatization or Cronyization?
Mayor Daley has become a public fan of “privatization” over the years.
He privatized the Skyway. Talked about privatizing Midway Airport. Privatized the parking meters.
And now he’s privatizing city trucking (gee, there’s never been a city trucking scandal before, has there?)
Anyway, true privatization is supposed to save taxpayers money by putting out certain government functions to bid to private companies. That is — putting it out in a competitive bid. Basic free market economics teaches us that this competition breeds better service and lower cost.
Unless, of course, the privatization is rigged and the bidding is anything but competitive.
Which brings us to this story in this morning’s Chicago Tribune:
About 60 recently laid-off Chicago truck drivers picketed Friday at a city facility on the South Side, protesting that politically connected private companies are now doing work public employees performed for Mayor Richard Daley’s administration.
Under a deal that went into effect July 1, the city hired private contractors to haul construction debris from city work sites for the Water Management Department. Among the companies chosen was Reliable Asphalt Corp., which received a $158 million, three-year contract.
Reliable owner Michael Vondra has donated tens of thousands of dollars to local politicians, including Daley, the Democratic organization in the mayor’s 11th Ward power base and the pro-Daley Hispanic Democratic Organization. City records show Reliable’s lobbyists on the deal are Victor Reyes, a former Hispanic Democratic Organization chairman and top mayoral aide, and David Bonoma, son of Daley’s longtime secretary.
Privatization is a convenient buzzword behind which the Daley Administration can hide behind to dole out lucrative contracts to political cronies while pretending to save the taxpayers money.
Mayor Daley’s Olympic Confusion
Filed under: 2016 Olympics, Mayor Daley, Spending, Taxes
So, did Mayor Daley commit the taxpayers as unwitting guarantors of the cost of the 2016 Olympic Games … or didn’t he?
Well, last week he sent word from Switzerland that he had, in fact, done just that.
But now, in a press conference back home in Chicago, Mayor Daley offered an explanation that was, well, confusing as heck.
The Chicago Tribune reports:
In a news release, Daley said he may have “spoke too quickly” when he agreed in Switzerland to give an unlimited financial guarantee.
Pressed by reporters, Daley then seemed to suggest he hadn’t made a blanket guarantee: “I just said I will sign an agreement, I didn’t say which one.” He added the city still planned to amend the Olympics contract to ease Chicago’s liability.
Well, that certainly clears things up, eh?
As Commissioner Peraica points out in this video, despite the firestorm surrounding Daley’s announcement from Switzerland, the mayor and Olympic organizers still are leaving taxpayers in the dark — even holding secret meetings with Chicago aldermen.
What should worry all Illinois taxpayers — even the most ardent Olympic supporters — is Chicago’s track record on funding and completing large projects.
We all can remember the Millenium Park billions-over-budget-and-years-late project…
And how about the CTA “megastation” project that has cost tens of millions already and now sit sidle in the middle of Chicago’s Loop?
Chicago just hasn’t shown the ability to effectively and efficiently manage large projects. And that makes us worried that the taxpayers will be left footing the bill for cost overruns. Furthermore, it’s very likely that, if those cost overruns are significant, that Mayor Daley will use his clout to push some sort of taxpayer bailout from Springfield.
And that leaves every single taxpayer in the state of Illinois on the hook for yet another Chicago boondoggle.
This isn’t about the Olympic Games. It’s about protecting the taxpayers. It’s about requiring Mayor Daley to, once and for all, act in a responsible, transparent manner that doesn’t insult the voters and throw our hard-earned tax dollars down the drain.
This Week in Cook County …
Filed under: Corruption, Mayor Daley, Reform, Spending, Todd Stroger
A few of our favorite updates from the past week:
- Commissioner Peraica initiated legal action against Mayor Daley’s unilateral committment of the taxpayers as guarantors for the cost of the 2016 Olympics. Read coverage of this action here, here, here and here.
- The city’s 2016 Olympic organizers hold secret meetings with a number of aldermen (but not enough to trigger the Open Meetings Act) … yet another slap in the face to Chicago taxpayers.
- The Wilmette Life covers the North Shore Tea Party, in which Commissioner Peraica took part.
- The Illinois State Crime Commission provides laughs by honoring Melrose Park Mayor Ron Serpico.
- Chicagoland is shocked (but not surprised?) when Anthony Abbate — the Chicago cop whose brutal beating of a female bartender was caught on video — was sentenced only to probation and “anger management.”
- This morning’s Sun-Times reports on a new, $5,000 expenditure by the Stroger Administration to have the Cook County seal embroidered on the carpet in the county building entrance. The usefulness of the expensive seal was especially called into question since it is “roped off” like a museum exhibit.
Banned from working for the city? No problem — the county will hire you
The Sun-Times has a story this morning that, unfortunately, is not surprising at all to those of us who long ago grew tired of the waste, patronage and mismanagement of Cook County:
As long as she lives, Patricia Fasula can never work for the City of Chicago.
That was her punishment for filing bogus documents to convince city officials that she — and not her husband — owned and operated Patricia Trucking, one of several “women-owned businesses” in the city’s scandal-plagued Hired Truck Program.
But Fasula is still a $58,816-a-year accountant for Cook County Circuit Court Clerk Dorothy Brown, where she was working when she and her husband set up their trucking company out of their Bridgeport
Thoughts on yesterday’s elections
Filed under: Budget, Corruption, Elections, Mayor Daley, Proviso Township, Reform, Spending, Taxes
The results at the polls in yesterday’s municipal elections were mixed.
In some municipalities, such as Bensenville, the machine-backed candidate won. (In that case, Daley was exacting revenge of Bensenville incumbent Village President John Geils for opposing Daley’s misguided O’hare boondoggle.)
In a township such as Proviso, the machine incumbents barely held on to power - but lost some key seats to reform-minded candidates.
In watching tonight’s edition of WTTW’s Chicago Tonight - an interesting bit of information was thrown out: this year, 69% of incumbents held their seats, compared to 73% two years ago, and 81% two years before that.
The trend is clear: incumbents aren’t as safe as they used to be.
Much of that can be attributed to voter anger - at the continued corruption and the skyrocketing taxes they are forced to pay in Cook County (and perhaps at the state level, as well.)
In fact, the voter angst over Cook County’s massive sales tax resulted in three townships voting to secede from the county. The Huffington Post reports more on that situation:
Referenda in Barrington, Hanover and Palatine Townships on whether or not to disconnect from Cook County, where the sales tax rate is the highest in the country, all passed overwhelmingly Tuesday, revealing the depth of unrest over the county’s 1 percent sales tax increase in 2008.
And we are sure to see that anti-tax voter sentiment amplified at the Tax Day Tea Parties being organized in Chicago and some suburbs next week.
The key is to keep this movement growing and to ensure that the anti-tax forces beat back the status quo politicians at the polls in 2010. Whether it’s the Cook County Board Presidency, the Governorship, or any of a host of key General Assembly seats - next year is a year in which the voices of reform need to join together to take back Illinois from the corrupt and the inept who are costing us millions in “corruption taxes” and who have made our state a national embarrassment.
Cook County Clergy Campaign Against Themselves
Filed under: Budget, Mayor Daley, Reform, Spending, Taxes, Todd Stroger
Despite the extra burden that the massive Cook County sales tax is placing on employers and working families in the county - a group of clergy today gathered to protest attempts to repeal the onerous tax.
It is a shame that these well-meaning community leaders have bought into and are furthering the hoax that only choice is between high taxes and necessary county services.
They ignore the real choice: between cutting the waste, fraud and abuse in the county budget … or funding necessary county services.
(For those, such as Stroger, Daley & Co., who still assert there is no waste in the budget, we implore you to view this hilarious video.)
Further, by campaigning for higher taxes, they hurt their own cause due to the simple economic reality that employers and workers produce the tax revenue that fund the services provided by the county - and the donations that allow churches and vital non-profits to function.
Higher taxes mean less jobs. Less jobs means less tax revenue. Less tax revenue threatens county services and community organizations.
So, the answer is simple: trim the fat and fraud from the budget; lower taxes; balance the budget.
Now that’s something for which the clergy should campaign.
Da’ Mayor Says He’s “Sorry” … Boy, He Sure Is
The week after Commissioner John Daley tried to attack Commissioner Peraica for fighting for lower taxes and a streamlined budget in Cook County … his brother, Mayor Richard Daley, turned an otherwise boring press conference (below) on home foreclosures into an absolutely surreal event (even by Chicago standards).
He read a prepared statement expressing that he was “sorry” about the hiring fraud scandal in city government - and then preceded to angrily reject the media’s pleas to ask questions about the statement and/or scandal.
A “sincere” apology and the city is magically reformed, right?
It kind of reminds us of the scene in “The Naked Gun” when Lt. Drebin (Leslie Nielsen) assures the gathering crowds that there is “Nothing to see here!” as the fireworks factory continues to explode behind him.
It strikes us as funny that, while everyone accuses Blagojevich of being detached from reality - this mayor has somehow avoided this same accusation.
Fitzgerald: Don’t ‘Trivialize’ the Harm from Hiring Fraud
In the wake of the conviction of former Daley political operative Al Sanchez over city hiring fraud - Chicago Public Radio reports on U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald’s statements that we should not “trivialize” the harm of such fraud.
In this case, he’s talking about hiring fraud at the city level - but let’s not forget that the federal patronage monitor in place at Cook County says the county still has a long way to go in fixing their hiring practices.
And, as of January, the Cook County Forest Preserve District has its very own federal patronage monitor.
Click here to listen to the full Chicago Public Radio segment.
Reform Tweets
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- Project Shield a big drain on taxpayers http://ff.im/gUAyV
- Corruption in City of Chicago Hiring Process http://ff.im/gJhye
- Ex-Bridgeport Village couple building a case against City Hall http://ff.im/gCjwn
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