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| Photo From BGA Think Tank UPDATED: September 2, 2011 11:30am From Chicago News Cooperative, dated today: word is Chicago's IG reported City Construction Company and the City of Chicago to the Feds! Good job Joe Ferguson.... City Construction Company is a Daley clout connected company - Rahm has known about this and did nothing. Ferguson reports the situation to the feds as the company continued to receive contracts and taxpayer money from the city. If the Minority & Women Owned Business Enterprise (MWBE) program was run properly, without the mismanagement & corruption that exists now...imagine the jobs it could create for Chicago residents... Click below for the story: Federal investigators, who long have found corruption in City Hall’s minority-contracting efforts, have subpoenaed the city’s files on a construction company that was paid at least $26 million in taxpayer money in the past decade. The office of United States Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald sent a grand jury subpoena to the city for minority-contracting documents related to the City Construction Company a year ago, according to records obtained by the Chicago News Cooperative through a Freedom of Information Act request. Even after the Chicago Law Department received the subpoena, the city continued to issue checks to pay the company for its work as a subcontractor on public works projects. Payments from the city have amounted to almost $3 million since federal authorities sought the documents. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________ |
Labor day weekend, not much going on. I have been meaning to post the last Inspector General Office report for some time. If you have a few minutes, look through it to see how the office works, what they are investigating and some of the outcomes of their investigations. In this report, I was surprised to see that little if anything has been done about the City's Minority & Women Owned Business Enterprise Program.......
What gives? The Mayor increases our property taxes, wants CPD to incur a large budget cut, withholds contractual cost of living raises for Chicago Teachers, but doesn't empower the Inspector General to genuinely root out fraud, abuse and mismanagement?
" On June 7, 2011, the IGO released an updated Report of its May 2010 Review of the City’s Minority & Women Owned Business Enterprise (MWBE) program. The updated Report showed that City leadership largely ignored IGO recommendations made in the May 2010 review. It also found that despite the best efforts of Office of Compliance employees, the MWBE program is still rife with widespread fraud, abuse, and mismanagement"
http://chicagoinspectorgeneral.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Q2-2011-Report.pdf
Some highlights in the report include:
• The IGO recommended to the Department of Procurement Services that a former, long-time City employee now working at as a high-ranking official of an active City vendor be found ineligible to do business with the City. The IGO based its recommendation on its review of the former City employee’s testimony in a federal criminal trial in which he/she admitted to having participated in a long-running scheme to rig the City’s hiring and promotion process for Shakman-covered positions in favor of political allies. As part of the scheme, the former City employee falsified interview ratings forms and requests to hire, and repeatedly stated that hiring and promotion decisions were based on merit, when in fact he knew they were based on political considerations.
• An IGO investigation found that a Deputy Commissioner with the Department of Streets and Sanitation regularly had City employees run personal errands for him while the employees were on City time. The errands included picking up cigars, refilling the Deputy Commissioner’s car with gas, and driving his vehicle from City Hall to a DSS facility. The IGO also found that the Deputy Commissioner arranged for two DSS employees to be chauffeured to work by other City employees on City time.
• On June 7, 2011, the IGO released an updated Report of its May 2010 Review of the City’s Minority & Women Owned Business Enterprise (MWBE) program. The updated Report showed that City leadership largely ignored IGO recommendations made in the May 2010 review. It also found that despite the best efforts of Office of Compliance employees, the MWBE program is still rife with widespread fraud, abuse, and mismanagement.
• An IGO investigation determined that a high level manager with the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE) refused to answer questions posed to him/her as part of an IGO investigation relating to an inquiry into a serious crime, despite repeated advisements that, as a City employee, he/she had a duty to cooperate with the IGO. The DCASE manager resigned his/her City position approximately two weeks following his/her interview with the IGO and days ahead of the IGO’s summary report to DCASE.
If the DCASE manager had not resigned, the IGO would have recommended that he/she be terminated. Since he/she is no longer a City employee, the IGO recommended that he/she be placed on the City’s ineligible for hire list.
I looked up the owners of City Construction Company. Lotsa vowels in those last names.
ReplyDeleteI'm so sick of turning on the news and hearing that ridiculous Rahm say he is "protecting taxpayer money". Baloney. If that were true, Rahm would fully swear in the IG as the new sheriff in town and let him go after the Daley clout connected lobbyists and contracts.
ReplyDeleteI can't believe I am expected to pay higher property taxes and while this type of corruption & fraud is going on?
ReplyDeleteNo wonder the city is broke
ReplyDeleteRahm still hasn't given the Inspector Gen any real power to do much. I'm glad he called the feds. The feds need to look at the entire work program, especially now, when JOBS are so needed in all sectors. We can't allow our tax dollars to be wasted like this
ReplyDeleteThe Emanuel administration, like Richard Daley's before it, denies the inspector general's independent authority to enforce subpoenas for City Hall documents.
ReplyDeleteCan you see why the city's IG has to work directly with the feds - the mayor won't give him the necessary authority.
Emanuel is no different than Daley - just sneakier and passive -aggressive
Rahm made all kinds of promises about reform. Where is the reform. Someone show me what the hell he has reformed.
ReplyDeleteNo forensic audit, no genuine IG, and my property tax goes UP? This mayor is just as phoney as the last mayor
ReplyDeleteJust imagine if the minority business program was run properly, how many jobs would be available to minority workers - this is a real shame.
ReplyDeletethe MWBE Program? Ha, I always refer to that program as the Mobsters' Wives Business Enterprise. just sayin
ReplyDeleteIt all a fraud. Chicago is 8th century king/serf exploitation. Good men are about to be awakened and repel evil.
ReplyDeleteYou would think the first thing Rahmbo would do is get the IG out of his cage to sniff out waste in the city budget. That would make sense if it were up to you and me.
ReplyDeleteBut because this mayor is a political animal who puts politics first, he won't do anything to stir the waters with the dem party, especially when it comes to Daley and how Daley and his friends ripped of taxpayers for decades. Forget the IG, Rahm will pay lip service or might allow him to investigate any of the janitors who haven't already been fired by the Mayor in his courageous axing of the little guy.