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Chicago is a big city that often seems like a small one, especially when you realize how many of its powerful political and business interests intertwine. The relationship between the city government and the Illinois Restaurant Association, the nonprofit organization that helps run the Taste of Chicago, is yet another example.
Remember way back in May, when Mayor Daley and some of his loyal aldermen muzzled the opposition, pulled out a parliamentary trick or two, and repealed the ban on foie gras faster than it usually takes the City Council to honor the month’s grade school spelling bee champs?
The worthiness of the ban isn't the point--as Mayor Daley has decreed, we're done debating that one for now. But no one's talked much about the fact that it was overturned at the bidding of a nonprofit city contractor that happens to make a lot of donations to a lot of elected officials--and will undoubtedly be weighing in on other issues before the council.
While the mayor mocked the ban for the cameras, the effort to get the council to repeal it was led by 44th Ward alderman Tom Tunney and the Illinois Restaurant Association, an trade and advocacy organization. Tunney, a restaurateur, was formerly the restaurant association’s chairman; Sheila O’Grady, once Mayor Daley’s chief of staff, is currently its president.
Since 1984, according to the Mayor’s Office of Special Events, the restaurant association has been a "partner" of the city’s in running the Taste of Chicago and other summer festivals. Under the terms of their no-bid contract for "beverage and food management," the association helps pick which restaurants get to set up booths and then provides "the knowledge, information and training necessary to maximize their ability to participate in the Events for which they are selected." Translated, that means the association is supposed to make sure vendors are properly handling food, disposing of garbage, and--don't forget, guys!--making money. "I don’t think the Taste could exist without IRA doing their part," said Cindy Gatziolis, a spokeswoman for the special events office.
For these services, the city will pay the restaurant association up to $3.6 million this year, according to their contract. Gatziolis said most of the money will go toward festival supplies such as ice and cups. But the association usually keeps a chunk of the money as service fees. Last year it held onto $232,500; in 2006, $1.1 million. (After expenses, the Taste brings the city about $3 million, which it spends on other festivals, according to Gatziolis.)
Gatziolis said the contract isn’t put out for a competitive bid because no one but the Illinois Restaurant Association is qualified to provide these kinds of services. "It is the only one," she said. "They have that expertise."
The City Council voted 48 to 0 in December to sign off on 2008 summer festival funding, including the contract with the restaurant association.
The deal with the city accounts for the majority of the association’s annual revenues, according to federal tax documents. In 2006, the most recent year available, the association reported about $5.8 million in revenues, and about $3.8 million of it came from the Taste contract and other summer event fees. The association raised about $565,000 through member dues.
Under federal tax rules, the association is allowed to spend a portion of the membership money on political activities, and it does. In 2006 the organization spent more than $200,000 on lobbying and other “political expenditures,” and its political action committee typically hands out thousands of dollars in campaign contributions each year. Among the recipients since the beginning of 2007 are aldermen Leslie Hairston (5th), Sandi Jackson (7th), George Cardenas (12th), Ed Burke (14th), Lona Lane (18th), Howard Brookins Jr. (21st), Carrie Austin (34th), Rey Colon (35th), Brian Doherty (41st), Brendan Reilly (42nd), Vi Daley (43rd), Tom Tunney (44th), and Bernard Stone (50th). Of that group, only Colon voted against repealing the foie gras ban.
In the last few years the association has also lobbied hard on other issues before the council. In 2005 its opposition helped weaken the city’s indoor smoking ban, and the next year it helped kill Burke’s proposal to prohibit restaurants from cooking with trans fats. It’s also weighed in on city and state debates about the minimum wage, liquor licensing, and tax policy.
O’Grady was out of town Friday. A spokeswoman for the association said she'd get back in touch with a comment but didn't. I suspect everyone was out for a long lunch.
You must be slippin'
All of that political involvement was under the leadership of Colleen McShane, the old prexy of the Association.
Come on Mick, a little more homework please. I hope you are teaching your Columbia College journalism students that research is more than just going to the City's free transparency website and then waiting for phone calls.
By Jeff Coen | Tribune staff reporter
12:23 PM CDT, June 13, 2008
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Digg Del.icio.us Facebook Fark Google Newsvine Reddit Yahoo Print Reprints Post comment Text size: A federal judge Friday sentenced a former Chicago Department of Buildings supervisor to 15 months in prison for taking bribes, saying she wanted to send a message to other employees that public corruption is not acceptable.
U.S. District Judge Joan Lefkow told Kurt Berger that his decision to take money to lift stop-work orders was extremely serious. Lefkow likened it to a judge who made a decision in a court case, "and then accepted a check for $1,000 from the winning side."
"You know that is not the way to carry out a public trust," Lefkow said. "The people of this city relied on you that you would act with integrity."
Berger, 45, had pleaded guilty. He had been charged as part of Operation Crooked Code after he accepted a payment through an inspector who was cooperating with the city's Office of the Inspector General and federal agents.
Berger's attorney, Jeffrey Steinback, told Lefkow his client had accepted responsibility for his actions. Public safety was not compromised, Steinback said. Berger viewed the situation as him lifting orders so fixes could be made, the lawyer said, and then taking "thank yous" from contractors.
"It wasn't with the sense that something structural was about to happen, or electrical wires were hanging out and the public was about to be exposed to them," Steinback said.
Assistant U.S. Atty. Juliet Sorensen disagreed with that view.
"He was responsible for safeguarding the integrity of the building code," Sorensen said. He was willing to ignore that for payments, she told Lefkow. "That was the bottom line."
When Berger addressed the court, he told the judge he had devastated his family through what he did. Counselors had become involved, and Berger said he knew his wife and three children would suffer when he went to prison.
He had worked for the city for 10 years before the case and had lost his dream job, he said.
"It was a selfish act I participated in without thinking about the consequences," Berger said.
Lefkow said she hoped the sentence she imposed would lead others to think about what it would mean for them if they followed in Berger's footsteps.
The judge agreed Berger had come from a good family, had supported his children, had been a good Catholic and had been entrusted with an important job by the City of Chicago.
"To whom much is given, much is expected," Lefkow told Berger, quoting from the Gospel of Luke.
It's nice your writing about another City Inspector takes a $1000.00 bribe. But tell your sold out editors that the real story is how did Calabrese, Marcello, Lombardo get people on the City Pay Role and Why does MAYOR Daley allow Frd Barbara to get City Contracts at will! Your talking as of this date $100's of $1000,000.00 of taxpayer dollars. Not $1000.00 in bribes . Thats why are tax's are high in Chicago....corruption at the HIGHEST level. But are two major papers continue to ignoire it as well as the TV news!
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City Investigates Railing Collapse Accidents
Source: CBS 2 Chicago
CHICAGO (CBS 2) There has been a new development as city officials investigate a deadly fall from a South Side porch. A building inspector will be fired for lying about how thoroughly he checked out 5509 South Bishop last Friday. One day later, a nine-year-old girl fell through a third-floor porch railing and died.
As CBS 2's Dana Kozlov reports, this isn't the only investigation into a potentially faulty railing.
Officials are also trying to learn why another porch railing -- this one in Lincoln Park -- gave way over the weekend, seriously injuring two people. In the first case problems were documented and allegedly ignored. In the second, City officials can't say when the porch was last inspected.
25-year-old Allison Gwin just moved to Chicago from Alabama. On Saturday she went to 439 West Webster to help someone move when, suddenly, a porch railing gave way. Relatives say Gwin is now in intensive care with a fractured neck, back, ribs, pelvis, and, possibly, a punctured lung. A friend who also fell underwent surgery.
Chicago Building Inspector Stan Kaderbek said, The City has no record of 311 complaints concerning the condition of the Webster porches."
Those victims lived, but 9-year-old Tiara Woods did not. She died Saturday after a railing at 5509 South Bishop gave way.
Tenant Rosie Downs says she'd repeatedly complained to managers about problems in the building and stopped paying rent. Her lawyer even prepared a document last week and filed it today highlighting railing concerns. But owner Alec Brikva says he wasn't aware of them. "Never received any complaints regarding the porches -- they're brand new; they're two years old," he said.
"The building does have a troubled history," Kaderbek said.
And Commissioner Kaderbek says that's one reason an inspector was sent to 5509 Bishop last Friday: to inspect an interior stairwell after a tenant fell through it and broke her ankle. That inspector, Charles Walker, later claimed he inspected the entire building including the porch railing. But Kaderbek says Walker lied. "I can only assume that Walker panicked on Monday after hearing that a young girl had fallen off the porch and died as a result," he said.
Kaderbek has now moved to fire Walker and that is part of the ongoing investigation.
I am voting for the white irish guy!
Well, aren't you the pot calling the kettle black.
Is being the blog police another one of your duties, besides the ones that require you to lick and swallow?
The more I try to get out! The more they pull me back in!
( Mike Corleone Godfather III)
Obama is part of the Chicago Machine (albeit the liberal part)
The proposed ban was referred to the health committee, on which Joe sits. Hearings were held, in October 2005, and nothing was done. First days went by, then weeks, then months, and — no word from the health committee.
Constant inquiries were made of the health committee by individual restaurants, the Illinois Restaurant Association, foie gras producers, avian scientists and others who were troubled by the proposed ban. All were told that an announcement would be made by the committee about when the measure would go to the floor of the City Council.
The announcement never happened.
Instead, at a meeting two years ago in June 2006, after a business session that covered a wide range of issues, the Mayor recognized an Alderman for the purpose of passing an “omnibus” measure — that is, a lengthy list of non-controversial items on which there was complete agreement.
The foie gras ban was included in that omnibus.
There had been no announcement. The ban was not identified. No one said, “Oh, and by the way, contrary to 170 years of practice, this week we have a controversial item tucked into the omnibus on which you are about to vote…”
Unlike the repeal, the vote had not been in the news that morning.
Unlike the repeal, opponents had not been informed that the vote was coming.
Unlike the repeal, no alderman was out among his colleagues asking for votes, as Tom Tunney did.
In the discussion after the vote several aldermen said they had never seen a controversial item slipped into an omnibus for a final vote by the council in their entire careers.
When Joe Moore was winning with a process that ignored public notice and normal practice he was happy as a clam. In fact,on Chicago Tonight, and he could not have cared less about deceiving his opponents. He was right proud of his little ploy.
But now that his colleagues have repudiated both him and the issue which pre-occupied him for more than a year, while 49th Ward kids were struggled below state averages in achievement, he cloaks himself in due process, claiming offense at tyranny and bully tactics.
That’s how Joe saw fit to pass his ban. So I am not surprised that the Mayor and his colleagues decided Joe needed an object lesson to learn that as one treats others, one may expect to be treated by them.
Fellow slurs snicker at word's utterance
Tribune staff report
June 15, 2008
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Digg Del.icio.us Facebook Fark Google Newsvine Reddit Yahoo Print Reprints Post comment Text size: It's hard to come up with an ethnic slur that has less of a sting than "whitey."
A prevalent yet unsubstantiated Internet rumor has it that Barack Obama's wife, Michelle, used this term at some point in a speech, and the Obama campaign is concerned enough to have posted an online rebuttal.
I've got to ask, though. Are there really white people out there so ignorant of history, so unaware of the nuances of language and so threatened by minority grievances that they take genuine umbrage at the term "whitey"?
More a taunt than a threat, the word has no ugly history and hints at no particular stereotypes. It may have been hurled in a menacing fashion in ugly personal confrontations from time to time, but it's never been used to keep a people down, to put them in their place, to rank them as subhuman.
To be truly offensive, a derogatory term needs to have an ominous context that "whitey" lacks.
Those who take offense are confusing prejudice—which is making negative assumptions about people based solely on external characteristics, of which all races and ethnicities are guilty—with racism, which is prejudice in action.
It requires them to imagine that "whitey" marginalizes, diminishes and therefore harms white people.
And if they're really that dumb, then I guess they deserve to be insulted.
June 14th - 9:57 p.m.
The restaurant association is no different than the Unions. You have to control all groups that generate money or there is a chance you become a fundriasing arm for a opposition candidate. Thats why the Unions neutralized Coconuts!
Talk to any Resturant that is involved in the Taste. They will tell you how much the hate giving all that money back to Daley and the Association! But 3% of something is better than nothing!
What about his girlfriend mini-me Erin DelValle?
Is the Mayor still defending HDO?
Does the Cook County Sherrif's office still have John Talavera?
Disgraced his dad, lets down his wife, embarrasses his kids.
Javier Torres,
HDO is stroger than ever. Mayor Daley loves the group.US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald will continue to put away low level City Workers and leave Mayor Daley and top LT's alone. Sanchez did nothing that John Daley, Jerry Joyce or Tim Degnan didn't do themselfs. It 's just that the Daley crew can throw a fish back in, just to protect the daley organization!
Seriously, you're losing readership and discrediting your own reporting with this nonsense. As much as I love the content, your comments section prevents me from recommending this blog to others.
It's mainly three assholes; one calling himself 'orion', and the other two star-crossed lovers, Patrick McDonough and Frank Coconate.
McDonough and Coconate both have their own, heavily moderated web blogs, but, apparently choose to use this open posting blog as a public tree to piss on.
'Orion' is too cheap, or broke, to host a blog and spreads his feces wherever he's allowed to.
All three are certifiable.
They should all rent a room and work out their mental issues together, preferably with any sharp objects being removed prior to their occupancy.
In the Reader blogs, the common problem is that most of the comments are misplaced. We have to wade through an ocean of irrelevant Frank Coconate and Mayor Daley attacks by a few regulars with well-known points of view in order to find a few pertinent comments about the issue in the story.
Couldn't the Reader just set up a standing blog for "Frank Coconate", another one for "Mayor Daley (pro and con)". Comments to other blogs that rightfully belong to these topics would not have to be deleted, but they could be redirected to these standing blogs. Other standing blogs could be created or eliminated as necessary over time, according to demand.
Or, in the parlance of the blog "to cocunutty."
If you'll agree to keep the sharp objects in the room, I'll be there.
Another area where this pattern is of great concern is the City's Department of Planning and Development's network of "delegate agencies," many former neighborhood chambers of commerce or community development corporations, who show up downtown at otherwise poorly-attended public hearings to testify in favor of City-sponsored property tax increases, like TIFs and SSAs.
thanks!