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Chicago
From a federal standpoint, the recent case of Walter S. Kozubowski was resolved when Chicago's city clerk admitted that he was corrupt. Politically, the scandal didn't go away until Mayor Richard M. Daley turned against his running mate, put a reformer in the office and sidestepped an ethnic quagmire. Kozubowski, who had served four mayors and 14 years as city clerk, pleaded guilty in April to three counts of mail fraud, bank fraud and tax evasion in connection with paying six "ghost payrollers" $476,000 over a 12-year period, underreporting his income to the Internal Revenue Service by $83,235 and filing six false bank loan applications between 1987 and 1991. Even by Chicago standards, the charges raised eyebrows not so much for the amount, but the office. The clerk, the mayor and the treasurer are the only officials elected citywide. Kozubowski is now a footnote in city history as the highest-ranking elected Chicago official to be convicted on federal charges. Unlike the scores of aldermen, circuit judges and city workers whose federal convictions preceded those of Kozubowski, the clerk's dealings drew much more than the usual "tsk-tsk" from Chicago residents. For one thing, Kozubowski kept working after telling the feds he did it. Under state law that disqualifies felons from elective office, he was allowed to keep drawing his $85,000 a year salary until he was sentenced. (He was scheduled to be sentenced this month.) For another thing, city law allowed $55,300 in his legal fees to be billed to taxpayers. Besides, many people felt they knew Kozubowski because they had his autograph. As clerk, his signature appears on city vehicle stickers and business and dog licenses. Once Kozubowski was convicted, Mayor Daley quickly joined a host of outraged Chicagoans and called on the clerk to resign. The mayor seemed to forget that he had agreed to keep Kozubowski on the Democratic ticket in 1991 despite a pending federal investigation. Daley said he had asked Kozubowski if he had done anything illegal and the clerk had told him, "No." When pressed by the media about his apparent naivete, the former Cook County state's attorney shot back, "I can't call a priest, can I?" It would have been easy for Daley to replace Kozubowski almost as soon as he resigned under pressure, appropriately on income tax day, April 15. All he had to do was put in a reformer to tell taxpayers they could rest easy. But in Chicago politics, things don't come easy. From the day Kozubowski confessed, would-be clerks had their names tossed into the mayor's appointment bag like old river ward precinct captains stuffing ballot boxes. And in Chicago, because politics is played along ethnic lines, the names were largely African-American or Polish-American. Because blacks account for two-fifths of the city, their leaders pushed for one of their own to sit in the top city post along side Mayor Daley, an Irish American, and city Treasurer Miriam Santos, a Hispanic. But Polish Americans also wanted the post because the clerkship had been held by a Polish American since 1955. The names included Water Reclamation District Commissioner Joe Gardner, Chicago Planning Commissioner Valerie Jarrett, state Rep. Joseph Kotlarz (D-20), Cook County Commissioners Ted Lechowicz and John Stroger, Cook County Recorder of Deeds Jesse White, and Aldermen Lemuel Austin (34th), Carole Bialczak (30th), Lorraine Dixon (8th), Mark Fary (12th), Theris Gabinski (32nd), Ed
42/July 1993/Illinois Issues Smith (28th), Allan Streeter (17th) and Michael Wojcik (35th). In the end Daley named U.S. Atty. Thomas Scorza to replace Kozubowski. Scorza's spotless reputation as a federal prosecutor was clearly intended to ease Chicagoans' concerns. It is also the first time in recent memory that lawyers hold all three of the city's top elected posts. "Tom Scorza has been an aggressive crimefighter for many years and is well-suited to the task of cleaning up any lingering stigma of corruption associated with the office of City Clerk," Daley said in naming the University of Chicago Law School graduate. As to the ethno-political concerns of blacks and Poles, Daley succeeded in not really offending them. By installing Scorza, an Italian American, with the condition that he not run for election to the clerk's post in 1995, Daley shifted the burden of choosing a candidate back to the various interests. But for taxpayers, the matter may not be settled until the clerk's office with its 125 employees and $4.8 million budget is privatized. Although elected, the clerk is not responsible for city policy. His duties are to supervise the issuing of licenses and serve as the City Council's record keeper by publishing its proceedings. If city government were concerned with better service and saving money in a corporate era of "right-sizing," the post would be appointive in the short term and privatized in the long term. Most of the work could be put out to competitive bid and the council proceedings could be published for the average citizen to understand. Ah, but then those contracts would have to be awarded along some entho-politically correct criterion. For the record: Kozubowski was born and bred in Chicago's Back of the Yards neighborhood, where cattle and hogs were slaughtered and no one avoided working at manual labor, even if it was ringing doorbells for elections. After a stint as a city inspector, he was elected state representative in 1972 from the same district Daley represented in the Illinois Senate. In 1979 Kozubowski was elected city clerk. In 1993 he was heading to jail. Manuel Galvan is a Chicago-based writer and marketing consultant.
July 1993/Illinois Issues/43 |
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