Patronage, Patronage Everywhere

By Amy Hart in News on Apr 11, 2006 11:43AM

Yesterday federal investigators said aides to Mayor Daley shredded documents and erased computer files in an attempt to hide the role patronage played in the hiring and promotion of city workers and Daley supporters, regardless of whether or not the job candidates were qualified for the positions. The prosecution says the "massive fraud" has been going on since the 1990s. Next month four Daley aides are going on trial for having roles in the scheme.

The long suspect Hispanic Democratic Organization is also mentioned in the new filing by federal prosecutors.

When it came to questions of dealing with questions of corrupt hiring processes, a former personnel director for the Sewer Department told his successor, "Deny everything -- deny, deny, deny." It seems to be a motto that spread far beyond the Sewer Department.

These new details are indeed serious, but for some reason we don't find ourselves all that surprised by them. We hope we're not becoming so accustomed to corruption that we just expect to find it everywhere we look.