City Ends Lease, Saves Face Money

By Kevin Robinson in News on Jul 11, 2009 8:45PM

City Hall is ending its month to month lease at a warehouse on South Pulaski that Mayor Daley's nephew, Robert Vanecko owned. Vanecko, you may remember, headed a real estate investment firm with Daley fundraiser Allison Davis. Davis and Vanecko got nearly $70 million in investment funding from five city pension funds. Both the city inspector general and federal prosecutors are investigating the deal, and Vanecko has since left the investment firm. Nevertheless, the city has determined that it no longer wants to be in the lease deal. But it's not because of the controversy. Certainly not.

Instead, the city is maximizing its use of scarce public resources during an economic downturn. "We're reducing the number of trucks utilized for the water department construction, and we will no longer need that large indoor facility this winter,'' Daley's deputy chief of staff, Lisa Schrader, told the Sun-Times. "So, instead of continuing to pay for indoor leased space for the remainder of the summer and fall months, we are moving those trucks to a city-owned outdoor location while we search for other city-owned sites that will allow us to park the trucks indoors.''

City trucks, in fact have been parked outdoors near that warehouse for years. It wasn't until Vanecko and partners bought the building that the city decided they needed to lease the space to park the vehicles indoors. The city has paid nearly $500,000 since signing the agreement, which was inked just days before Vanecko and company closed on the sale of the building.