The Revenge Of A Stroger Scorned?

By Marcus Gilmer in News on Sep 15, 2009 2:20PM

Poor Todd Stroger. He's had a rough couple of weeks. There was that whole tax-rollback-veto brouhaha and then he found out fewer people approved of his job than approved of Blago. Now, an employee who just got the ax from Stroger's office is accusing the embattled Cook County Board President of firing him out of revenge. As Carol Marin and Lisa Donovan report for the Sun-Times and NBC 5, Byron Steele was fired from his job as First Deputy Director of Cook County’s Department of Facilities Management yesterday morning. Byron alleges it's because his brother, Cook County Commissioner Robert Steele has voted for the tax rollback both times. Not only that, but the Steele's mother is Bobbie Steele who served as interim president of the Cook County Board in the interval between John Stroger's stroke and Todd's election.

Com. Steel told the Sun-Times/NBC 5 crew, “I’ve stood by Todd on everything. The sales tax veto was the only issue on which we disagreed.” So why, then, does he believe this was a politically motivated firing? One reason, apparently, is because Todd won't return Com. Steele's phone calls. Byron maintains he was told the decision to fire him came directly from Stroger and that his job evaluations had always been excellent. So no returned phone calls plus good job evaluations equal politically motivated firing? We're not saying that's not the case and Lord knows we've been pretty hard on the Toddler here at Chicagoist, but we're just not sure if the evidence given is enough to make us buy it. Though, we admit, we wouldn't put anything past anyone involved in local government.

Stroger spokesman Gene Mullins defended the firing:

“It’s not politically motivated whatsoever. He — the president — said he would continue to evaluate every job under his purview. He wants a tighter ship with the departments under him. Byron is not the first change he’s made over the past year.”