Is Clout Dead in Chicago?

By Kevin Robinson in News on Feb 11, 2010 3:20PM

Soon-to-be-former 7th District Cook County Commissioner Joseph Mario Moreno thinks it's on the way out. Reeling from his loss to Jesus "Chuy" Garcia, Moreno lamented the demise of the Chicago Machine to the Sun-Times. "The committeemen don't have as much influence over the voters as they did when patronage was alive and well," Moreno told the paper. With Al Sanchez and the Hispanic Democratic Organization out of the way, and a federal judge looking over the mayor's shoulder when it comes to hiring, ward bosses can't round up mobs of poll workers to help turn out the vote. Garcia, who was bounced from his seat as a state senator in 1998 at the hands of the HDO, beat Moreno in last week's election.

And while Moreno has family on the county payroll, aldermen may not be able to put relatives on what the Tribune has termed a "stealth payroll" following a council vote Wednesday. According to a Tribune investigation last year, a $1.3 million line-item in the Revenue Department's budget permits aldermen to hire people "to perform secretarial, clerical, stenographic, research, investigations or other functions expressly related to the office of aldermen." While the Shakman decree prohibits politically connected hiring except in cases of exempt positions, the stealth payroll doesn't appear on that list, even though the city withholds taxes and sends out a W-2 each year. The vote to prohibit family members from earning wages from the stealth payroll passed the council by a vote of 45-5, with Aldermen Anthony Beale, Lona Lane, Willie Cochran, Ray Suarez, and Bernie Stone voting against it.