Former City IG Hoffman Appointed To Investigate Berrios Nepotism
By Chuck Sudo in News on Mar 18, 2013 3:30PM
Former Chicago Inspector General David Hoffman (left) and Cook County Assessor Joe Berrios
The Cook County Board of Ethics scored a victory in its ongoing fight with County Assessor Joe Berrios over whether Berrios’ hiring of relatives violates the County’s Ethics Code. A judge recently appointed former City Inspector General David Hoffman as a special state’s attorney in the case.
Berrios has long refused to pay the County Ethics Board’s $10,000 fine for hiring his son Joseph “Joey” Berrios and sister Carmen Cruz, claiming the County Ethics Ordinance doesn’t apply to him and other elected officials outside of the County Board. The Board of Ethics also recommended firing Joe Berrios and Cruz. (Another Berrios relative, daughter Vanessa, also works in the Assessor’s office but was hired by Berrios’ predecessor, Jim Houlihan.)
County Board President Toni Preckwinkle said she supported legal means to get Berrios to comply with the Ethics Board's decision. The Board of Ethics requested a special investigator after Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez’s office refused to pick up the case. A special state’s attorney to represent Berrios and Alvarez’s office said representing either Berrios or the Ethics Board would be a conflict of interest. Hoffman, whose investigations into transparency and corruption in City Hall often drove former Mayor Richard M. Daley mad, is currently in private practice and serves on the board of Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s Chicago Infrastructure Trust, where he recommended transparency guidelines for how the Trust funded public works projects with private money. Hoffman also helped draft the mayor’s new ethics plan after Emanuel was elected.
It’s unknown at this time how much sway Hoffman will have with his investigation but, given his dogged tenure as City IG, he may be the one person with the sway to beat Berrios. Not that we expect Berrios to care. In addition to the nepotism charges, he’s refused a subpoena from County Inspector General Patrick Blanchard’s office for records related to an illegal tax break given to Lewis Towers, a manager in his office. Towers owns homes in Chicago and Sauk Village (where he’s also mayor) and allegedly claimed homeowners exemptions on both. Berrios again claimed Blanchard didn’t have the authority to investigate his office.
Berrios’ court battles against the County Ethics Board and Blanchard’s office have cost the county (which is required to foot his bills) $24,716. Now that Hoffman has been appointed, those costs are sure to increase. The big loser in all of this? County taxpayers.