It would be a bit of an understatement to say that the BGA has been critical of Governor Blagojevich over the years.  However, back in 2004 we actually congratulated him for a job well done.

At the time the General Assembly had passed a bill that would have set a 60 day limitation on the filing of Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) lawsuits.  Under the proposed law if your FOIA request to a public body was denied you would have to file a suit within 60 days of the final denial.

The BGA called upon the Governor to veto the legislation.  To his credit, the Governor did exactly that.  My guess is right now he is probably regretting that decision. 

In 2006 we sent a FOIA request to the Governor asking for copies of federal grand jury subpoenas that had been served upon his office.  Our final denial from the Governor’s office occurred on September 15, 2006.  On January 4, 2007, we filed suit, 110 days after the last denial. 

We won at the trial level.  The Governor appealed and on September 16^th, 2008 the 4^th District Court of Appeals held oral arguments.  I thought we had the better of the argument and the BGA believes it will be victorious on appeal and the appellate court will uphold the trial court’s decision.

I just hope that the General Assembly doesn’t get any more bad ideas and revisit the statute of limitations issue.  Counting on Governor Blagojevich once to do the right thing was risky.  I don’t have a lot of faith he would do so twice.

Posted on: 9/17/2008 at 9:42 AM
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For the inaugural posting on Clout Fairy it is only appropriate that we feature Mayor Daley.  No person has done more to further the myth of the Clout Fairy than our esteemed Mayor.  Anytime something blows up in the Mayor’s face it is always the Clout Fairy or his henchmen, “A Few Bad Apples™,” that are responsible.  Anyone but the Mayor. 

Only in Chicago can someone have a reputation for being a master of detail while also claiming to be completely oblivious to an unfortunate reality staring them in the face.  Kudos to Mayor Daley for pulling it off. 

Recently the Mayor stated in an interview “I don’t know where we get this, this idea that there’s a big Democratic machine going on. Chicago and the metropolitan area is very Democratic and the state is. There’s no, this machine. I thought it was laughable.” 

Apparently the Mayor forgot that little matter that gained some notoriety in the press the last few years, the federal criminal trial and conviction of Robert Sorich. 

Sorich, a former high ranking staffer in the Mayor’s Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, and three others were charged with and convicted for systematically rigging the City of Chicago’s hiring system to reward applicants who had done political work for the Mayor or his favored candidates.  The Shakman Decree, civil service rules, criminal law and common sense were ignored by Sorich and his colleagues; the only factor that mattered for an applicant was whether he or she had done political work as ordered by the Mayor’s cronies. During the course of the trial it came out that the effort to illegally reward political work with City jobs was no mere isolated instance of corruption.  The effort went back to at least 1994 and was highly systematized, it even included color coded binders and computer databases.

Webster defines a machine in part as “a combination of persons acting together for a common end along with the agencies they use.”  Sounds suspiciously like the City Hall hiring scheme.

I guess the Mayor views irrefutable evidence of a thriving and expansive political machine in an office under his supervision as “laughable.”  I wonder if Robert Sorich shares his good humor as he sits in prison serving his sentence.

Posted on: 9/9/2008 at 6:05 AM
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