The Victims of Chicago Patronage Begin to Collect:Top Victim No Match For Alderman Burke's Patronage Operation

The Chicago Tribune reports:

A tree trimmer who was harassed by his Daley administration bosses because he wouldn't "play ball" won the biggest award—$100,000—from a settlement fund to pay victims of political discrimination at City Hall, according to a list obtained Wednesday by the Tribune.

Richard Gramarossa, a 27-year employee, was passed over 13 times for promotions in favor of less experienced, politically connected co-workers. When he complained, he was punished with bad assignments, such as picking bugs out of infested trees in the bitter cold.

The 47-year-old said that he was happy to have received the award, but that it was not substantial compared with the salary and pension he would have gotten had he been promoted years ago. "$100,000 is nothing," he said.

He heads the list of 1,427 people who will share a $12 million settlement of a long-running court case against political patronage in Chicago. The list of recipients and the amount each received was released by city officials in response to a Tribune public records request.

The list already is sparking debate about how the money was divvied up and whether the most deserving got their fair share.

"I can't imagine anyone else's case deserving more than mine," said LaVerne Johnson, who will get $4,000. Johnson said she lost her job in the Public Health Department in 2000 because she refused to campaign for Mayor Richard Daley.

Even before the list was released, some people who came forward and acknowledged winning awards had been ridiculed by Daley, aldermen and employees. Among them were Jay Stone, a losing City Council candidate and the son of Ald. Bernard Stone (50th), and Frank Coconate, a former city worker who is an outspoken Daley critic. They each will get $75,000.

The person who signed off on the awards, city hiring monitor Noelle Brennan, sent out letters to recipients last month, but did not reveal the names.

Brennan worried that disclosure of the names might prompt retaliation against recipients from supervisors and other employees. "People already think they're being retaliated against," she said.

Jennifer Hoyle, spokeswoman for the city's Law Department, said that how taxpayer money is spent is a matter of public record. "The city's personnel rules and other policies prohibit any retaliation in this court settlement or any other court settlement," Hoyle said. "Anybody who retaliates would be subject to discipline."

The awards cover people harmed by the city's actions from the beginning of 2000 to the end of May 2007. The maximum permitted award was $100,000.

Brennan declined to explain Wednesday why Gramarossa deserved the top amount. She had previously said that those awarded the largest amounts had been repeatedly discriminated against over many years and had meticulously documented the abuse.

Gramarossa, who works in the forestry bureau of the Streets and Sanitation Department, was one of six current or former city workers who had received $25,000 each for being plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed by lawyer Michael Shakman.

The Shakman case alleged that coveted jobs in the forestry bureau went to workers with political clout, mostly from Ald. Edward Burke's 14th Ward Democratic organization. When Gramarossa asked a boss why he was transferred to a job far from his home, he was told the move would teach him to "play ball," according to court records.

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