Cook County Record reports:
Saying the mayor’s refusal to wrest control of the city’s workers compensation division has allowed Chicago’s most powerful alderman to turn the office into a political patronage “army,” giving preferential treatment to loyal city workers, a lawsuit brought by a city worker who helped expose the Hired Trucks scandal has asked a federal judge to declare unconstitutional Ald. Ed Burke’s management of the office that handles Chicago city workers’ workers comp claims, and force Mayor Rahm Emanuel to oversee operations there, despite city rules delegating the task to Burke.Stay tuned... there could be much more to this story.
On July 30, plaintiff Patrick McDonough, who works in the city’s water department, filed suit in Chicago federal court on his own behalf, along with citizen activist Jay Stone, of Pleasant Prairie, Wis., alleging the arrangement created by Chicago city code, giving the chairman of the city’s Finance Committee control of the city’s workers comp division violates Illinois law, the Illinois state constitution and U.S. Constitution, by improperly giving control of an executive office function to a member of the legislative branch.
Specifically, the complaint alleges the city’s ordinance giving Burke, who represents the city's 14th Ward and chairs the City Council’s Finance Committee, does not comply with Illinois state law, which gives Chicago’s mayor “the power and duty to appoint and remove all City of Chicago department and division heads.”
Further, the plaintiffs argue Burke’s oversight of the workers comp division violates state law prohibiting aldermen from serving as both alderman and an administrator of an executive office. In this case, the complaint asserts Burke should be barred from serving as alderman and “Chief Administrator for the Chicago Workers’ Compensation Division,” as the “dual roles” create “inherent conflicts of interest,” as he is able, as the City Council’s Finance Committee chairman, to access $1.4 billion in “water, sewer and vehicle tax funds,” and then spend that money through “workers compensation vouchers.” The complaint does not specify how much of the “water, sewer and vehicle tax funds” the city may spend on workers compensation claims.
