Feds take files from Streets and Sanitation offices

May 4, 2005

BY FRAN SPIELMAN City Hall Reporter
 

Federal investigators probing Mayor Daley's scandal-ridden Hired Truck Program showed up at City Hall this week to review the personnel records of a third major department -- Streets and Sanitation -- whose commissioner has long-standing ties to the Daley-created Hispanic Democratic Organization.

In a pre-arranged visit that took place after the close of business Monday, federal investigators without search warrants or subpoenas arrived at Streets and Sanitation's personnel office on the seventh floor of City Hall, stayed about 20 minutes and left with a "very limited number of documents," according to city Corporation Counsel Mara Georges.

Georges refused to discuss the contents of the documents seized at the request of the U.S. attorney's office, which on Monday took the unusual step of praising the Daley administration for its cooperation with the Hired Truck investigation.

"This administration is saying to the federal government, 'Come on in and take a look and use all the powers available to the federal government to get to the bottom of wrongdoing," Georges said. "And if that wrongdoing is discovered, we will deal with it.' "

City's cooperation lauded

The Monday night visit to City Hall came just three days after federal officials armed with search warrants seized documents and computer hard-drives from the Water Department and the mayor's Office of Intergovernmental Affairs. The office oversees political hiring activity controlled by mayoral operative Robert Sorich, who has close ties to Daley's brother, County Commissioner John Daley.

First Deputy Chief of Staff Matt Crowl, a former federal prosecutor, said search warrants are routinely used to avoid concerns about the admissibility of evidence. "That's in our interest, too. The mayor wants to get to the bottom of this just as much as the U.S. attorney does."

Crowl said a search warrant was not required for the pre-arranged Streets and Sanitation search because federal investigators "didn't go through a series of offices. It was an open space, as opposed to several offices, some of which have doors locked. There's not a single locked door or anything like that they had to get through. It seemed to me they didn't have any issues at all about admissibility of evidence. If they did -- if they had rather done a search warrant, we would have accommodated that, as well."

'Bagman' pleads guilty

Randall Samborn, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office, issued a rare public statement that said, "In recent days, the U.S. attorney's office has asked for the city's assistance in obtaining certain information regarding an ongoing investigation. City officials have been fully cooperative in responding to our requests."

Pressed to explain the rare public kudos, Sanborn said, "Hopefully it encourages cooperation and rewards it when appropriate."

The Streets and Sanitation visit occurred on the same day that an alleged "bagman" for former First Deputy Water Commissioner Donald Tomczak entered a pivotal guilty plea that lifted the veil on what one insider called a "political infrastructure" that has benefitted Chicago politicians for decades.

George Wesolowski described how campaign contributions were solicited from companies seeking Hired Truck business and how Water Department employees won promotions, pay raises and coveted overtime in exchange for doing campaign work for Daley, U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) and others. Unnamed city officials gave Tomczak his marching orders, prompting campaign organization meetings to be held on city time in city offices. according to the guilty plea.

It was nearly a year ago to the day that Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Al Sanchez spent an hour answering questions from federal investigators gathering information about Hired Trucks, earning a vote of confidence from Mayor Daley.

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