Stroger Watch

- UPDATE-

Claypool Critical Of Stroger Hire
Stroger Says Triche-Colvin Qualified

part of his ward organization," Claypool said. "A boyhood spouse of a boyhood friend."

Triche-Colvin is the wife of state Rep. Marlow Colvin, a Chicago Democrat who grew up with Stroger in the South Side's 8th Ward

Triche-Colvin moves into the job from the Forest Preserve District, where she was also purchasing agent, making $95,000 a year.

NBC5's Phil Rogers reported that Claypool recalled the scene of federal agents descending on City Hall during a publicized raid two months ago.

Stroger spokesman Steve Mayberry called Triche-Colvin "eminently qualified" and said it wasn't politics, but rather a resume that includes business and finance degrees and 15 years of county government work that made her qualified for the job.

"Anyone who tries to characterize it as a political inside deal couldn't be more off-base," Colvin said. "I didn't even have to lobby Todd about it."

On Friday, Stroger defended his decision to hire Triche-Colvin.

"We found a very, very talented person who's been in purchasing for many years, serves on the procurement board of the state, went to Drake (University) and I am very confident of her ability," Stroger said.

Rogers reported that some commissioners said they were willing to give Triche-Colvin the benefit of the doubt.

"What I tell folks is that not everyone who's political is unqualified," said Commissioner Mike Quigley.

Commissioner Willam Beavers, a strong Stroger loyalist, criticized Claypool's comments.

"It's not that she's not qualified -- he's not qualified," Beavers said. "He doesn't realized the election is over. He's not going to be the president; he will never be the president. Todd Stroger is the president."

Still, the move rankled some of those officials who are being asked to cut 17 percent from their budgets and comes just days after Commissioner Forrest Claypool criticized Stroger for his across-the-board approach to cuts, saying it hurts low-paid nurses and jail guards while preserving high-paid patronage jobs.

Stroger's 17 percent cutting plan is his way to fill a $500 million budget deficit.

That plan was the subject of a quiet Thursday morning meeting that involved nearly all of the county's elected officials. Afterward, those involved declined to say what was said, if there's a joint strategy emerging or why Stroger wasn't invited to attend.

Mayberry said Stroger was aware of the meeting, and "it's our hope it had something to do with them having met the 17 percent cut."

Additional information provided by Chicago Sun-Times Inc.

This Democrat's had more than enough
Forest Park Review
August 8, 2006

So the Cook County Democratic Party has slated Todd "Urkel" Stroger for the presidency of the Cook County Board. Didn't we fight a war with England over inherited titles in the late 18th century? Stroger Lite was slated despite the availability of Congressman Danny K. Davis, whose training and broad governmental experience makes him eminently more qualified. But Davis, acceptable to just about any Democrat not nakedly beholden to the machine power brokers who have carved up city and county offices like personal fiefdoms, managed only about 23 percent of the weighted vote. Davis lost not due to a lack of qualifications, but rather because he wouldn't put on a white coat and play house boy to entrenched interests in county government. Those interests will only give up their control of power when it's pried from their cold, dead fingers-politically speaking. Fine. I've indeed "had enough," as Republican Board President candidate Tony Peraica has been saying rhetorically.

I plan to do my small part this November to help see that power is pried from those greedy little fingers. I'm voting for Peraica.

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Clout wins out in county hiring, too
Chicago Sun-Times
August 21, 2006

Test scores get changed in Cook County government for the benefit of politically connected job seekers just as they do at Chicago's City Hall, according to a county Highway Department supervisor. Eric Petraitis, 41, tells the Chicago Sun-Times he felt coerced by his bosses to change the low scores of clouted candidates for county jobs so they could be hired over qualified people. (…) So Petraitis put away the "oral interview evaluation" form with Robinson's low scores and wrote up a new one with better ratings for Robinson -- who he would later learn was active in Stroger's 8th Ward Democratic Organization, he said. He saved the first version, which appears with this story. (…) 'Hey, Mr. Alderman' Soon after Robinson was hired, the 6-foot-5-inch, 300-pound soldier in Stroger's 8th Ward Democratic Organization started bragging about his clout, Petraitis said.

"He talks about how he's so involved," Petraitis said. "He was hired as a machinery operator, but he didn't know how to operate anything. He did not know what to do. They could not give him too many assignments."
Petraitis was in the field with Robinson when Robinson's cell phone rang. Robinson said to Ald. Todd Stroger, Stroger's son, "Hey, Mr. Alderman. How you doing?"

The younger Stroger was slated last month by 59 of Cook County's 80 ward and township Democratic committeemen to replace his father on the ballot this November because of the elder Stroger's stroke.

"Every once in a while, I call Dwayne when I have problems with my phone -- he helps me," Ald. Stroger said. "I know him like a neighbor. He is a neighbor. I can only speak of Dwayne from working in the [8th Ward Democratic] Organization. He's a hard worker, dedicated, spends a lot of time making sure the picnic, the back-to-school parade get done."

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Study: Patronage bad for county's health
Chicago Sun-Times
August 8, 2006

Cook County runs an "archaic" health system set up to allow "a clear opportunity to use the system for political hiring," according to an analysis released Monday. The six-month study by the Institute for Health Care Studies at Northwestern University notes that most health-care officials interviewed complained the Cook County Bureau of Health had too many patronage workers in key positions for it to operate effectively or efficiently. That is among a number of problems facing the $926 million bureau, which is in drastic need of an overhaul in the way it delivers health care to the poor and uninsured, it says.

That overhaul, the report adds, should include oversight from a panel other than the Cook County Board and hiring decisions made by someone other than the County Board president -- a one-person hiring process unlike any other system in the country.

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Todd Stroger Faces Criticism In Cook County Race
CBS 2
July 19, 2006

A power struggle over John Stroger's replacement heated up Wednesday night as the Cook County Board shuffled in an interim president. After Commissioner Bobbie Steele was elected interim board president, she came face-to-face with three others who have been vying for the permanent job. CBS 2's Jon Duncanson reports criticism is already starting to fall on Ald. Todd Stroger (8th) and how he ended up replacing his father on the November ballot. Stroger and Steele appeared on WTTW's "Chicago Tonight" on Wednesday along with County Commissioner Forrest Claypool, who lost a close race to John Stroger for the Democratic Cook County Board president nominee in March, and Stroger's Republican challenger this fall, Commissioner Tony Peraica.

"lt's the kind of thing that would happen in Mongolia, not in the United States of America," Peraica said.

The 'kind of thing" was the alleged backroom dealing that led to Todd Stroger's ascension to board president candidate on the Democratic ticket in this fall's election replacing his ailing father.

"Both the Sun-Times and Tribune have called for the U.S. Attorney to investigate criminal charges in the realm of basically withholding key information from the public," Claypool said.

On Wednesday, the county board voted to replace John Stroger with Commissioner Bobbie Steele for the next four months.

There are criticisms that the young Stroger says what others tell him to say. A Sun-Times cartoon on Wednesday shows Ald. William Beavers (7th) controlling what Todd Stroger says.

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Stroger Jr. aided black separatists
Chicago Sun-Times
August 1, 2006

Ald. Todd Stroger, the Democratic nominee for Cook County Board president, and the 8th Ward organization he represents have given almost $8,000 to a group that believes blacks should not be taxed and should not be involved in interracial relationships, and which supports the creation of a separate state for blacks. Records show that since 2000, the Coalition for the Remembrance of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad (C.R.O.E.) has received $2,000 more from the campaign committee for Ald. Stroger's father, longtime county Board President John Stroger. Found via campaign filings The Nation of Islam splinter group calls for "former slave masters" to provide the land for a black state and 20 to 25 years of supplies for those living there, along with free schooling for black students, who should be taught only by other blacks, its Web site says.

A spokesman for Todd Stroger said he is a practicing Catholic who "does not adhere to" the group's beliefs. "The donation is a reflection of mutual respect," he said, "like so many in the African-American community."

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