| Submit your comments on this article |
| Fifth Column |
| "I never even really looked at the applications to see if they had the qualifications" |
| 2006-05-17 |
| Crook County IL With Daley Machine and Serbian Machine... Witness: Probe affected City Hall hiring By Dan Mihalopoulos and Michael Higgins Tribune staff reporters Published May 17, 2006, 1:38 PM CDT Mayor Richard Daley's office stopped dictating hires for coveted union jobs and the city began choosing applicants based on merit only after it became clear that authorities were investigating City Hall corruption, a former city official testified today. Mary Jo Falcon, who resigned last year as personnel director for the Water Management Department, said the federal probe of the city's Hired Truck Program prompted a change in personnel practices in the Daley administration. Falcon is the government's first witness in the trial of former mayoral patronage chief Robert Sorich and three other former city officials. The four are charged with participating in a scheme to rig city hiring and promotions in favor of pro-Daley political workers. For many years, beginning in 1994, Falcon said she filled city jobs based on who Sorich or his aide, Timothy McCarthy, wanted her to hire for posts such as house drain inspector, bricklayer, laborer and truck driver. "I never even really looked at the applications to see if they had the qualifications," Falcon said. But Falcon went on to describe how a round of hiring in 2005—after the Hired Truck investigation became public—differed from the usual process. She told jurors she met with McCarthy, who had replaced Sorich, to discuss who would be hired as operating engineers at the city's water purification plants. "He gave me names but also told me, 'Go screen and just pick whoever I thought was best,' " Falcon said. In that case, Falcon testified, she picked those job seekers with enough experience to really do the work for the city. Falcon said Sorich had instructed her to lead a group of Asian-American city workers on election campaigns for Daley, U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), Illinois Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan, 2000 Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore and several aldermen whose wards have heavily Asian precincts. Sorich's orders to work for Daley in 1999, when the mayor was re-elected, came at a meeting at the mayor's Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, where Sorich and McCarthy worked, Falcon said. The leader of a pro-Daley Korean-American group was also present at the meeting, Falcon said. Falcon resigned from the city in June after federal agents raided her office at the Water Management Department, seizing her computer and files. She is testifying under a grant of immunity from prosecution. Defense attorneys are expected to question Falcon's motives and credibility on cross-examination. McCarthy's attorney, Patrick Deady, had warned jurors Monday to be wary of her testimony. |
| Posted by:3dc |