Lightfoot calls for probe into whether Gardiner denied services
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Friday called for an investigation into allegations that Northwest Side Ald. Jim Gardiner retaliated against community critics by attempting to withhold their city services.
Gardiner has been at the center of a controversy in recent weeks after text messages he apparently sent were made public by an anonymous Northwest Side group, The People’s Fabric, showing the writer referred to one City Council colleague as “a bitch” and the top aide of another council member as “his bitch,” and also used the term to describe a political communications consultant.
Block Club Chicago also published a story containing allegations that Gardiner sought to withhold services to constituents of his 45th Ward who have been critical of him and similarly used derogatory language to refer to constituents in texts that were later leaked.
At an unrelated news conference Friday, Lightfoot said she’s recommending city Inspector General Joe Ferguson do a “fulsome investigation” into allegations.
Lightfoot also said she told Gardiner during a recent phone call that his alleged actions weren’t acceptable.
“Under no circumstances, any circumstances, should a resident be denied access to city services simply because of their political choice or affiliation,” Lightfoot said.
Gardiner, who was elected in 2019, could not be reached for comment Friday.
In response to revelations about Gardiner’s language in the texts, two dozen aldermen were joined by City Clerk Anna Valencia and City Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin earlier this week in calling for Gardiner to issue “a sincere, in-person apology” and to “demonstrate through his actions — not just his words — that he understands the effect of his behavior in creating a toxic environment for those around him.”
“We are deeply concerned about Ald. Gardiner’s apparent recurrent use of sexist and homophobic language toward one of his colleagues and toward multiple women who work in and around City Council,” the group’s statement reads in part. “In addition to being a legislative body, the City Council is a workplace for hundreds of people. All of us have an obligation to ensure our work environment is safe and inclusive, especially for women. That means we must all speak up and speak out against any effort by a member of this body to demean, disparage or inflict inappropriate retaliation on individuals who work in this space.”
Ald. Tom Tunney, 44th, confirmed last week that Gardiner apologized to him over the phone for language in one of the leaked texts.
Lightfoot’s Friday comments came a day after Cook County Circuit Clerk Iris Martinez’s office announced Martinez had asked the office’s inspector general to investigate whether an employee in that office improperly released information about a past criminal court case involving a political opponent of Gardiner.
After The People’s Fabric published additional texts with a former Gardiner staffer that appear to show the alderman calling for the information about the case to be leaked within the ward, Circuit Court Clerk spokesman Patrick Hanlon told the Tribune the office “was recently made aware of an allegation that an employee may have accessed a court document and improperly used it for a non-Clerk or court-related function. The matter was referred to the Circuit Court Clerk’s Office of Inspector General for an investigation.”
While court case files are available to the public, Hanlon said it wouldn’t be appropriate for a clerk’s office employee to track down and direct case files to someone while at work.
“You can come in and order up files and pay a court fee and we’ll get those for you as a member of the public,” Hanlon said. “But for an employee to do it on their own and then send the file out to someone, that would be different. So we just need to learn more about how exactly this happened.”