Chicago’s ‘keep your mouth shut’ City Council needs reform
There is much public lamenting these days about codes of silence, whether it’s about the Catholic Church, the Chicago Police Department or Hollywood. We might fairly ponder whether we should add the Chicago City Council to that group — when an alderman was reported to have violated that unspoken code, recriminations erupted.
In response to last week’s reports that Ald. Danny Solis, 25th, wore a wire to record conversations with Ald. Edward Burke, 14th, who is the subject of a federal criminal complaint alleging attempted extortion, a chorus arose from some aldermen that is both discouraging and misguided and should not go unaddressed
One alderman is reported to have said, “(W)here I come from, if you wore a wire, someone’s gonna kick your ass,” while another offered, “If I was caught doing something wrong, I’d just take my punishment, deal with the consequences ... and keep my mouth shut,” and another stated, “You don’t do that. You just don’t.”
If the first comment came out of someone in Washington right now, legal experts would be clucking, fairly, about whether it was a message intended to obstruct justice. As for the latter two, we could surmise two things — the first rule of a code of silence is nobody talks; the second rule is nobody records anyone else who does talk.
They weren’t the only ones. Another alderman indicated that Solis’ cooperation was a dishonor, and still another implied that Solis had disrespected the City Council “family.” This is the language of mobsters, not legislators. It is wholly inappropriate, and at this moment in the city of Chicago’s history, disturbingly myopic and tone-deaf.
Law enforcement relies on the cooperation of complainants and witnesses. Threats of violent reprisals to those who cooperate in criminal investigations is an obstruction of justice. Any suggestion that honor lies in keeping your mouth shut sends the wrong message to other elected officials and undermines public confidence in government.
It also violates Chicago’s municipal code, which states that city officials and employees have an affirmative duty to report corrupt or unlawful activity. In other words, the law says they do not have the option to “keep their mouth shut” in the face of misconduct. Unfortunately, Chicago has had to put that into a law — passed by, you got it, the City Council — even though as a matter of plain principle it should be pretty obvious.
It’s especially appalling at a time when violent crime in Chicago continues to outpace that of other large cities and the Chicago Police Department’s clearance rates for shootings and murders remain at record lows. The CPD’s struggle to solve crimes is due, in significant part, to lack of community trust and the resulting inability to gain the cooperation of witnesses critically needed to not just solve crimes, but make cases. That disconnect is especially daunting in wards of aldermen contributing some of the choice quotes above, at least one of whom is a lawyer.
Against this backdrop, city officials have a responsibility to model transparency and honesty. Regardless of a cooperator’s motive — be it civic responsibility, selfinterest or a combination of the two — cooperation is crucial to successful law enforcement, and it should be encouraged, not vilified, by our elected leaders.
The so-called corruption tax falls into two buckets. The first involves direct theft of public money and property. The second is what is called honest services fraud — which at its core involves monetizing official authority entrusted by the public, for private gain. And the form it takes is basically the imposition of an illegal surcharge on whatever a resident, a property owner, a small business, a major developer needs from the government — a permit, a zoning variance or any number of services. The result is that many small businesses never open and many that do go under because of the corruption surcharge. Residents throw up their hands and leave the city. And many big businesses for whom Chicago would otherwise be a great home never come. And those outcomes require higher taxes on those who stay, and increase inequity of opportunity and outcome from community to community.
Most public officials and employees don’t engage in either form of corruption. They are honest and hardworking. But make no mistake — most every one of them knows that it goes on, and many can tell of situations where they have seen it or have heard about it. It is time to wrestle with the question of whether our silence makes us complicit.
With two sitting aldermen facing felony corruption charges and a third entangled with the criminal justice system, a muchneeded conversation on ethics in government has suddenly begun. Where it leads is anyone’s guess. Along the way, someone can be relied upon to trot out the ghost of Paddy Bauler, the old-time ward heeler who is famously quoted for saying, “Chicago ain’t ready for reform.” To that I say, it is no longer a choice. But we aren’t going to get there so long as corruption taxes are protected by a code of silence.
With a municipal election underway, the voters have a rare opportunity to challenge every officeholder and candidate to embrace real, lasting, comprehensive, structural reforms. Let’s hope that the men and women asking for the privilege to serve rise to the challenge and condemn the code of silence in their own ranks. We can be better. Let’s be.