Aldermen upset at having to go through metal detectors, searches
Chicago aldermen with their noses out of joint today demanded to know why they are searched along with the masses at the city’s central headquarters for administrative hearings.
Scott Bruner, director of Administrative Hearings--the department Chicagoans love to hate--was put through the wringer again during City Council budget hearings, but for different reasons.
Normally, Bruner gets pummeled for presiding over a “kangaroo court” of rude, cavalier and predominantly white hearing officers who don't give the accused a fair shake, critics say.
This time, he was ambushed by aldermen, some of them attorneys, who showed up at 400 W. Superior only to be searched and put through metal detectors like every other Tom, Dick and Harry.
“Why am I searched as an alderman and as an attorney?…I don’t want to be searched going through a city building. There’s only 50 of us and we all have gold badges,” said Ald. Howard Brookins (21st).
Ald. Freddrenna Lyle (6th) noted that aldermen are shown far more courtesy at the Daley Center and the State of Illinois building.
“If I present my attorney identification card and the sheriff’s ID, I don’t get searched [in those buildings] as an officer of the court. I am offended that you would think that this administrative hearing process is superior to or has a greater security risk than the Circuit Court of Cook County or the Appellate Court of the state of Illinois,” Lyle said.
Budget Committee Chair Carrie Austin (34th) was so “offended,” she warned Bruner what might happen if he fails to “take another look at your policy.”
“It’s not a matter of giving anybody any preference. But us that are aldermen—we are the ones who set your budget. If we’re the ones setting your budget maybe we’ll take an adjustment” downward, if the policy is not rescinded, Austin warned.
Bruner initially defended the policy, telling aldermen, “It’s not my intention to offend anyone. It’s only our intention to make sure that people coming through are searched…We’re trying to treat everyone equally. We’re not trying to give anyone any particular favors.”
But by the time the hearing ended, he had clearly gotten the message.
“We will go back and look at the policy. We’ll talk to the vendor about what they are comfortable with and we’ll see what, if anything, we can do to address it,” Bruner said.
“That wouldn’t just be aldermen [excused from searches],” he said. “We would be expanding that to all attorneys if we decided to change the policy.”
Today’s complaints were reminiscent of an outburst during the 2000 budget hearings.
At that time, a handful of aldermen complained about showing up to claim their VIP seats at a Taste of Chicago concert only to be turned away like gate-crashers by sassy, part-time security guards.
“When I get there, I don’t expect some $5-an-hour, part-time summer help to talk to me like I’m somebody who just rolled in off the corner,” Lyle said at the time.
“It’s a matter of disrespect more than anything else…There are five or six male, white aldermen who could have walked in there and never been questioned. But I saw several black women who were hassled [by security who said], ‘Those seats are for the sponsors.’ Well, as an elected official of the city of Chicago, I’m a sponsor, too.”