Daley dumps Hired Truck Program

With 17 indictments already and no end in sight, Mayor Daley is throwing in the towel: He's getting out of the Hired Truck business, turning the mess over to a private contractor and taking the extraordinary step of banning donations to his campaign fund from firms doing business with the city.

The cost to Daley is expected to be significant -- assuming he decides to seek re-election in 2007. At mid-term, the mayor has $3 million in his war chest, including roughly $1 million from city contractors.

But after indictments galore and a parade of scandals tied to cronyism and minority business fraud, that's a chance the mayor is apparently willing to take.

"Anyone who believes that my interest in public life is in enriching my family, friends or political supporters doesn't know or understand me at all," the mayor said during his annual City of Chicago address. "My reputation and the well-being of this city are more important to me than any election."

Targets 'pay-to-play' image

Contractors already are limited to $1,500 contributions. Daley's decision to stop accepting even that amount, and to extend the ban by executive order to cover owners and their spouses, is aimed at removing a "pay-to-play" cloud that has loomed over city contracts for decades.

Last year, the Sun-Times reported that the city's 165 favorite trucking firms had given $108,575 to the mayor since 1996 and $47,525 to his brother, Cook County Commissioner John Daley. One-fourth of all Hired Truck money went to firms operating out of the mayor's 11th Ward power base.

Unless the mayor's ban on contributions covers subcontractors, his decision to privatize Hired Truck could allow him to continue receiving trucking money.

Order may have loophole

The mayor said his executive order will place the onus on contractors. If they "knowingly contribute" in violation of the edict, they will lose their contracts and their donations will be returned.

But Daley's description of the legal language appears to leave a loophole that could allow rank-and-file company employees and law firm associates to contribute.

Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.), who has prodded Daley to "clean up the stench" in the minority set-aside program, said: "Although belatedly, Mayor Daley has taken small, but positive steps to clean up the rampant corruption, fraud and abuse at City Hall."

Jay Stewart, executive director of the Better Government Association, said the mayor's decision to finally draw the curtain on contributions from city contractors should be imposed, not by executive order that can be erased by mayoral whim, but by an ordinance that would sweep aldermen and citywide elected officials into the new era of reform.

"Look at Hired Truck. Not all contributions went to Mayor's Daley's [campaign] operation. They went to ward committeemen and other elected officials," he said.

Corruption despite reforms

Daley's decision to wash his hands of Hired Truck follows several failed efforts to clean up the program by starting over. The reforms have cut costs -- $15 million of the $40 million annual price tag at last count -- but the feds are still uncovering corruption.

After public bidding, a private contractor in the United Parcel Service mold will be chosen to handle everything from hiring, screening and dispatching trucks to making certain they do what many in the Hired Truck program failed to do: give Chicago taxpayers' an hour's work for an hour's pay.

Stewart called Daley's decision to get rid of Hired Truck a "stunning admission by the city that they can't police their own programs."

But he added, "Who is to say that this new private operator who runs the whole program won't be subject to the same pressures? . . . Who's going to police the private actor?"

Newly appointed chief procurement officer Mary Dempsey said the goal is to have a replacement for Hired Truck in time for the spring construction season.

How much is at stake?

It's unclear just how much Mayor Daley is giving up by pledging to sign an executive order banning himself from taking campaign contributions from anyone who does business with the city.

His aides said that $1 million of the $3,052,283 in his campaign coffers on Jan. 1 was contributed by firms with city contracts. The Sun-Times reported a year ago the mayor received $108,575 from Hired Truck firms since 1996.

All of that money would be off-limits, but his campaign aides could not say how much of his fund-raising would be affected.

"It would be hard for us to determine how much this would mean," said Pat Kilroe, Daley's campaign treasurer. "It probably would be significant."

But no one expects it to cripple Daley's ability to raise money. During his 2003 campaign, Daley raised $1.7 million in just six weeks, bringing his total to at least $4.2 million. He went on to wallop three little-known challengers with 79 percent of the vote.

HOW WILL IT WORK?

City contractors are out. So are husbands and wives, but employees aren't.

And aldermen don't have to worry.

Mayor Daley's aides said they are still working out the details of his proposed executive order, but his comments and the existing ordinance give some idea what is in store:

*The most significant change is an outright ban on the mayor taking any contributions from any firm doing business with the city. Under the existing ordinance, anyone who has done more than $10,000 in business in any 12-month period during the previous four years is limited to contributing $1,500 a year or $3,000 in an election year.

*Daley said he would not only ban the owners of such firms from contributing, but their spouses as well. Employees of companies with city contracts would not be barred from contributing. But Daley's campaign will scrutinize donations to make sure contributors are not engaged in "bundling" -- a practice in which workers and relatives contribute en masse to circumvent the ban, said David Axelrod, Daley's political consultant.

*People without a financial interest in the city presumably could still make unlimited gifts, unless they are seeking city business or have done so in the previous six months. The order apparently would not bar contributors from seeking city business in the future.

*As an executive order, it would not apply to aldermen. That would require an ordinance from the City Council.

Owner of company linked to scandal has family ties to city

BY TIM NOVAK AND STEVE WARMBIR Staff Reporter

Michael Leyden -- the son of a Chicago fireman, the brother of a Chicago cop and the nephew of a Cook County judge -- ran a company that allegedly paid bribes to get work in Mayor Daley's Hired Truck Program, the Sun-Times has learned.

Then Leyden's firm, American Tank Inc., got paid by the city for trucks that allegedly didn't even go to work sites, records show.

As many as 50 times.

Even when Leyden's driver was on a two-week European vacation.

American Tank trucks typically got $50 an hour for an 8-hour day.

A truck driver who worked for Leyden, Tim Shrader, was charged last month with paying bribes to city Department of Transportation foreman Dennis Natale so Natale would lie that Shrader had done city work. Natale was also charged.

Leyden's firm is not named in court records, but city records show Shrader drove for Leyden and worked under Natale.

Leyden isn't identified in court records either, but state records show he owns American Tank with his wife. Prosecutors note in a court filing that the owner of the trucking firm won't be prosecuted in exchange for telling the truth.

Leyden did not return messages for comment.

American Tank was paid about $473,000 between 2001 and last February when the firm left the Hired Truck Program.

The company has done other work for the city, but it's unclear how much money the firm made.

Leyden has a number of relatives on government payrolls. His uncle, Michael Close, a Cook County judge until the mid-1990s, was once investigated but never prosecuted for allegedly fixing a murder case. Close denied the allegation.

While on the bench, Close had been accused of deriding interracial marriage, the morals of Danish people, British people for bringing black people to the United States, and Guatemalans.