Well, Illinois taxpayers, the Metra scandal is giving you quite a thorough inside look at how things work for the politically connected class of your fellow Illinois citizens.
And thanks to the Chicago Sun-Times, we can now add pensions to the various aspects of Illinois government the Metra affair has touched. Until late Thursday, it had shone a spotlight on patronage, influence peddling and a culture of secrecy Metra was willing to pay $718,000 to maintain.
The Sun-Times reported Thursday that Patrick Ward, the $57,000-a-year Metra employee for whom House Speaker Michael Madigan tried to get a raise, already was collecting Chicago city and Cook County public pensions that paid $60,744 a year. Ward, now 57, started receiving the pension payments in 2009, the Sun-Times reported.
Madigan’s attempt to get the raise for Ward, a longtime Madigan political volunteer and donor, has become the focal point in the controversy over the resignation of former Metra CEO Alex Clifford. Clifford alleged in a memo in April he was being forced out because he refused Madigan’s request. The Metra board then gave Clifford a $718,000 severance package with a confidentiality clause that forbade him from discussing his allegations of political interference from Madigan and others.
But this isn’t just the story of a squabble between a board of directors and a CEO. It’s an ever-expanding case study of a political culture in which patronage thrives, threats are always implicit and the connected get rewarded.
The Sun-Times’ revelation that Ward was collecting a healthy portion of pension income in his mid-50s while also collecting another government paycheck backs up an assertion often made during the debate over pension reform. Public pensions today all too often aren’t supplying retirement security. Rather, they’re financing second careers for people who will work many more years (in Ward’s case, on the public payroll).
Oh, and when Ward didn’t get that raise from Metra? Well, he got a position with the Illinois Department of Central Management Services. At a salary of $69,996. That has put Gov. Pat Quinn, whose administration controls CMS hiring, on the defensive. Quinn said last week that Ward got no special treatment, though the Sun-Times report on Thursday said CMS hiring guidelines restrict new employee salaries to 5 percent above what an employee previously made in a job outside state government.
Also on Thursday, the Chicago Tribune reported that the General Assembly’s Ethics Commission has granted Madigan’s request to investigate whether Madigan broke any laws in his contact with Metra on behalf of Ward and two other people. Madigan has claimed all along that he did not violate any laws or ethics rules.
Pay close attention to this one, but don’t expect any blockbusters, if precedent holds. From the Tribune:
“By law, the legislative inspector general will issue a report to the Ethics Commission, which has legislators from both parties and chambers. Legislators can be fined up to $5,000 if the commission concludes there is a violation of the state's ethics act. That has yet to happen in the several years the system has been in place. The commission will determine whether to make Homer's report public, but the panel must release the report if a lawmaker is fined, Homer said.”
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