{"id":485378,"date":"2010-03-29T15:54:07","date_gmt":"2010-03-29T19:54:07","guid":{"rendered":"tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d8341c60fd53ef0133ec4ff049970b"},"modified":"2010-03-29T20:05:16","modified_gmt":"2010-03-30T00:05:16","slug":"daleys-embattled-ethics-aide-resigns-in-power-struggle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/485378","title":{"rendered":"Daley’s embattled ethics aide resigns in power struggle"},"content":{"rendered":"

UPDATE 7 P.M. by Todd Lighty and Hal Dardick: Boswell explains his departure.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mayor Richard Daley\u2019s compliance officer abruptly resigned today after waging a rare battle in which he publicly challenged the mayor\u2019s authority.<\/p>\n

Anthony Boswell, an outsider Daley tapped in 2007 to lead the newly created Office of Compliance, informed the mayor\u00a0 he plans to leave city employment at the end of May.<\/p>\n

\u201cI uprooted my family from Dallas, Texas in order to accept a position with the City, with the implicit promise that the City was serious about having a best-in-class compliance program,\u201d Boswell wrote in a one-page letter<\/a><\/span> to Daley. \u201cGiven recent events, it has become difficult for me to remain excited about the work of the Office of Compliance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boswell has been embroiled in controversy since Daley suspended him for 30 days earlier this year after the inspector general determined Boswell mishandled a sexual harassment complaint involving a 911 center boss. Boswell, who returned to work recently, sued Daley and the city\u2019s inspector general in Cook County Circuit Court to clear his name. <\/p>\n

He alleges Daley overstep his authority by suspending him. Boswell also accused the city\u2019s top lawyer and the inspector general of engineering a \u201cretaliatory power grab\u201d because Boswell questioned what he thought was an improper hiring attempt in the office of the legal counsel.<\/p>\n

Daley had moved to strip Boswell\u2019s office of much of its authority and recently shifted responsibility for overseeing city hiring\u00a0 to Inspector General Joseph Ferguson.<\/p>\n

Boswell\u2019s lawyer, Jamie Wareham, said the civil lawsuit against Daley and Ferguson will still go forward. \u201cThey drove an honest man with a family out of town and without cause,\u201d Wareham said.<\/p>\n

Jodi Kawada, a mayoral spokeswoman, said the administration had no plans to eliminate the compliance office, adding it still has other responsibilities such as overseeing aspects of minority and women contacts with the city. \u201cWe\u2019re not aware of a commissioner\u2019s resignation meaning the end of a department,\u201d Kawada said.<\/p>\n

It is not uncommon for top mayoral aides to be eased out when they are caught up in controversy, but typically they go quietly.<\/p>\n

Boswell declined to talk about his future plans but said the time was right to move on. \u201cThis was an attempt to do something new that\u2019s never been done before in city government,\u201d Boswell said in an interview. \u201c Obviously, I would have liked for it to have ended differently.\u201d<\/p>\n

Daley created the office in 2007 to ensure city government complies with legal and ethical guidelines and grew the department to include a budget of $3.5 million and 39 employees.<\/p>\n

The inspector general and others at City Hall had opposed the new office, fearing Daley was trying to weaken the inspector general\u2019s authority. Several aldermen, including Ald. Robert Fioretti, 2nd, believe it\u2019s time to eliminate the compliance office. Fioretti said corporate-style compliance and ethics did not translate well to City Hall.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis isn\u2019t a normal corporation,\u201d Fioretti said. \u201cIt\u2019s an empire that has been built on patronage and political hiring. . . . The power always should have been in the inspector general\u2019s office. \u201d
<\/br>
<\/br><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n


<\/br><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

UPDATE 3:18 p.m. by Todd Lighty and Hal Dardick;<\/strong> originally posted <\/em>at 2:52 p.m.<\/p>\n

Mayor Richard Daley\u2019s embattled compliance officer abruptly resigned today amid a power struggle that pitted two City Hall watchdogs against each other.<\/p>\n

Anthony Boswell, executive director of the Office of Compliance, informed Daley that he plans to leave city employment at the end of May, said Boswell\u2019s lawyer, Jamie Wareham. He said Boswell\u2019s future plans were unclear.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s leaving because of the stress and strain on his family and because of all of the unfairness,\u201d Wareham<\/p>\n

Boswell has been embroiled in controversy since Daley suspended him for 30 days earlier this year for allegedly mishandling a sexual harassment investigation. In his <\/span>resignation letter<\/a><\/span>, Boswell said it had "become difficult for me to remain excited about the work of the Office of Compliance."<\/p>\n

Boswell, who returned to work recently, sued Daley and the city\u2019s Inspector General in Cook County Circuit Court to clear his name. He alleges the Daley administration’s top lawyer and the city’s inspector general engineered a\u00a0 \u201cretaliatory power grab\u201d because Boswell questioned what he thought was an improper hiring attempt in the office of the legal counsel.<\/p>\n

Wareham said the suit will still go forward. \u201cHe\u2019s trying to ensure that unlawful suspensions don\u2019t happen to future directors of compliance or, for that matter, future inspectors general,\u201d Wareham said.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, Daley has moved to strip Boswell\u2019s office of much of its authority. He recently shifted the responsibility for overseeing city hiring from the compliance office to the inspector general.<\/p>\n

Daley created the compliance office in 2007 to ensure city government complies with legal and ethical guidelines and grew the department to include a budget of $3.5 million and 39 employees. The City Council plans to hold hearings on the mayor’s proposal to realign the powers between compliance office and the inspector general, including giving the inspector general the authority to investigate aldermen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UPDATE 7 P.M. by Todd Lighty and Hal Dardick: Boswell explains his departure. Mayor Richard Daley\u2019s compliance officer abruptly resigned today after waging a rare battle in which he publicly challenged the mayor\u2019s authority. Anthony Boswell, an outsider Daley tapped in 2007 to lead the newly created Office of Compliance, informed the mayor\u00a0 he plans […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3992,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-485378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485378","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3992"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=485378"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485378\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=485378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=485378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=485378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}