Company can't find any political hiring

Chicago Sun-Times

October 19, 2005

By Steve Patterson

Six years of investigating has yet to turn up one instance of a Cook County employee being hired for political reasons, county commissioners were told Tuesday.

Hay Management Group has analyzed random samples of hires made each year, and each study has yet to find a single violation of the federal Shakman Decree.

The decree prohibits politics from being used in deciding who gets most county jobs.
In spite of years of allegations that County Board President John Stroger has led a patronage-driven operation, the outside firm hasn't found conflicts in hiring at all.

Commissioners voted 12-3, plus two abstentions, to approve another $100,000 contract with Hay Management Group to perform an analysis of all hires made under Stroger in 2004.

The county, like city government, must provide annual reports in U.S. District Court detailing the findings of random samples of those hired in the last year.

And while federal investigators have found rampant violations at City Hall, county human resources director Mark Kilgallon said similar problems have not been found in county government.

Hay Management Group takes a sample of 10 percent of all hires within a year -- about 100 -- and follows the hiring process, from application to the first day on the job, Kilgallon said.

Through hundreds of checks, no politically driven hires were found -- a finding that some are meeting with skepticism.

"The odds of that happening are beyond Carl Sagan numbers," Commissioner Mike Quigley said. "There's either something wrong with the process or their efforts."

Copyright 2005, Chicago Sun-Times, Inc.

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