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Report: Taxpayers paying a price waiting for Joseph Berrios to start anti-patronage reforms
Cook County taxpayers are paying for county assessor Joseph Berrios vintage Chicago Machine-style politics, according to a new investigation by the Tribune and ProPublica Illinois. Reports from monitors “reveal a persistent pattern in Berrios’ office of improper hiring and firing, arbitrary staffing decisions and resistance to change.” Any reforms to happen in the assessor’s office have been slow-paced, and Berrios does not seem enthusiastic to adapt, according to the report. “If you’ve got an office that practices patronage and disregards rules, I don’t think we should be surprised that the outcomes we get, in terms of assessments, are shoddy,” former head of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, Cynthia Canary, said. “It’s like garbage in, garbage out.” [Tribune]
