For decades, Cook County Republicans have given Cicero their highest praise: Next to Chicago, the old west suburban town once favored by Al Capone has the best political machine around, capable of electing anyone slated.
But this election season, political opponents and a citizens group are charging that Cicero’s Republican officials are borrowing another page from Chicago’s political history: the one on dirty tricks and intimidation.
Over the last month:
– Debbie Zellers, an independent candidate for town trustee, received a citation ordering her to do extensive home renovation or face a fine of up to $200 a day.
– Cicero businesses that displayed campaign posters for candidates other than interim Town President Betty Loren-Maltese have been promptly visited by health inspectors.
– Fliers have been distributed that falsely linked convicted child molester Rev. Robert Mayer to a church-based citizens group that has questioned spending by incumbent town officials.
– A Catholic church affiliated with that group, the Interfaith Leadership Project of Cicero, Berwyn and Stickney, had its trash bins removed, then was cited two days later for not having bins and warned it could be fined $200 a day.
– Town officials have called corporate sponsors of the organization, local priests and regional church officials and suggested that they might want to reconsider their support for the interfaith group.
– The town attorney has filed complaints with the U.S. Justice Department, accusing the church group of blockbusting, and with the Illinois attorney general’s office, challenging the group’s status as a non-profit organization.
– Town officials have attempted-successfully in the case of independent challenger Frank Wicker-to have both opposing town president candidates thrown off the ballot.
Loren-Maltese concedes that village inspectors issued the citations, but that the inspectors were just doing their jobs-not engaging in some sort of political vendetta. And she denies any involvement in the distribution of the flier.
Nevertheless, political opponents of the town’s long-standing power structure say it all amounts to an organized campaign of intimidation.
“This town tries to strong-arm people into not making waves,” said Judy Contreras, the manager of Wicker’s campaign, who recently had the windows of her car broken out.
And church leaders simply are stunned at the barrage of charges unleashed against their interfaith group, which they say had no goal other than to address community problems and promote positive change.
“It’s very much like the old Chicago political tricks, and I don’t know why that is in this day and age. This is 1993,” said Rev. Mark Canavan, pastor of St. Frances of Rome Catholic Church, where the Mayer fliers were passed out last Sunday.
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Long-smoldering political tensions have roared to life in Cicero recently. In a town where political cronyism is a way of life and organized-crime ties linger, Morton High School students have helped topple a new superintendent accused of corruption, just as the elections approach.
The town president’s husband, Frank Maltese, also resigned his town trustee’s job Tuesday after pleading guilty to his role in a gambling operation run by mobster Rocco Infelice.
All this, combined with the death late last year of longtime Town President Henry Klosak and the January appointment of Maltese’s wife to the Cicero mayor’s job, have prompted Cicero officials to challenge those whom they perceive as a threat.
And that includes the town’s churches. Specifically, the town’s battle is with the Interfaith Leadership Project, a church-based community group that is planning to hold a candidates night next Tuesday.
Recently, the not-for-profit group has suggested that the town hire more police, for instance, and has asked for copies of the town budget and for details on how taxpayer money is being spent, figures that project leaders say they would ask of any elected official.
“We are not political. We are into safety, more police, jobs for youth, and honest fiscal accounting in our town no matter who runs it,” said Rev. Ralph Starus, president of Interfaith and an associate at Mary Queen of Heaven Church.
But, Canavan said, “because we’re asking questions about projects, about budget things, that comes across as, `You’re attacking our leadership.’
“They think, `How could you attack our leadership? You’re being political. If you’re attacking us, you must be for the other guys.’
“It’s been a knee-jerk reaction on their part,” the pastor said.
Specifically, in letters from town attorney Dennis Both to leaders of Interfaith, the town has accused the group of “engaging in covert political activities,” of being “charlatans” and of lobbying for opposing candidates.
The town president is more direct. Interfaith’s goal, she says, “is strictly to get rid of the Republican” candidate for town president-herself.
In particular, she is upset with the organization for publicizing plans she reportedly revealed to Interfaith members Feb. 2 on demolishing much of the town’s predominately Hispanic Grant Works neighborhood to build new townhomes.
Interfaith members, who had come to speak to Loren-Maltese as part of a get-acquainted effort, were concerned and passed the information on to their church members who live in the area, according to Starus.
Harangued by angry residents, Loren-Maltese has since denied that she ever made such a statement, and the town attorney has filed blockbusting charges with the U.S. Justice Department, accusing Interfaith of attempting to scare Hispanics out of town.
“They have been contacted twice by our legal department telling them to quit using these scare tactics and to quit misrepresenting the facts,” Loren-Maltese said. Starus, however, calls such charges a “wild punch.”
“We’re simply reporting what she told us,” he said. “She’s the one who brought it up.”
The split between Town Hall and the church group also apparently stems from the signatures of Cicero priests and nuns on the nominating petitions of Democratic mayor challenger Tom Nichin and independent Frank Wicker.
Church officials say they signed the petitions only because they believe anyone should be able to run for town president and note that they would have been happy to sign for Loren-Maltese as well if they had been approached.
Town officials believe otherwise. Emil Schullo, Cicero’s commissioner of public safety and former police chief, charged in calls to or meetings with a variety of Interfaith corporate and church supporters that the group was endorsing candidates in the race and perhaps financially supporting them.
Those supporters, including Paul Darling of Cicero’s Corey Steel plant and regional Bishop Thad Jakubowski, say they have checked on the charges and found them to be untrue.
The most difficult part of the recent battles, Interfaith members say, is that the group had hoped to work with Cicero officials, not alienate them.
“It wasn’t put together as an adversarial thing, like we’re against the town, we’re out to get everybody out,” said Therese Sherlock, vice president of Interfaith.
But relations have deteriorated so far that Interfaith members now have worries beyond making sure Cicero is run right.
“I’m very afraid, personally, that there will be a miscalculation on the part of some of their supporters that may end up with vandalism or a personal injury to someone,” Starus said. “This is Cicero.”