Stung and embarrassed by allegations of corruption and mismanagement in the city’s Hired Truck Program, Mayor Richard Daley on Tuesday ordered an overhaul that will include ousting the companies that now participate and starting over with what he promised will be stringent new standards.
Once the revamped program is in place on June 1, a cap–yet to be determined–will be placed on the number of trucks belonging to a single firm that can be used in a day. That is an effort to spread around the business of the $40 million-a-year program, officials said.
The biggest losers under the new approach apparently will include Marina Cartage and MAT Leasing, two companies controlled by Michael Tadin, a friend of the mayor’s, who has won millions of dollars’ worth of city business since Daley was elected in 1989. Marina and MAT are among the biggest participants in the program.
The changes were announced a day after a former head of the program appeared in court on attempted extortion charges and after seven of the 165 companies in the program were suspended over unspecified rules violations, officials said.
Daley, who was out of the city on vacation, issued a statement about the reforms. Details were outlined at a City Hall news conference by Corporation Counsel Mara Georges.
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“The kinds of abuses reported recently in the Hired Truck Program are not only embarrassing, they are unacceptable,” Daley said.
Participants will be free to apply for the reformed program, but Georges said no company will be admitted if it leases, but does not own, the vehicles it uses. Also, no company will be admitted if its owner has been convicted of bid rigging, extortion, syndicated gambling or other “crimes of dishonesty.”
Proof of proper business and drivers’ licensing will be required, as will equipment-safety inspections and “enhanced” economic disclosure statements showing the “familial relationships among applicants,” Georges said.
Some companies in the program are owned by members of the same family.
Each participant will be required to reapply every two years, and an outside consultant will review all applications and determine whether applicants are qualified to participate, Georges said.
Under the program, participating companies are paid to provide trucks and drivers to haul materials at city construction sites.
Officials have conceded the city sometimes has paid for trucks that sit unused at the sites, and they have acknowledged the program is open to corruption.
Angelo Torres, who managed the program until his transfer in December, was arrested by the FBI over the weekend. He solicited money from a trucking company owner in exchange for city business, prosecutors charged.
Torres was associated with the Hispanic Democratic Organization, a pro-Daley group whose members include many city workers. It is headed by Victor Reyes, a lawyer and former senior aide to Daley.
Reyes on Tuesday described Torres as a “fringe participant,” in the organization.
“If what he is charged with is true, then he should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law,” Reyes said in a statement, declining to comment further. “There is no room for betraying the public’s trust. As a Hispanic, I am angry that my community is and will be tarnished with his actions.”
Illinois Sen. Antonio Munoz (D-Chicago), another leader of the organization, who has gotten thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from Hired Truck Program participants, said he is not aware of any fundraising on his behalf by Torres.
“My district is made up of a lot of the trucking outfits,” he said. “When I host a fundraiser, letters go out from the campaign office.”
Torres worked in his election campaign in 1998, Munoz said. “He’s a friend … but it’s not like we go out to dinner once a week,” Munoz said.
Munoz said he did not help Torres get his job with the city.
Ten years ago, Torres was a former gang member interested in both status and community betterment, said Irving Spergel, a University of Chicago sociologist. Spergel said he employed Torres as a youth counselor in an anti-gang initiative from 1993 to 1995, until Torres lost interest when he was passed over for a promotion.
Though Torres was eager to root out drugs and work with police, he also had a hard-to-manage ego, Spergel said.
Torres wanted to be a police officer, so he worked part time as an armed security guard–a job that conflicted with his youth work, Spergel said. On one occasion, Torres proudly flashed to Spergel the gun he was licensed to carry as a security worker, Spergel said.
Spergel said he was so troubled that Torres was carrying the gun in his car that he issued a written policy banning his half-dozen youth workers from possessing guns while working on the anti-gang initiatives.