Stroger under new scrutiny after top aides get raises

The hot water surrounding Cook County Board President Todd Stroger got hotter - and deeper - late this week with the discovery he had awarded raises to top aides Jaye Morgan Williams and Eugene Mullins.

It's what members of the Cook County Board said they suspected when they voted unanimously earlier this week to impose a 72-hour notification requirement on all new hiring, personnel transfers and raises.

Williams, the county's chief financial officer, saw her salary rise $54,000 from $176,000 to $230,000. Mullins, Stroger's director of public affairs and communications, got a raise from $105,000 to $115,000.

All while Stroger was in the process of losing February's Democratic Primary and becoming a lame duck scheduled to leave office at the start of December.

And more similar revelations may be forthcoming. Prompted by the amended 72-hour ordinance on personnel, the county comptroller and human-relations department were preparing a list of all county employees who'd recently received raises. The list was originally to be delivered to commissioners Friday, but was delayed until early next week.

"It's a little more cumbersome to pull all the information," said Jim Clark, spokesman for Bartlett Republican Commissioner Timothy Schneider.

Chicago Democratic Commissioner John Daley, chairman of the finance committee, said he had canvassed fellow commissioners, and they had agreed to grant the extension over the weekend.

"They would rather have the list completed," he said. "There'll be some more, and that's why we want to make sure the list is finalized."

Earlier in the week, Stroger admitted to using a county-supplied credit card to make personal purchases, insisting, "I paid for everything" in reimbursements.

He also all but admitted to skirting board approval on personal-service contracts of $25,000 or more by setting the contracts just under that threshold.

"It's hard for me to do anything with the board," Stroger said.

Stroger was unapologetic in acknowledging Williams' raise on WGN 720-AM Friday.

The 72-hour notification, as well as a board-approved hiring freeze, were imposed in response to findings that Stroger had hired former campaign spokeswoman Carla Oglesby as deputy chief of staff at a salary higher than her predecessor, and paid her public-relations firm $24,975 in March for work on top of that. Oglesby subsequently was placed on unpaid leave pending an investigation by the county's inspector general. Former Stroger campaign consultant Vincent Fry also earned a county contract worth $24,995.

Riverside Republican Commissioner Tony Peraica said contracts and raises were being "handed out as gifts" by Stroger and called for "a much more intensive investigation." Peraica called Stroger's admission that he had raised Williams' salary "outrageous."