In a not-so-great bit of news for Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, the Inspector General in Chicago released a report on Wednesday, January 29, in which it was revealed that Mayor Johnson had a “gift room” stash of gifts he received and that the gift room was kept in City Hall. The room was full of things like designer handbags, expensive cuff links, and similar items.
The Office of the Inspector General for Chicago announced as much in a stunning report released through its official city website. The report revealed not only that the secretive “gift room” existed, but what sort of expensive luxuries filled it and what dramatic steps the mayor took to keep it hidden from inspectors.
Beginning the report, the Inspector General’s office said, “The City of Chicago Office of Inspector General (OIG) has released an advisory with recommendations to the Mayor’s Office to improve transparency and accountability around gifts accepted “on behalf of the City.” As a general rule, gifts accepted on behalf of the City must be reported to the Board of Ethics (BOE) and the City’s Comptroller, and those reports are publicly available.”
Next, the report noted the shocking way in which gifts were not reported, saying, “Pursuant to a long-running, unwritten arrangement dating back to the administration of Mayor Eugene Sawyer, gifts accepted by the Mayor’s Office on behalf of the City were not reported in this way, but rather were to be logged in a book which would be available for public viewing on the Fifth Floor of City Hall.”
Continuing, and describing how the OIG personnel found out what was inside the room, the report revealed, “OIG visited the Fifth Floor in a covert capacity and asked to see this logbook; that request was denied and undercover OIG personnel were directed to file a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the log.”
Building on that, the report said, “OIG did so, again in a covert capacity; the Mayor’s Office failed to timely respond, constituting a denial of the FOIA request. Thereafter, OIG sent an official document request for the log, and received a spreadsheet detailing gifts accepted by the Mayor’s Office on behalf of the City.”
Then, describing what sort of gifts were in the secret room, the report said, “The log identified many of those gifts—including Hugo Boss cufflinks; Givenchy, Gucci, and Kate Spade handbags; a personalized Mont Blanc pen; and size 14 men’s shoes—as being stored in a “Gift Room,” and others in the Mayor’s personal office in City Hall. OIG subsequently visited the Fifth Floor to conduct an unannounced inspection of the Gift Room, and was denied access.”
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The report later added that the OIG made simple, reasonable requests about the room, saying, “OIG recommended that the Mayor’s Office comply with the generally applicable rules for public reporting of gifts accepted on behalf of the City, and that the Gift Room be made available for announced or unannounced inspection by OIG.”
But, predictably, the mayor tried to refuse. As the report put it, “In its response, the Mayor’s Office indicates that it would allow OIG access to the Gift Room, but only with “a properly scheduled appointment.” Their response further attaches a letter from BOE in which BOE “concurs” with OIG’s recommendation on public reporting; the Mayor’s Office says it will ‘work closely with [BOE] to transition to this new guidance.'”
In the report, Chicago Inspector General Deborah Witzburg was quoted as saying, “When gifts are changing hands—perhaps literally—in a windowless room in City Hall, there is no opportunity for oversight and public scrutiny of the propriety of such gifts, the identities or intentions of the gift-givers, or what it means for gifts like whiskey, jewelry, handbags, and size 14 men’s shoes to be accepted ‘on behalf of the City.’”
Continuing, the inspector general said, “It is perhaps more important than ever that Chicagoans can trust their City government, and for decades we have given people no reason at all to trust what goes on in the dark. These gifts are, by definition, City property; if they are squirreled away and hidden from view, people are only left to assume the worst about how they are being handled. If we do not govern responsibly on the small things, we cannot ask people to trust the government on the big ones.”
Featured image credit: By Fotografía oficial de la Presidencia de Colombia – https://www.flickr.com/photos/197399771@N06/54011713288/, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=154990012