Cook County’s Homeland Security interim chief resigns

The interim director of Cook County’s Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management has resigned nearly a year after he took the reins. His predecessor was fired after serving only one year.

Mark Edingburg tendered his resignation Friday, which was also his last day, according to Frank Shuftan, a spokesman for Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle.

Shuftan said a replacement to head the agency will be named “shortly.”

“In the meantime, there is a management structure in place at the agency,” Shuftan said in an email.

Edingburg, who was appointed in November, realized he was not going to be named permanent director of the agency and decided to step down, said a county source familiar with the resignation.

“He decided he didn’t want to go backwards,” the source said.

Edingburg could not be reached for comment Sunday.

Edingburg’s predecessor was former high-ranking Chicago cop Ernest Brown, who Preckwinkle sacked after reading a series of stories about how cops under Brown’s command ripped off drug dealers at public housing facilities.

Preckwinkle was also concerned about Brown’s possible role in the so-called Homan Square scandal, which began after the Guardian newspaper described a West Side police facility as a “black site” where people were interrogated, abused and denied the right to an attorney.

Brown died in January.

During Brown’s tenure as head of the county’s Homeland Security agency, a bill was introduced in the Illinois Senate that sought to turn the agency into a new police force but not acted upon.

The bill hasn’t been reintroduced in the current legislative session.