Editorial: Berrios should heed court, clean up his act

Follow @csteditorials

Here’s the message we hope Cook County Assessor Joseph Berrios heard last week from the Illinois Supreme Court: Follow the county’s ordinances and stop giving everyone, including the taxpayers, the runaround.

The court’s ruling was narrow, but also unanimous. It said the county’s inspector general has the power to investigate Berrios, something he had disputed.

The ruling didn’t address a separate case still working its way through the courts in which Berrios thumbed his nose at a county Board of Ethics ruling that he can’t pad the payroll with his relatives. After he was elected assessor, Berrios promptly hired his son, Joseph “Joey” Berrios, and his sister, Carmen Berrios. His daughter, Vanessa Berrios, already on the payroll, got a promotion and a pay raise of $10,000 a year.

Follow @csteditorials

Last year, a Circuit Court judge sided with Berrios in the Board of Ethics case, a decision that is on appeal. But, come on. Berrios’ spokesman said after last week’s Supreme Court ruling that the assessor’s opposition to the inspector general’s subpoenas was all about “legal principal.” If that’s so, the constitutional question has been made clear: Berrios is subject to the ordinances of the county and must follow them. He should drop his opposition in the Board of Ethics case as well.

Remember, the county’s taxpayers have been paying the lawyers for both sides of these cases for a long time. Berrios, who also is chairman of the county Democratic Party, can — and should — end that, right now. The taxpayers could use a belated favor, for once. They’ve already had to dig deep into their pockets to pay more than $500,000 to 11 people Berrios unlawfully fired after he was elected in 2010. That’s something to think about when the next round of property tax bills goes out by the end of next month.

Last week’s Supreme Court ruling involved a four-year effort by county Inspector General Patrick Blanchard to subpoena records involving two property tax exemptions, at least one of which was reportedly given to a Berrios employee. In refusing to comply, Berrios argued his separately elected office cannot be controlled by the County Board and is therefore not subject to the authority of the board’s inspector general. He also said an internal review showed everything was on the up-and-up. If that’s so, why not let the inspector general have a peek at the records?

Had Berrios prevailed in the Supreme Court case, the county IG also would have been precluded from subpoenaing records from the other separately elected offices in county government, which would have ruled almost all of county government off limits. Other separately elected officials — Cook County Recorder of Deeds Karen Yarbrough, Treasurer Maria Pappas and Board of Review Commissioners Michael Cabonargi, Dan Patlak and Larry Rogers Jr. — already had followed Berrios’ lead in ignoring the county inspector general. Just what we needed: a county inspector general who isn’t allowed to inspect.

Instead, the Supreme Court’s ruling gives Blanchard the authority to do his job.

The assessor’s office is one in which the occupant should strive to operate openly and ethically at the highest levels. The assessor has the ability to make or break taxpayers by shading assessments up or down — a tool some past assessors have used to reward friends and penalize foes. The assessor should be all about transparency. Instead, Berrios has built walls so thick they keep out all sunlight.

This is the office of which a federal court monitor said in 2014: “The general impression of the employees in the office was that employment actions were based on nepotism, favoritism or politics.”

Berrios needs to show us he understands — at long last — that’s not how a Cook County office should operate.

Tweets by @csteditorials