City Council member warns about possibility of fraud in gas, Ventra card giveaways

Newly-appointed Inspector General Deborah Witzburg was urged Tuesday to investigate Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s $12.5 million gas and mass transit card giveaway for possible fraud.

Six months ago, downtown Ald. Brendan Reilly (42nd) was among 23 alderpersons voting against that giveaway — perhaps the highest-profile program among Lightfoot’s string of pre-election freebies.

With Witzburg testifying at Tuesday’s City Council budget hearing, Reilly used the opportunity to raise eyebrows and put another case on the inspector general’s radar.

“It seems that the pre-paid gas subsidy cards that the city issued with free transit were defective. I have a constituent who stepped forward and wanted to do the right thing and report that he used his card at a Walgreens or CVS and was able to overcharge it by some $50 or $60 and was also able to load part of it onto a Ventra card,” Reilly said.

“This person wants to make it right. But my concern is, if this happened to one of my constituents, how many others are out there not stepping forward and raising their hand and saying, ‘There’s a problem with this’?”

Reilly said he hopes his example is a “limited circumstance” and that fraud is not more widespread. But he reviewed receipts and a copy of the card sent to him, and said “this appears to be real.” He promised to forward the evidence to Witzburg in hopes it will trigger a full-blown investigation.

“This kind of falls in line with exploiting a well-intended program — the potential for it, at least — and obviously the faulty technology is a concern,” the alderperson said.

Witzburg told the Sun-Times she takes the allegations of fraud “very seriously” and looks forward to receiving and investigating the evidence Reilly provides to her office.

“We cannot have programs designed to help vulnerable people being abused. That limits the availability of the programs to the people entitled to them,” she said.

Opposition to the plan that City Hall calls “Chicago Moves” forced Lightfoot to make several tweaks just to get it through committee and even more changes to secure the 26 votes needed for final approval.

The income ceiling for eligibility was lowered, and three-fourths of the $7.5 million in gas cards were reserved for South and West Side neighborhoods defined by the city as “high-mobility hardship community areas.”

The eligibility area was further broadened to include the wards of at least two Council members who changed their votes from “no” in committee to “yes” on the Council floor.

The rest of the cards were distributed through citywide lotteries “in equal portions to each ward.”

The 50,000 gas cards were worth $150 each. The 100,000 Ventra cards were worth $50.

The giveaways have also included: guaranteed minimum income checks; free bicycles, locks and helmets; and more than $1,000-per-household in rebates to defray the cost of security cameras, outdoor motion sensor lighting, cloud storage and GPS trackers to hunt down vehicles in the event of an auto theft or carjacking.

“Many benefits do raise the risk of fraud. The challenge is to put controls in place to guard against fraud without raising obstacles to access for the people entitled to the benefits,” the inspector general said.

After clashing repeatedly with longtime Inspector General Joe Ferguson and ultimately forcing him out, Lightfoot said she wanted a successor who understood “the importance of staying in their lane.”

Months later, Lightfoot settled on Witzburg — who declared she had no intention of staying in her lane.

The new inspector general proved that again Tuesday by talking about how important it is to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of Ethics Committee Chair Michele Smith (43rd).

“That person is defined in our ordinance as the ultimate jurisdictional authority for much of the work that comes out of our office. Without someone in the chairman’s seat, we are without a really critical partner in our transparency and accountability work,” Witzburg said.

Lightfoot fired right back at Witzburg, just as she always did with Ferguson.

“With due respect to the IG, that’s nonsense” to suggest the inspector general’s office is hamstrung by the absence of an Ethics Committee chairperson, Lightfoot said.

“Obviously, their work continues. I wish their work would continue at a faster pace. If you look at the age of their reports, they’ve got a number of cases that are now almost a decade old that I hope get resolved. But clearly, they’re issuing reports. They’re doing their audits. The Ethics Committee ... didn’t even exist until I created it in 2019. ... So, I don’t buy that.”

The IG further burnished her independent credentials by claiming police budgeting is “not as transparent as any of us should want it to be” and she’s counting on the new civilian oversight panel to provide that “missing” function.

Ald. Matt Martin (47th) has introduced a resolution calling for promoting himself from vice chairman of the Committee on Ethics and Government Oversight to chairman.

Lightfoot responded: “The process is, the mayor makes the final picks” and there’s “no reason to break from that long-standing precedent.”

The Better Government Association has urged the Council to declare its independence from Lightfoot. So has Ferguson, who has branded Chicago the “only major city in the United States” allowing its mayor to dictate committee chairs.