It’s often said you can’t legislate morality.
To which I might add that you never get very far trying to legislate honesty by public officials either.
That’s not to say we shouldn’t keep trying.
More than two decades after a state law took effect seeking to stop Illinois politicians from maintaining off-the-books political funds, a new federal indictment Wednesday indicates the practice is still a problem.
Among the accusations against Ald. Willie Cochran (20th) is that he used something called the 20th Ward Activities Fund to raise money for charitable purposes that he instead illegally spent on his daughter’s tuition and casino gambling.
The 20th Ward Activities Fund does not publicly report the source or use of its funds. It is not registered with the Illinois State Board of Elections as an official campaign fund, nor with the Illinois Attorney General’s office or Internal Revenue Service as a charitable fund as it probably should have been.
It was just that sort of loophole state lawmakers said they were trying to close in 1995 when they cracked down on what were then called “committeemen funds” — another device that allowed elected officials to secretly raise and spend money for the ostensible purpose of supporting non-campaign related activities.
This is going to shock you but those funds often turned up in federal investigations of politicians who used the accounts for activities they wanted kept secret from the public — like taking bribes.
Starting in 1995, public officials were required to disclose all donations and expenditures of their committeemen funds.
Most either did so or closed them down, although some sprouted new funds that report only to the Internal Revenue Service, which makes them hard to track.
Cochran has no committeeman’s fund, but for many years he has maintained his 20th Ward Activities Fund, which raised money for back-to-school picnics for children, a Valentine’s Day party for secret citizens and other parties for constituents at Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Photos from Cochran’s website and Facebook page through the years make clear these events actually took place.
But the fund generated enough in donations to support Cochran’s private life as well, prosecutors allege.
For years, the only evidence that the fund existed in campaign finance records was from donations made to it by other political organizations.
These included $300 from then-state representative candidate Will Burns in 2008, $200 from Cook County Commissioner Robert Steele in 2011 and $300 from Metropolitan Water District Commissioner Mariyana T. Spyropoulos in 2012. I should emphasize there was nothing improper about those donations.
Still, I would have thought the accounting discrepancy might have been enough to prompt the bean-counters at the State Board of Elections to take a deeper dive. No such luck.
I was first to raise a red flag that Cochran was in trouble over his fundraising and the first to report he maintained this off the books fund. But I was just chasing an ongoing federal investigation and was never sure exactly where it was headed.
The activities I reported upon earlier, involving Cochran amending the reports for his main campaign fund, Citizens to Elect Willie B. Cochran, to divulge previously undisclosed payments to himself, were more an indication he knew he was in trouble than the problem itself.
In the end, the charges announced Wednesday do not appear to directly involve those tardy disclosures.
I’m told Cochran isn’t the only public official maintaining off-the-books fundraising accounts.
Obviously, that’s a problem. Even when the money is used legitimately, it’s a secret way to curry favor with the politician in question.
Charitable funds organized under the auspices of elected officials and political organizations should undergo the same rigorous reporting requirements as campaign funds, instead of the slow and opaque system that currently exists.
Will closing the loopholes make the crooks more honest? No, but it might slow them down a bit.
