City Hall Corruption Scandals Barely Scathed Mayor Richard M. Daley

Chicago - Mayor Richard M. Daley's critics have said his greatest failing was his inability to root out corruption at City Hall.

But unlike Illinois governors George Ryan and Rod Blagojevich, Mayor Daley himself was never charged in connection with any scandals, even though he wasn't shy about accepting responsibility when his aides got into trouble.

Six years ago, he took the blame for the Hired Truck scandal, when a gang member was found running a program that paid millions of dollars to politically connected trucking firms doing little, if any, work.

"As I stand before you today, I am very embarrassed, very angry, very personally disappointed as I feel I let the people down," he said back then.

The Daley Administration was also rocked by a hiring scandal, which led to the conviction of patronage chief Robert Sorich and other top mayoral aides. But federal prosecutors never linked the mayor himself to any wrongdoing.

Andy Shaw of the Better Government Association said those scandals reflected the Mayor's reluctance to clean up a City Hall that was filled with his longtime friends and supporters.

"He went through the motions at times, he pretended to attack corruption," said Shaw. "But at the end of the day, I don't think that was ever a sincere commitment, and that is his one Achilles heel on a record that is otherwise relatively exemplary."

Political consultant Don Rose said corruption investigations hurt the mayor's standing in the polls, but the real backbreaker was the parking meter deal. Rose said Mayor Daley had a unique talent for distancing himself from all of it.

"It's amazing to me," said Rose. "He could go down an alley looking for a pothole, but he said he never knew what was going down the hall on the fifth floor when Sorich was doing all that cheating on tests?"