The fact that the city pays $22 million in rent on properties housing its various functions isn't to be unexpected; this is a big city that inevitably needs to spend money on leases as part of the mix.
But this is also Chicago, and a Sun-Times examination of the city's leases has found that the city rents "usually from clout-heavy landlords and often at higher rents than other tenants pay."
The city's lease agreements have come under question because the real estate investment firm of the mayor's nephew, Robert Vanecko, "used city pension money to buy a Southwest Side warehouse that the city leases to park dump trucks," the Sun-Times reports.
That lease, however, was not on the list of city leases requested by the paper.
"Michi Pena - the mayor's general services commissioner, who oversees the city's real estate leases - didn't return calls seeking comment on the leases and to explain why Vanecko's warehouse wasn't on the list of property leased by the city," the Sun-Times reports. "Pena is a former treasurer of Daley's Hispanic Democratic Organization, the now-defunct patronage army that was at the center of a federal investigation into illegal hiring at City Hall."
The city's general services department told the paper it has 75 leases in all, usually used for such things as warehouses, clinics, libraries, and, of course, offices.
"None of the city's leases is competitively bid," the Sun-Times reports.
And at least one of them - the one held by the mayor's nephew - apparently isn't even listed in city records.
Steve Rhodes is the proprietor of The Beachwood Reporter, a Chicago-centric news and culture review.
