Thousands of city workers, from police officers to department heads, haven't paid their parking tickets or water bills, and a battle of political one-upmanship has led to the release of their names.
Mayor Richard Daley on Thursday gave the scofflaws a week to pay up or think about getting new jobs. The flustered mayor made the threat after a bizarre week in which he and other officials argued over who was at fault."This whole thing should have been out in June," Daley said.
The commotion started Monday when City Clerk James Laski disclosed that 5,200 city workers - about one-eighth of the payroll - owed $1.2 million in unpaid parking tickets. Police officers owed about half of the total, Laski said.
Not wanting to be upstaged, the mayor released a list of the scofflaws the next day. For good measure, he added an accounting of 1,600 city workers who owed $835,000 in delinquent water bills.
That list included 102 water department workers who together owe $48,280 to their employer and a city police officer who is behind $20,985.37 in his water bills.
Thomas Walker, Daley's trans
portation commissioner, said he didn't know he owed $113.89 until his name appeared on the list.
Some city workers, like Michael Tollivar, the commander of the police department's public housing division, is named as both a water-bill and a parking-ticket scofflaw.
"I don't pay the bills, my wife does," Tollivar said. "Of course, I am embarrassed by this. She no longer will be paying them."
The mayor said he was about to reveal his own plan to force city workers to pay their bills when Laski did it himself.
Laski, meanwhile, accused Daley of rushing the lists out to draw attention to himself.
"You've got some big egos at City Hall," said Alderman Mike Zalewski, who was not named as a scofflaw. "The city clerk was offended, and he has an ego. And some people in the mayor's office - they've got big egos, too."