(no links)
AGENCIES RECEIVE UNEXPECTED CASH
Pantagraph, The (Bloomington, IL) - Friday, June 17, 1994
Author: STEVE ARNEY
Roland Burris , Illinois attorney general and the bearer of many nasty surprises such as lawsuits, enjoys pleasant surprises, too.
He convened an impromptu reception at Catholic Social Services in Bloomington Thursday to hand out three unexpected checks totaling $25,000.
Accepting checks were representatives from Women’s Counseling and Support Services ($10,000), BroMenn Home Health Care ($10,000) and John M. Scott Health Resource Center ($5,000).
“Everybody smile and say, `Money,’ “ Burris said as cameras clicked.
Then he was off to Champaign to distribute four more checks totaling $50,000.
(snip)
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CHRISTMAS MONEY IN JUNE FROM SANTA ROLAND BURRIS
Pantagraph, The (Bloomington, IL) - Thursday, June 23, 1994
Author: bw
Editorial
EXCERPT
The money given to the Bloomington-Normal groups last week came from the status change of Personal Care HMO in Champaign-Urbana in late 1988 or early 1989, according to the attorney general’s office. The HMO had to pay $400,000 plus interest in eight annual installments.
Where the money comes from is important, Burris’ office said, because they try to earmark the money to similar charitable groups in the same region. In this instance, they reviewed the annual registrations required of charitable groups and looked for health-care related charities in Central Illinois, Burris’ office said.
Burris has handed out these funds since he became attorney general, but his office didn’t have a breakdown of amounts or recipients immediately available.
Handing out checks has to be pleasurable, and Burris doesn’t get many such jobs.
It’s hard to say anything bad about $25,000 going to three worthwhile area charities, but we think the law allowing such disbursements at the discretion of any single office holder ought to be examined.
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BURRIS’ OLD LAW FIRM TOPS LIST OF MINORITIES HE AIDED
Chicago Tribune - Saturday, February 26, 1994
Author: Flynn McRoberts, Tribune Staff Writer.
Roland Burris has a quick response when asked about his former relationship with a Chicago law firm, which has won nearly a half-million dollars in state legal work since he became Illinois attorney general.
He says the work received by Jones Ware & Grenard, the state’s largest black-owned law firm, shows his commitment to opening state legal work to minorities.
“I have spent my whole life making sure that minorities . . . receive their fair share of contracts and business,” Burris said during Tuesday’s radio debate among the three main Democratic gubernatorial contenders
State records and interviews with minority-owned law firms indicate Burris accurately defended himself. The amount of legal work throughout state government that has gone to minority-owned firms has nearly tripled since Burris was elected attorney general in November 1990-an increase several firms attributed either directly or indirectly to Burris.
But those records also show that Jones Ware & Grenard or individual partners in the firm received nearly a third of the $1.52 million in state legal work awarded to minority firms from fiscal year 1991 to the present, according to an analysis of state records by the attorney general’s office.
(snip)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2160551/posts
Chicago Public Schools’ cappuccino bill: $67,000
The Chicago Sun-Times ^ | 1-07-09 | BY ART GOLAB Staff Reporter agolab@suntimes.com
Posted on Wednesday, January 07, 2009 5:13:45 PM by originalbuckeye
Chicago public school bureaucrats skirted public competitive bidding rules to buy 30 cappuccino/espresso machines for $67,000, with most of the machines going unused because the schools they were ordered for had not asked for them, according to a report by the CPS Office of Inspector General.
That was just one example of questionable CPS actions detailed in the inspector general’s 2008 annual report. Others included high school staffers changing grades to pump up transcripts of student athletes and workers at a restricted-enrollment grade school falsifying addresses to get relatives admitted.
In the case of the cappuccino machines, central office administrators split the order among 21 vocational schools to avoid competitive bidding required for purchases over $10,000. As a result CPS paid about $12,000 too much, according to Inspector General James Sullivan. “We were able to find the same machines cheaper online,” he said.
“We also look at it as a waste of money because the schools didn’t even know they were getting the equipment, schools didn’t know how to use the machines and weren’t prepared to implement them into the curriculum,” Sullivan said.
CPS spokesman Michael Vaughn said CPS plans to change its purchasing policy so that competitive bidding kicks in when a vendor accumulates $10,000 worth of orders, no matter how many schools are involved. One person was fired and disciplinary action is pending against three others, he said.
The grade-changing took place at an unidentified high school, where student athletes grades were boosted, then, after transcripts were issued for college admission offices, the grades were changed back. The culprits could not be identified because passwords allowing entry to the grading system were shared by a number of people, Sullivan said. A new record system has tighter security, he said.
At Carson Elementary, an overcrowded school in Gage Park where even neighborhood kids were restricted from enrolling, five lower- level employees got six relatives into the school by falsifying addresses. Sixty-nine students from outside the attendance area got in, but they didn’t even bother to lie about their addresses. CPS had to spend as much as $252,000 to bus kids who live in the neighborhood to other schools, Sullivan said.
Vaughn said the employees involved have resigned, been fired or will be fired.
(No link)
Burris faces toughest step up political ladder - Candidate points to experience in bid for governor
Chicago Tribune - Sunday, February 17, 2002
Author: Dan Mihalopoulos, Tribune staff reporter.
EXCERPT
“I handle the state’s money like my own,” the candidate said. “I’ve made relatively little money, but I live as comfortably as anyone. Money has never been important to me, not at all.”
It’s not clear how much Burris has made, since he refuses to release tax returns. After leaving the attorney general’s post, he became the managing partner of the Chicago law firm of Jones, Ware and Grenard, and pocketed a settlement, the size of which he refuses to disclose, when the firm dissolved in 1998.
Before Burris became attorney general, the firm he would later join had never received a state contract. But it earned more than $744,000 from the state between 1991 and 1997, records show. Burris said he was justified in steering work to a qualified minority-owned firm.
http://bwstlaw.net/attorneys.jsp
http://archpundit.com/blog/page/2/ (sorry to use that link)
(Sources need:)
Two Clarifications for the National Press
December 30, 2008 By: ArchPundit Category: Uncategorized
One, Roland Burris II is part of a law firm that has made significant contributions to Blagojevich as well, but Burris the elder is no longer with the firm–he was of counsel previously for RB II’s firm. Whether to include those contributions in Burris the elder’s total depends upon the dates. His current firm has given some as well–I’ll break that out in a bit.
Burris’s lobbying firm didn’t receive only $295,000 in state contracts, try $705,000 since 2003.
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Burris’ son arrested during incident outside nightclub
Daily Herald - Monday, August 21, 1995
The son of former Attorney General Roland Burris was arrested with another man about 2 a.m. Sunday for allegedly provoking a crowd outside a downtown Chicago nightclub.
Roland W. Burris II and Richard Porter, both 28, were both charged with mob action, a misdemeanor.
The two men were among about 40 people waiting to get into the Cairo nightclub.
The crowd had spilled out to the street because the club was at its maximum capacity, authorities said. The club, which has a 400-person capacity, is open until 4 a.m.
They were arrested after causing the crowd to become rowdy, Chicago police Lt. William Powers said.
When police tried to disperse the crowd, Burris and Porter yelled at police, saying, “You white coppers are picking on us because we’re black. You wouldn’t do this if we were white,” Powers said.
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Topinka says Blagojevich spends too much time reading at home
State Journal-Register, The (Springfield, IL) - Thursday, June 9, 2005
EXCERPT
Burris honored
Former Attorney General ROLAND BURRIS was the guest of honor at a gathering of former employees Friday at Maldaner’s Restaurant in downtown Springfield. GARY KOCH, who oversaw patronage and government relations for Burris in the offices of comptroller and attorney general, said more than 45 people attended, and U.S. Sen. DICK DURBIN, D-Ill., also stopped by.
Burris credited Koch, who is now director of communications and education for the Illinois Municipal League, and former deputy attorney general JIMMIE VOSS and former aide GLORIA SCHISLER for arranging the party marking a decade since Burris left state government.
“It was a great evening,” said Burris, who picked up the tab.
Burris now has a consulting and lobbying firm with former top staffer and campaign manager FRED LEBED and is of counsel to the law firm in which his son, ROLAND BURRIS II, is a named partner. Congratulations also are in order as the family name is being carried on by his son’s first child, born Feb. 18: ROLAND THEODORE BURRIS.