The Chicago Park District sex scandal should have been an opportunity for leadership in Chicago to rise to the occasion to protect victims from being re-victimized and from others from not being victimized at all. Instead, Chicago got exactly what most Chicagoans would expect. Political leadership at the Park District and at city hall chose instead to go in to coverup mode or outright deny their power to impact the response to allegations of widespread sexual harassment, abuse, and assault at the city’s pools and beaches.

Dan’s reporting clearly detailed that Michael Kelly, the CEO and superintendent, received materials that detailed an allegation of sexual misconduct involving  employees and he say on it rather than the legal and moral thing to sound all the alarms possible and demand immediate action to protect not only other Park District staff but the tens of thousands of Chicago children that frequent the city’s pools and hundreds of thousands of residents and tourists that visit Chicago’s many beaches each year. Kelly actions unfortunately were not an outlier when it came to Park District officials. Chicago Park District Board President Avis LaVelle told 32nd Ward Alderperson Scott Waguespack in a meeting that all the allegations that Dan uncovered were nothing more than “sour grapes” from women who had consented to the sexual harassment, abuse, and assault. Instead of demanding the Chicago Police Department and Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office get involved to make every effort to protect the women the Park District leadership did nothing more than coverup the allegations including firing the Deputy Inspector General running the investigation and later forced out the Inspector General. Not the response of ethical and moral people but exactly what you would expect from Chicago politicians.

In our conversation with Dan we will touch many aspects of the scandal including how Kelly and LaVelle got to their positions of power. We also discuss the unbelievable fact that the Park District has a history of going back to at least 1975 of ignoring allegations of sexual misconduct at the city’s pools and beaaches.