Chicago Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin was fined $60,000 this week following an Ethics Board ruling that she misused taxpayer resources, the city’s first disciplinary action meted out against the official since last year’s release of an explosive letter detailing misconduct allegations against her.
The Chicago Board of Ethics voted Monday 5-0 to find that a city official violated the ethics ordinance 12 times and issued the maximum fine of $60,000, or $5,000 per breach. In keeping with its rules, the ethics board did not name Conyears-Ervin, but the Tribune has identified her as the subject of the board’s ruling.
The decision capped off an investigation by the Office of the Inspector General launched in the fall that centered on “multiple occasions” in which Conyears-Ervin violated her fiduciary duty, made unauthorized uses of city property and conducted prohibited political activities, the board wrote in its summary. The ethics panel did not elaborate further on those incidents, though several Tribune articles have revealed wide-ranging concerns from former employees over alleged misdeeds.
Conyears-Ervin has two months to pay the $60,000 fine or reach a settlement with the board. Her spokesman Brian Berg did not say Tuesday what her next move was.
A separate probe over whether Conyears-Ervin violated the ethics code’s whistleblower protections remains pending. The ethics board found in November that there was probable cause to conclude she wrongfully terminated two staffers who had alleged she repeatedly misused taxpayer resources and pressured public employees to help her political allies.
On that matter, the ethics body this week opted to seek further clarification from Inspector General Deborah Witzburg’s office, after the treasurer’s counsel met with the board to rebut the finding. That case will resurface when the Ethics Board meets in May.
Ethics Board Executive Director Steve Berlin and Witzburg declined to comment Tuesday.
Monday’s findings follow internal complaints from several now-former employees of the treasurer’s office who accused Conyears-Ervin of ethical lapses or misusing public resources for her private benefit. While many of the allegations were made years ago, they weren’t detailed publicly until recent Tribune reports.
The allegations filed by the two top Conyears-Ervin aides date to November 2020, when the city treasurer dismissed her chief of staff, Tiffany Harper, and other top aides as part of what she called an office shake-up. The Tribune first reported in September that Harper and another high-ranking employee, Ashley Evans, alleged they were retaliated against and fired after reporting Conyears-Ervin engaged in a series of unethical and illegal acts.
Harper and Evans, who had been the treasurer’s chief impact officer, contended in a December 2020 letter that Conyears-Ervin used a staffer to plan her daughter’s birthday party and another employee to be her bodyguard. They also outlined broad allegations that Conyears-Ervin repeatedly misused taxpayer resources and pressured public employees to help her political allies.
In addition, Harper and Evans alleged Conyears-Ervin attempted to force BMO Harris — one of the banks where city money is deposited — to issue a mortgage tied to the building that houses the aldermanic office for the treasurer’s husband, Ald. Jason Ervin, 28th. The landlord is also a longtime family friend of the couple who told the Tribune he used to drive Conyears-Ervin to school when she was growing up.
For her part, Conyears-Ervin has defended asking BMO Harris to help her family friend. Conyears-Ervin has also denied having public employees run personal errands for her while they were on duty but declined to address whether they did work for her on their personal time.
Conyears-Ervin also used “City resources to advance the agenda of several churches and other religious organizations, many of which support her and her husband … politically and turn out church members to vote for their respective campaigns,” the letter said. Those events included a “panel and praise” series of events, where she hand-picked pastors to highlight, and a “Back to School Citywide Prayer.”
Staffers told Conyears-Ervin she could not “spend city money to promote religion,” but she “not only refused to stop the events but also insisted that she could handpick the prayer leaders (including her political supporters) rather than open the opportunity to all faiths, justifying it by saying that she wanted religious leaders who preached consistently with the Christian Bible.”
In a statement released shortly after the letter became public, Conyears-Ervin acknowledged she “didn’t go far enough to make sure that the ‘Back-to-School Citywide Prayer’ event was representative of a range of faiths, and that was a mistake.”
“My religion is extremely important to me, but I would never want to do anything to offend or exclude anyone from another faith,” she said.
A third former employee filed a complaint with the inspector general’s office in summer 2021 alleging they were forced to attend an event where seniors signed political petitions to receive a free ham. It’s unclear whether city officials took action over that worker’s complaints.
The $60,000 fine was first reported by WTTW.
Chicago Tribune’s Gregory Royal Pratt contributed.
ayin@chicagotribune.com