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It's Pier politicsBY TIM NOVAK STAFF REPORTER Put a quarter in the Gumball Coaster at Navy Pier, and a gumball sails down a little roller coaster, while the money goes straight into a sewer inspector's pocket. Buy a frozen lemonade at Navy Pier, and you're supporting the business of
the daughter of a former city worker from Mayor Daley's old
neighborhood--Bridgeport--who was convicted of running an illegal gambling
den.
The popcorn shop and a new upscale cafe at the pier are run by Jerry Joyce, son of Daley's key political strategist. A gourmet food shop and a T-shirt store are run by the wife of a business partner of the elder Joyce. These are just a few of the politically connected men and women cashing in on the fun and games at Navy Pier, where 9 million visitors spent $120 million last year at about 100 concessions, making it the state's top tourist attraction. The Chicago Sun-Times found that the owners of at least 20 percent of these businesses at the pier appear to have political connections, sometimes large and sometimes small, and often directly to the mayor or the governor. While nothing illegal was uncovered, the lesson seems clear: Chicago remains the City of Clout, where who you know may be all you need. "Just as O'Hare is a playground for the connected, now you have Navy Pier. Any place in Chicago, they run by the same principles: `Who do you know?' and `Who sent you?' " said Terrance Norton of the Better Government Association. Daley runs the airports, but at Navy Pier he must share the contracts and jobs with Gov. Ryan. The unique city-state deal has confounded one vendor who was booted out after Ryan's people at the pier replaced former Gov. Jim Edgar's people. "I went back to the guy who helped get us in there in the first place. I said, `What's going on?' I was told there was a new sheriff in town," said a former Navy Pier vendor, who refused to be identified. The new sheriff is Scott Fawell. Ryan appointed Fawell CEO of the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority, which runs Navy Pier and McCormick Place, in 1999, a reward for serving as Ryan's campaign manager and chief of staff in the secretary of state's office. But John Torre, the pier authority's spokesman, insists that setting up shop at Navy Pier in no way depends on politics. "Those who have so-called political connections, most were out there from the beginning, long before the new sheriff arrived," Torre said. "Any suggestion that there's an attempt to politicize the operation is just wrong. "It's interesting speculation, but the pier has been a huge success because a lot of people took a chance, risked their own money, and some have succeeded very well. And politics had nothing to do with that." But ever since Navy Pier was reborn in 1995 as a family entertainment center, there has been no shortage of politically connected people lining up to sell tourists everything from little statuettes of the Water Tower to popcorn to lunch. Even gumballs. The first restaurant to open at the pier was Perchy's, run by a Southeast Side bar and grill owner who teamed up with former Chicago Deputy Treasurer Edward Murray and Burbank Mayor Harry Klein. Perchy's is now the pier's worst-performing restaurant, which the owners and pier officials blame on the location. Perchy's is at the pier's northwest entrance, while most of the activities are on the pier's south side. Klein scoffed at suggestions that his group used clout to get on the pier. "We followed the same protocol everybody else did to submit a bid," he said. This year, pier officials decided to open two new restaurants run by businessmen already operating at the pier--one tied to Daley, the other to Ryan. Jerry Joyce, whose father, Jeremiah, is a top political advisor to Daley,
and his partner, Chris Heitmann, got a lease to open a Haagen-Dazs Cafe,
serving ice cream, sandwiches and alcoholic ice cream drinks. But Jon Clay, the pier's general manager, said Joyce and Heitmann had a leg up on another bidder because they had run a popcorn and candy shop at the pier since 1995. "The fact that the operator has been here and been a good tenant . . . gave us confidence," Clay said. "It certainly seemed like a minimum risk to us." The pier's other new restaurant is the Billy Goat Tavern, a Chicago institution run by Sam Sianis, a frequent campaign donor to the governor. Since 1996, he and Tom Coutretsis have owned Tommy's Greek Express in the pier's food court. Coutretsis' daughter Alexandra worked for Ryan in the secretary of state's office, and then moved over to the pier in 1999 as a top aide to Fawell. But Torre said this had nothing to do with Sianis getting the restaurant lease. Sianis and his son own the new Billy Goat, while Coutretsis is a consultant on the project, pier records show. "I applied for this, and I got accepted because of the [restaurant's] name," Sianis said. "They want names over there." Clay said Sianis was the only person to respond to the pier's public request for proposals to open a restaurant next door to Riva, a white-tablecloth restaurant that grossed $11 million last year as the pier's biggest moneymaker. Also new at the pier this year is the Gumball Coaster, a machine owned by Pasquale "Pate" Esposito, a 25-year city worker who inspects sewer problems. Esposito obtained a one-year license last January to operate the machine on Navy Pier's arcade in exchange for giving the pier authority a fourth of the total take. The Gumball Coaster has been an immediate hit. From January through April, the pier's slow months, kids put $2,800 in quarters in the 6-foot-tall machine that takes the colored gumballs on a wild ride before dispensing them. Esposito took home about $525 a month from the machine, an operation with not much overhead. So how did he get the contract? Esposito's not talking. "I don't know who the gumball vendors are," Clay said. "I guess [Esposito] had an idea. He made an investment." Esposito got a license for the machine five months after he made a $600 campaign donation to a top Fawell aide at the pier and McCormick Place, Orland Township Republican Committeeman John Doria. Torre said he was unaware of the donation and that Doria would return it to Esposito. A second gumball machine operator at the pier is Nikki Rodich, 27, the daughter of a Bridgeport Streets and Sanitation Department worker who was busted in 1991 for running a gambling den that took in as much as $1 million a day. He no longer works for the city. Rodich, who also lives in Bridgeport--ancestral home of the Daley clan and several other Chicago mayors--has been selling gumballs at the pier since 1999. She has three gumball machines. She also has two stands that sell frozen Italian lemonade during the summer. Rodich did not return several telephone calls. So what does it take to be a pier vendor? "We get calls and e-mails every day from people wanting to jump on the bandwagon," Clay said. "They submit a concept, a proposal. If it's a great idea, we'll work with them." Contributing: Chuck Neubauer |
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