The Chicago suburban village of Dolton, Illinois, has hired former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot to conduct an investigation of embattled Dolton Mayor Tiffany Henyard. The appointment of Lightfoot was announced Monday to great applause at a board of trustees meeting on Monday evening. Henyard was absent from the meeting.
Henyard can veto the appointment, but the board has enough votes to override any veto.
Henyard has been accused of wrongdoing including misappropriation of funds, using the village police force as private security, using the village credit card to take lavish trips with hand-picked staff, nonpayment or habitually late payment to village vendors, and refusing to allow the board of trustees access to the village’s financial statements.
She has also been accused of the misallocation of federal relief funds through the American Rescue Plan Act, and there are questions about payments to village prosecutor Michael Del Galdo of more than $900,000 over the past two years.
Most recently, Henyard was named as a defendant in a civil lawsuit alleging assault and battery by Henyard associate Andrew Holmes. A woman who had been traveling with Henyard and Holmes on an economic development trip to Las Vegas claimed that Holmes assaulted her, and that she was retaliated against after telling Henyard of the incident.
While other entities such as the state of Illinois and the federal government are also investigating Henyard, the board feels that appointing Lightfoot gives them a chance for quicker answers and a faster resolution.
“This board specifically has made reaches to the state’s attorney, attorney general, governor’s office, and as we know, there are ongoing, well, it’s been reported that there are ongoing investigations from federal entities. Those entities as we know can take anywhere from two months to five years,” said trustee Jason House. “We feel this option will give us an independent process.”
Lightfoot has worked as a federal prosecutor and the Assistant United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, but is best known for her term as Chicago’s mayor from 2019 -2023.
Lightfoot finished her disastrous stint as Chicago mayor last year when she failed to garner enough primary votes to be able to compete in the April election. Former Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson replaced her, and Lightfoot was given a teaching position at Harvard, where she was engaged to teach “Health Policy and Leadership.”
At the board of trustees meeting announcing Lightfoot’s appointment, Lightfoot told the large turnout that the applause she received was an indication that “people in this village want something different, they want to go in a different direction.”
“The residents of Dolton deserve nothing less than a government that is fully accountable, responsive, transparent, and effective stewards of your precious tax dollars,” she added.
Lightfoot is to be paid $400/hour for her investigative services. After she bills $30,000 she is required to provide the board with a summary of her investigation. The former mayor has no prosecutorial powers, but any information she turns up can be turned over to authorities.
She expressed hope that Henyard would cooperate with the investigation, but claimed she was ready to do what was necessary to get to the bottom of things.
“I am expecting that there will be some roadblocks but ultimately I’m expecting we will get the information that is needed to be able to understand the breadth of what’s been going on,” Lightfoot assured the meeting.
Prior to Monday’s meeting, Del Galdo sent the board a letter advising that hiring Lightfoot would “violate the Village Code as well as the Illinois Municipal Code and established case law,” and that Henyard’s administration would not pay any bills connected with Lightfoot’s appointment.
“If the trustees’ main motivation was to get media attention, the former mayor of Chicago was their perfect choice,” Del Galdo wrote on Tuesday. “The only surprising part of this is that Ms. Lightfoot agreed to be part of this circus.”
Lightfoot’s prosecutorial experience may lead her to find answers for the village of Dolton, but she is not without baggage of her own. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Lightfoot went to war with city employees over vaccination mandates. Violence in the city increased, and at one point the mayor declared that racism was a public health crisis.
Lori Lightfoot was a bad mayor. Perhaps she can make up for it by being a decent investigator.
