Cook County tax board commissioner, staff face multiple fines from ethics board

Chicago Tribune

3 hours ago

Cook County's ethics board fined Board of Review Commissioner Samantha Steele and aides for a series of breaches this week, finding that she provided confidential information to the press about the Chicago Bears' Arlington Heights property and wrongly allowed a staffer to attend a conference on county time.
A top Steele aide was separately fined for attending Cubs games and traveling for personal trips on county time.
Reached Friday, Steele said she 'absolutely disagreed' with the findings but declined to comment further.
Steele is one of three commissioners on the county's Board of Review, which hears property tax appeals. She is currently running in the Democratic primary for county assessor.
The county's board of ethics released three findings related to Steele's office this week.
The highest-profile found that Steele had improperly shared appraisal information about the Chicago Bears' Arlington Heights property with the media three different times. She did so first in the middle of settlement negotiations in mid-2023, and then again later that year during an appeal.
Steele had been warned by the county's general counsel afterwards that the board was prohibited from commenting on pending, confidential board matters, noting the property tax code required board members to 'remain fair and impartial and free from bias or influence,' and that confidence in the board would be eroded if the board's decision-making was perceived to be 'subject to inappropriate outside influences.'
But Steele again commented for February 2024 stories about an appeal, triggering an email from the Bears' lawyer, who asked why the press was notified before the team.
The board of ethics found Steele's comments to Crain's Chicago Business, NBC Chicago and the Tribune amounted to three violations of confidentiality code in the county's ethics ordinance and fined her $3,000, which she must pay in 30 days.
Steele was arrested in 2024 for driving under the influence of alcohol after a car crash, but has been fighting the charge and is due back in court later this summer. She won back her right to drive after her attorney argued she wasn't given proper warning of the consequences of refusing a breathalyzer test.
She was fined another $1,000 by the ethics board this week and her top aide, Dan Balanoff, $750 for permitting an employee to attend an unauthorized conference unrelated to his county duties on county time.
That employee, Ryan McIntyre, was fined the equivalent of 16 hours of county pay after he improperly attended the 2023 International LGBTQ+ Leaders Conference in Washington D.C.
McIntyre managed Steele's calendar, meetings, and outreach events. He told the ethics board he was 'told to go' to the conference with Steele in late 2023.
After learning about the trip, BOR staff told Balanoff twice that McIntyre would need to use paid time off to go because the conference was 'political in nature and unrelated to McIntyre's County duties,' according to the board's ruling. Balanoff told them Steele pushed back and he went on to approve travel and lodging expenses.
The board did not determine attendance was 'prohibited political activity,' but did conclude it was unrelated to his job at the county. Balanoff, they said, 'still approved and submitted' McIntyre's request for reimbursement, permitting him 'to misuse County property,' and failing to ask about the purpose of the conference or review any materials related to it. Steele, meanwhile, 'had even more of a duty' to meet the highest ethical standards as the head of the office, including getting preauthorization for attendance at conferences and training sessions.
In the third finding, the ethics board concluded Balanoff, Steele's director of special projects, 'conducted dual employment' by doing legal work for his own firm and attended non-government activities — including two Cubs games — on county time on four separate occasions.
Balanoff admitted to answering client calls and working on three real estate transactions during county hours, though he contended he did not have a set 9-to-5 schedule at the county.
Balanoff posted pictures of himself at Wrigley Field and the nearby bar, Murphy's Bleachers, on social media on August 4, 2023, when the team played against the Braves, after clocking in at the county that morning. He posted on his Instagram from Wrigley again on April 1, 2024, the day of the Cubs season opener against the Rockies. According to the board, he used sick time to attend when he should have used vacation time, a violation of the county's attendance policy.
Balanoff also joined a Board of Review meeting virtually in September 2023 while on a plane for a personal trip after clocking in that morning and not requesting time off. He said he had notified Steele of the travel. The board reported a similar incident in which Balanoff traveled for personal reasons without clocking out.
The board separately found Balanoff took non-county calls during normal working hours.
Balanoff tried to challenge the board's investigatory findings after he resigned on May 25, arguing the board didn't have jurisdiction anymore, that he did not knowingly violate the county's rules, and that his use of county resources was 'de minimus,' because they did not interfere with his county duties or impose extra taxpayer cost.
The board said those arguments were 'unavailing,' that his behavior was 'troubling,' and that the comingling of the outside activities 'creates the appearance of impropriety' and misused taxpayer funds, but was not 'an indictment of Balanoff's performance of his County duties.'
He was fined a total of $4,500 for various ethics provisions, which are due within 30 days.
Balanoff on Friday said the ruling was a political attack by opponents to unionization within the office. 'We obviously don't agree with it, I'm going to appeal,' he said.