Mudron: A Few Local Businessmen Can Help Pick Next City Manager

JOLIET, IL — WJOL Morning Show Host Scott Slocum invited Joliet Mayor Bob O'Dekirk and his political nemesis, City Councilman Patrick Mudron, to appear on the radio to talk about the Joliet City Council Wars of 2019. The council wars resulted in the ouster of Marty Shanahan as interim city manager and a failed attempt to bring former city manager Jim Hock out of his retirement in Michigan, to fill the job, at least on a temporary basis.

And on Tuesday night, the Mudron 5 defeated the city council's Fiscal Four by voting to approve a controversial contract to make assistant city manager Steve Jones the interim city manager for the next six months. The Mudron 5 supported Jones' request to allow him to become a double-dipper, come next March.

Jones wants to start collecting his Illinois municipal government pension but Jones prefers to retire from the city of Joliet in name only. After he begins collecting his pension, Jones wants to stay on the job with Joliet and continue to get paid a six-figure annual salary as an independent contractor, preferably in an economic development capacity, a job he likes to do.

Here are some of the key comments councilman Mudron made during his interview with Scott Slocum that lasted about 13 minutes on Wednesday:

There Is No Mudron 5: "It's not the Mudron 5. We're not a team, a group, a musical group," Mudron insisted.

The David Hales city manager debacle: Mudron was asked to address the September 2017 hiring of Bloomington city manager David Hales to become the city of Joliet's manager. Mudron and the council gave into Hales' demands to pay him $30,000 more than Jim Hock made. The council gave Hales $215,000 in base salary, a $12,500 relocation allowance, plus another $250 every month as a vehicle allowance.

After less than a year in the job, the Joliet City Council approved a severance package to break their three-year contract. In effect, Hales got another $89,000, which was five months of salary, in exchange for his immediate resignation. The council agreed it would not bash his performance.

(Article continues below this photo.)

"The David Hales situation, it's a personnel matter," Mudron said on the radio. "I voted for him also. Why he didn't work out, it just didn't work out, and I'm not going to get into that. I think David Hales is a very good person and just the Joliet situation didn't work for him."

On Mudron's unsuccessful plan from June to bring Jim Hock out of retirement to oversee Joliet a second time around. "I called Jim Hock and said, 'We're in between, is this a position you would consider?' He said 'Definitely, I'd consider it.' I thought he would be a quality candidate. Jim Hock knows Joliet, he's been involved as city manager in a number of different positions and as naive as I am on that, I thought he'd be a great interim person."

(Article continues below this photo.)

On his role in the ouster of Marty Shanahan as interim city manager in June.

"I voted not against Marty, I voted to open up the process. With that, I felt there was a delay and roadblocks were being set up ... We're the third largest city in the state of Illinois. This is the only position we as the city council vote on ... Are there other good candidates out there? Sure there are. You're in business. I'm in business here .... I felt this process should be opened up ... There's a handful of businessmen, I shouldn't say men, business people, here in town that could and should and love to have their input on who they think could do the job to take us on to the future."

During his WJOL interview, Mudron didn't reveal the identities of the Joliet businessmen who can help him decide the next permanent city manager of Joliet, during the next few months.

However, a review of Mudron's political campaign contributions reflects that Terry D'Arcy of D'Arcy Motors is listed as chairman of the Committee to Elect Patrick Mudron.

D'Arcy gave $500 to Mudron's campaign on March 15, records from the nonpartisan website Illinois Sunshine show.

And besides D'Arcy, Joliet commercial real estate and development lawyer Michael W. Hansen, who frequently appears at Joliet City Council meetings, also donated $500 on March 1 to support Mudron's city council re-election bid against challenger Vincent Alessio, Mudron's campaign filings indicate.

Hansen's lawyer biography notes "he was instrumental in the founding of Empress Casino. In 1994, he became vice president and chief legal counsel for Empress Entertainment, Inc."