Rialto Places General Manager on Paid Leave

Rialto Square Theatre General Manager Randy Green has been placed on paid leave due to thousand of dollars in unpaid payroll taxes.

On the advice of Rialto lawyer David Silverman, an approval of a separation agreement with Green was tabled once again as an agreement had not yet been reached. The Will County Metropolitan Exposition and Auditorium Authority board will consider the matter again at its next meeting.

Green has been under fire after it came to light that only one payment for federal and state payroll taxes has been made since November 2015. The Rialto currently owes around $110,000 in back taxes.

In Green’s place, the board approved Rialto Development Director Jack Ericksen as the theater’s interim manager.

“I feel he is the right person for this position as we work through the issues before us,” Board Chairman Dan Vera said in a statement at the meeting.

The board also approved a financial review to be performed by Theobald Associates at a rate of $275 an hour.

“They sent a proposal to the chairman on Thursday or Friday of last week to come in and take a look at the procedures of the authority’s financing and to begin to look at that and make some outside recommendations to the board,” Silverman said.

Last week, Mayor Robert O’Dekirk said he wants to know more about the Rialto’s financial condition and status of Green’s employment with the theater before giving the Rialto more money. Joliet gives the Rialto $600,000 a year in quarterly increments.

“I don’t know how we’re going to vote to forward money without knowing what the status of Mr. Green is,” O’Dekirk said. “I would expect that at our meetings on (April 4) and (April 5) we aren’t going to address the issue now.”

Joliet City Manager Jim Hock said the council had advanced the theater $10,000 of its second quarter payment in order to pay its state payroll taxes.