Mayor Lori Lightfoot was urged Thursday to “take a water hose and clean out” Chicago’s Department of Water Management where, former employees contend, discrimination persists two years after a white commissioner was replaced by an African American.
Katherine Ealy was promoted to the job of chief operating engineer at the Eugene Sawyer Water Filtration plant shortly after a 2017 housecleaning triggered by racist, sexist and homophobic emails swept out Water Management Barrett Murphy and his top deputies and supervisors.
Veteran City Hall insider Randy Conner, who is African-American, replaced Murphy and was given carte blanche to clean house. He chose Ealy, a black lesbian and a Navy veteran of Operation Desert Storm who was a plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit triggered by the department’s hate-filled culture.
Ealy said she was “hoping and praying” that a “new day” had dawned at the scandal-scarred department, where she claims to have been called a “f---ing whore” and a “black bitch” by a co-worker before the promotion, only to have her written complaints ignored.
She was wrong.
“I learned pretty quickly that things were not going to change — even after they appointed a black commissioner, Randy Conner,” Ealy, fighting back tears, said Thursday at a news conference at her attorney’s office.
“As the only black female and openly gay official, I was constantly micro-managed. I was disrespected by co-workers both below and above me. Even deputy commissioner and former Ald. John Pope. I was even told that the only reason I was promoted was because I was black and a woman.”
Ealy said she was “forced” to resign from her “dream job” on July 19. She refused to discuss the circumstances of her resignation, except to say it was a “trumped up” and erroneous charge.
“I am black. I am a strong woman. And I am openly gay. I continue to feel each and every day that the culture at the Water Department has not changed and that upper management — from Commissioner Randy Conner on down—was setting me up to fail. I could see it. I could feel it,” Ealy said.
Flanked by other Water Management alums, Ealy spoke directly to Lightfoot.
“If anybody can understand the battles that I face as a black person, a woman, and someone who is openly gay, it should be the mayor,” Ealy said.
“We are asking the mayor — the first black female mayor of Chicago and the first openly gay mayor of Chicago—to stand with us in our fight for justice and respect.”
Attorney Victor Henderson filed the still-pending lawsuit accusing Chicago’s Department of Water Management of creating “a hostile and abusive work environment,” of violence, intimidation and retaliation that denied African-American employees promotions, transfers and overtime.
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Henderson followed Ealy to the podium to make three demands of the new mayor.
• Hold a closed-door, town hall meeting at the Department of Water Management to listen to the stories of black employees, both active and retired.
• Stop fighting the employees’ demand for all of the emails and personnel records they need to support their lawsuit.
• Above all, change the culture.
“Take a water hose and clean out the water department. Get rid of the cronyism. Get rid of the racism. Get rid of the nepotism. Get rid of the homophobia. Clean the place out. And that includes Commissioner Randy Conner, who’s an African American,” Henderson said.
As for the new leadership, he said, “It doesn’t matter what their color is. It doesn’t matter what their gender is. It doesn’t matter what their race is. ... When you have African-Americans who are saying, `Get rid of an African-American water commissioner,’ what does that tell you? All they want is fairness.”
Water Management spokesperson Megan Vidis had no immediate comment on the group’s demands. Nor would she explain why Ealy was forced out.
Henderson likened the city’s stonewalling to former Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s decision to withhold the Laquan McDonald shooting video until after he was safely re-elected in 2015 and even then, release it only after a court order.
“This city has a history of ignoring racism. … A sordid history. ... This time around, it should be different,” Henderson said.
“Stop fighting the FOIA requests. Let the truth come out. Shine the light.”
Lightfoot played on her name with a campaign promise to “bring in the light.”It helped the former federal prosecutor portray herself as a change agent in a change election dominated by the City Hall corruption scandal that culminated in the racketeering indictment against Ald. Edward Burke (14th).
