Top Chicago Park District officials failed to initiate an investigation for months into troubling allegations of misconduct by Chicago lifeguards, an independent investigation found.
Just after the release of the report, new Superintendent and CEO Rosa Escare？o announced she had fired three high-level managers.
Park District commissioners released the report on its management’s response to the lifeguard sexual abuse investigation on Tuesday afternoon, after months of scrutiny driven by a WBEZ report on widespread allegations of sexual assault and harassment within its lifeguard program.
Last month, Park District superintendent and CEO Michael Kelly resigned on the same day that Mayor Lori Lightfoot joined several aldermen in calling for his ouster. After Kelly’s forced resignation, he was replaced by Escare？o, a recently retired commissioner of Chicago’s Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protections and a veteran of Chicago mayoral administrations.
Tuesday’s report provided the most comprehensive look at how the Park District handled allegations of sexual misconduct. In a statement, Park District Board President Avis LaVelle said the allegations of sexual abuse “were credible and taken seriously from the point they were turned over the Inspector General in March of 2020.”
But, she acknowledged, “We were simply dysfunctional in our approach to this investigation, and I apologize for what has been a slow, tortured process.”
In a statement, Lightfoot said she’s “outraged and appalled by these findings, particularly those that show that the people entrusted to lead the Park District were aware of these heinous allegations of bullying, intimidation, sexual harassment, and assault and chose to do very little in response.”
“It is clear that all the way to the top of Park District senior leadership absolutely failed to take these complaints seriously,” Lightfoot said. “The investigations themselves were, until recently, also hampered by unacceptable layers of incompetence.”
Former Chicago Park District CEO Michael Kelly, shown in June, was faulted in a new report for not reporting misconduct allegations sooner. Mayor Lori Lightfoot, shown at right in the background, said she was "outraged and appalled" by the report's findings. (Stacey Wescott / Chicago Tribune)
The report by former federal prosecutor Valarie Hays was harsh on Kelly and other top Park District staff. Hays concluded that Kelly “violated the (Park District’s) policy on sexual harassment by not reporting Complainant One’s allegations to the Deputy Director of HR within five days of receiving them, and he violated (Park District’s) violence in the workplace policy by not immediately reporting potentially dangerous situations.”
Kelly first received allegations from the complainant’s parents on Aug. 30, 2019, then received the allegations from Complainant One herself on Feb. 7, 2020, but did not provide the original complaints to the inspector general’s office until March 19, 2020 — over six months after he originally received the allegations from the woman’s parents, according to the report.
Investigators “did not find evidence that Mr. Kelly initiated any investigation into Complainant One’s allegations between August 30, 2019 and February 7, 2020,” the report said.
The investigation found that, contrary to Kelly’s statements saying he “always planned to turn the complaint over to the (inspector general) for investigation,” Kelly briefed a staff member in April 2021 and indicated that although “disturbing, the information in the letter did not warrant a referral to the Inspector General’s Office.”
Kelly told investigators that between Feb. 7, 2020, and March 19, 2020, he directed Alonzo Williams, chief programs officer, and Eric Fischer, assistant director of recreation, to conduct an initial investigation related to Complainant One’s allegations. But aside from Fischer and Williams saying they requested a database check for other similar complaints against lifeguards, “there is no evidence that Mr. Williams or Mr. Fischer investigated Complainant One’s allegations, let alone any investigation that should have taken 41 days,” the investigation found.
Williams failed to report the allegations to HR, the report said. Fischer also never reported a complaint he received from Complainant One, the investigation found.
“Mr. Fischer’s position is that he did not see this email in his inbox, even though he admitted to (investigators) that he was very good about checking his email,” the investigation found.
Chicago Park District Superintendent and CEO Rosa Escare？o speaks during a news conference Nov. 2, 2021, at Jesse White Park in Chicago, addressing claims of sexual misconduct by beaches and pools employees and an independent report on the district's handling of sexual misconduct claims. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
Fischer and Williams have been fired from the Park District, as has Pools Unit Manager Adam Bueling, Escare？o announced Tuesday.
According to the report, Bueling violated the district’s sexual harassment policy “by not reporting Complainant Two’s allegations to HR within five days of receiving them.”
Bueling received the allegations from Complainant Two via email on March 9, 2020, which he acknowledged reading, according to the report. “He never reported the complaint to HR or any other department or supervisor,” the report said.
“Upon receiving these reports last night I immediately moved to dismiss all employees found to have committed sexual misconduct and three senior managers that failed in their responsibility to keep their employees safe. Failings of this nature will not be tolerated,” Escare？o said during a Tuesday news conference, later confirming the identity of the three managers when asked by a reporter.
“In addition to the immediate disciplinary actions that I took, I am also committed to using the findings to enact real change across the district,” she said.
Chicago Park District Board President Avis LaVelle speaks during a news conference Nov. 2, 2021, at Jesse White Park, addressing claims of sexual misconduct by Park District beaches and pools employees and an independent report on the district's handling of sexual misconduct claims. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)
LaVelle said when the reported complaints initially reached her, she trusted that Kelly was making changes within the department.
“I was assured repeatedly by former Superintendent Mike Kelly throughout the process that management was taking corrective steps to address these problems systemwide,” LaVelle said. “What I never expected was that it would take so long to get to the point of holding accountable those who are responsible.”
LaVelle said she should have stepped out of the usual Office of Inspector General’s reporting structure and shared findings with the park board earlier.
Although LaVelle attempted to blame Kelly and other park managers for the scandal, Lightfoot ally Ald. Michele Smith released a statement calling on LaVelle to resign.
“To dismiss more than three decades of systemic and sustained abuse and harassment as simply something not being handled in a ‘timely manner,’ suggests a stunning level of tone deafness and a failure to accept responsibility as Chair by Ms. LaVelle,” Smith said. “In order to rebuild trust in the program and within the Park District, Ms. LaVelle needs to explain her communications with Ms. Little and what was communicated to the board. Given today’s events, nothing has changed my opinion that Ms. LaVelle should resign.”
The Park District inspector general has approximately 27 open investigations arising from lifeguard complaints, the report said.
The original complainant’s mother emailed Kelly to say that there was a profane fight song that lifeguards had to memorize and chant every morning as they did pushups at Oak Street Beach. The lyrics contained sexual references and profane references to bodily functions.
The girl’s mother also reported that her daughter “was regularly called a bitch by some of the guards (along with other female guards) and at least two times, thrown against a locker by an older male guard.”
“The whole atmosphere at Oak Street is degrading yet there is a code of silence and you are called ‘weak minded’ if you confront the behavior,” according to the report’s summary of the email.
The girl later emailed Kelly directly, telling him that she was regularly called degrading names and that lifeguards acted “very abusive and unprofessional.” She said she was forced to go to the end of year Oak Street banquet where awards such as “bitch of the beach,” “slut of the beach” and “little dick” were given, according to the report.
Many of the girls “were grabbed in ways they should not have been grabbed,” the complainant said.
The person identified as Complainant Two emailed emailed the mayor’s office on March 6, 2020, saying she was “sexually assaulted by a male lifeguard five years earlier when she was 17 years old and he was approximately 20 years old.” Complainant Two said “there is a huge incidence of sexual violence within the Park District — from sexual harassment to sexual assault and rape.”
Kelly received the complaint from the mayor’s office, then forwarded it and the earlier message to the inspector general.
According to the investigative report, Kelly told investigators he verbally mentioned to then-Inspector General Will Fletcher that he had a file coming his way on lifeguards.
But Fletcher denied that to the investigator, saying “the first time he heard about either complaint was when Mr. Kelly’s assistant called him on March 19, 2020 to let him know that she would be emailing the complaints.”
In addition to concerns over the Park District’s handling of the investigation, questions have been raised about Deputy Inspector General Nathan Kipp being fired earlier this year. Hays’ investigation “found no evidence that Nathan Kipp, the former Deputy Inspector General and Interim Inspector General of the CPD, was terminated in an effort to impede the OIG’s investigation of the Lifeguard Complaints,” according to the report.
Former Inspector General Elaine Little, who resigned earlier this year, told investigators that she initiated Kipp’s firing. Kelly sent Little a letter on Aug. 6 “in which he expressed concerns about a report he received” related to Kipp. Little responded to the letter and said she’d suspended him “for reasons unrelated to the concerns raised by” Kelly.
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