Tag Archives: cook county

Another Letter to John P Daley

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Mr. John P Daley, Commissioner 11th District,

Two weeks ago I wrote you a letter asking if I could talk with you  regarding serious budget issues that affect me and my clients in Cook County.  In that letter I identified myself as a new resident of the 11th district and a long time Probation Officer in the Clinical Interventions Division.   In that letter, I did not describe my job duties.  I had hoped that I would be able to discuss the nature of my job with you or with one of your staff.  That has not happened.  In order to encourage this badly needed conversation, I am more than willing to discuss about my job and my responsibilities in a more direct fashion.

Mr. Daley, for the past 11 years I have provided supervision, case management and treatment to Cook County Wards with aggressive sexual behaviors.  Cook County’s community based treatment program is a leader in addressing sexually aggressive children and youth, and this program is in danger of being cut by the recent threat of layoffs from the Cook County Board.

In addition to the services I provide these youth, I am also the Co-Chair of the Juvenile Advisory Council (JAC).  This is a national model of youth input in Juvenile Justice matters.  Jurisdictions from 20 states have come to the Cook County Juvenile Court to learn about the Juvenile Advisory Council, how we work with court wards and court staff and how JAC improves the services at the Court.  This program is also targeted by Budget Cuts.

I am not sure how the Cook County Board can demand for more cuts to programs and services while Cook County Commissioners refuse to take their furlough days.  I do not understand how vital court services can be cut or delayed when management heavy offices in Cook County Government are not sharing the burden of the budgetary short fall.  I do not understand how the County Board can talk about providing key services while cutting key staff.

If Layoffs occur, half of the JSO unit will be affected.  This will affect my workload and make it impossible for me to run the Juvenile Advisory Council.  This year I have already surrendered 5% of my salary to Cook County and increased my workload 25%.  Another 5% pay cut and another increase in my work load will make me look for work outside of Cook County Government.

I want to work providing service for the residents of Cook County.  I want your office to support me, and my coworkers, as we work to provide vital services to the children of Cook County.  Will you help me do my job?

 

I look forward to hearing from you or your staff,

Martin Gleason

 

An Open Letter to William M Beavers, Cook County Commissioner

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Mr. Beavers:

I am a Cook County Juvenile Probation Officer who has covered the majority of your district for the past Eleven years. I have considered it a privilege to work with the families on Chicago’s far South Side. The current budget woes in Cook County threaten my job, and jeopardize the services that I provide to the families of Cook County.

I provide supervision, case management and treatment to juveniles who have committed sexually aggressive behaviors. I’m on the Illinois Sex Offender Management’s Board of Approved Treatment providers, and I have 12 years of direct experience working with this difficult and expensive population. The services I provide are cheaper than sending a juvenile to Big Muddy or to a residential treatment facility. Despite the savings that my colleagues and I provide the county, we are on the chopping block to close a budget gap.

The County Board believes the best way to close the budget gap is to lay off 29 of my coworkers. Of these 29 dedicated officer, at least two work with me in the Juvenile Sex Offender Unit. Laying off those two workers will at least double my work load. Laying off front line workers, something that President Preckwinkle stated she will not do, will directly cut the services to Cook County’s most vulnerable residents. Within 30 days, instead of providing direct service to the residents of the South Side, I may be limited to coordinating services for a much larger neighborhood. In short, I will have to attempt to find other low-cost Sex Specific Treatment Providers on Chicago’s South Side.

To be blunt, Mr. Commissioner, I am the only low-cost treatment provider on the Management Board’s list in your neighborhood.

Instead of fixing the budget gap by eliminating waste in the forest preserve, within management or with the FIVE IT departments in Cook County (Chief Judge, State’s Attorney, Public Defender, Office of the President, Cook County Clerk), you are targeting the people who rely on services.

Why are you cutting Services, Mr. Beavers? The argument we have heard was that AFSCME refuses to negotiate. As a member of the Bargaining Committee, I can assure you that we have come to the table in good faith. We want a contract–a contract that is years past due–to ensure that our rights as workers are protected. Instead, you want to close the budget gap by directly eliminating county services, in this case necessary mental health and law enforcement. Your actions in this case will make the your neighborhood less safe.

Mr. Beavers, I urge you to work with AFSCME to create a budget that is fair to the people of Cook County. Do not balance your budget by cutting services to the people who need them the most.

Sincerely,

Marty Gleason

PS: I would mail this do you directly, but you don’t have an email address on your Commissioner page or your campaign site.

An Open Letter to My Commissioner, Jesus Garcia

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Mr. Garcia:

You don’t know me, but I am a resident in your district. I am also a Cook County Juvenile Probation Officer. For the past Eleven years, I have been blessed to serve the families of Cook County on Chicago’s far south side. I cover neighborhoods where Chicago’s Finest refuse to go without a partner, a gun and a bullet proof vest. I work these same neighborhoods, sometimes well into the night, by myself. I am not complaining. I love my job. But by the end of this week, you and your colleagues want to remove my job for political reasons.

I should mention one additional fact about my job: I provide supervision, case management and treatment to juveniles who have committed sexually aggressive behaviors. I’m on the Illinois Sex Offender Management’s Board of Approved Treatment providers, and I have 12 years of direct experience working with this difficult and expensive population. The services I provide are cheaper than sending a juvenile to Big Muddy or to a residential treatment facility. And these services will be cut due to the County Board’s insistence on Layoffs.

The County Board believes the best way to close the budget gap is to lay off 29 of my coworkers. Of these 29 dedicated officer, at least two work with me in the Juvenile Sex Offender Unit. Laying off those two workers will at least double my work load. Laying off front line workers, something that President Preckwinkle stated she will not do, will directly cut the services to Cook County’s most vulnerable residents. Within 30 days, instead of providing direct service to the residents of the South Side, I may be limited to coordinating services for a much larger neighborhood. In short, I will have to attempt to find other low-cost Sex Specific Treatment Providers on Chicago’s South Side.

To be blunt, Mr. Commissioner, I am the only low-cost treatment provider on the Management Board’s list in those neighborhoods.

Instead of fixing the budget gap by eliminating waste in the forest preserve, within management or with the FIVE IT departments in Cook County (Chief Judge, State’s Attorney, Public Defender, Office of the President, Cook County Clerk), you are targeting the people who rely on services.

Why are you cutting Services, Mr. Garcia? The argument we have heard was that AFSCME refuses to negotiate. As a member of the Bargaining Committee, I can assure you that we have come to the table in good faith. We want a contract–a contract that is years past due–to ensure that our rights as workers are protected. Instead, you want to close the budget gap by directly eliminating county services, in this case necessary mental health and law enforcement. Your actions in this case will make the South Side less safe.

Mr. Garcia, I urge you to work with AFSCME to create a budget that is fair to the people of Cook County. Do not balance your budget by cutting services to the people who need them the most.

Sincerely,

Marty Gleason

PS: I would mail this do you directly, but you don’t have an email address on your Commissioner page or your campaign site.

Homonym Failure

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Last week I attended a training on the Court’s new “Core Values.” I CARE. Integrity, Compassion, Accountablity, Respect, Empowerment. We’re clever here, aren’t we?

We went over the values, ideals, qualities and principles that have intrinsic worth as well as what we, as individuals, value. See the problem here?>

This, my friend, was a bit more confusing than our trainers intended. Overall the training was fantastic. Using words and pictures cut out of magazines, we ranked our most important values. I cheated by using pictures that could represent multiple values. I thought I was extremely clever–then I realized how ugly my Values Art was. Sadly, it won’t scan properly, so I can’t prove just how little I get Aesthetics.

The training did help me realize what the mission of the court is, and how little we follow through with it on a consistent basis. Compassion we have, and the management is big on accountability for line staff, but empowerment? I suggested this word to the planning committee because I feel our end goal is to empower parents to work with their children, to empower our clients to move past their criminal behaviors and to empower line staff to continue to develop.

The court tries to hold people accountable, but, in the end, it is just punitive. Accountability implies that one will be able to make amends for screwing up. We have made our system so overly complex that accountability isn’t necessarily the outcome. What we do is punish. Punishment does not always work, nor is it the most effective ways of educating kid.

We can’t punish management for not following through with the mission, or the values, of the court. We can hold them, and everyone else interested in working with children, accountable for favoring punishment over more effective methods.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a trivia competition to win.

Your Taxes At Work

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Here at County, we don’t waste your money. Oh no. We skimp on services and infrastructure to make sure that your government is as incompetent as possible–just like you want it.

1) We make sure to buy pens in bulk. These pens don’t work, of course, because documenting our interventions with clients can be addressed in a much simpler fashion: by sending them to detention.

2) Our Voice Mail system is top notch! Why? Because our phones just don’t work. Second generation touch-tone phones that have poor jacks, shoddy handset cables and no volume control. These phones ensure that your important, immediate call will go right to voice mail.

3) Computers. All Probation officers have access to cutting edge 1999 computers or Thin Clients. Rest assured that if the county gets a grant to equip multi-tasking, specialized service units with laptops, we’ll divert the grant money to make sure our REALLY valuable units get them.

4) Bathrooms. Our restroom facilities are the envy of the third world. They may be filthy, without soap or toilet tissue, but they are connected to the sewer grid. We make sure that no county employee would waste time emptying bowels or bladders for fear of MRSA infections

Cook County: Don’t call us. Seriously, don’t call us. We don’t have a working phone and I don’t want you wasting my minutes.

update: lrn2spelnub